Amber Heard reacts to the alleged Blake Lively smear campaign

Amber Heard sees some similarities between her story and Blake Livelypp.

Lively, 37, filed a lawsuit against her ex It ends with us costars Justin Baldoni Friday, December 20, accusing him of sexual harassment and orchestrates a smear campaign to damage her reputation. One of Baldoni’s publicists Melissa Nathan — who represented Johnny Depp during his and Heard’s 2022 defamation trial — is also named in the lawsuit.

Heard, 38, responded to the legal filing in a statement shared with NBC News Monday, December 23.

“Social media is the absolute personification of the classic saying, ‘A lie travels halfway around the world before the truth can catch up,’” Heard said. “I saw this up close. It’s as terrifying as it is destructive.”

Family: Breaking Down Blake Lively’s Allegations Against Justin Baldoni

Months after a reported rift between It Ends With Us costar Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, she sued him for sexual harassment. In the lawsuit, which was filed Friday, Dec. 20 and obtained by Us Weekly after it was reported by TMZ and The New York Times, Lively accused Baldoni of launching a (…)

Depp, 61, took legal action against Heard after she identified herself as a victim of domestic violence in 2018 Washington Post op-ed. Although Heard did not mention Depp by name in the article, he claimed that her allegations of violence damaged his reputation and career. The former couple were married between 2015 and 2017.

A jury sided with Depp in June 2022, awarding him $15 million in damages. Heard has previously spoken out about how social media coverage of the highly publicized trial affected public opinion of her.

“Even someone who is sure I deserve all this hate and vitriol, even if you think I’m lying, you still couldn’t tell me – look me in the eye and tell me – that you believe social media has been a fair representation,” she said during a June 2022 interview with Today’s Savannah Guthrie. “You can’t say you think this has been fair.”

Lively claimed in her legal filing that Baldoni, 40, hired a crisis communications team that included Nathan to stage a “social manipulation” campaign to damage her reputation amid reports of drama between the pair on the set of It ends with uswhich went to cinemas in August.

Family: Blake Lively claims Justin Baldoni has been texting her about ruining her reputation

Blake Lively claims it’s over with us director and director Justin Baldoni allegedly conducted a “social manipulation” campaign to damage her reputation. News broke on Saturday, December 21 that Lively, 37, sued Baldoni, 40, for sexual harassment. According to The New York Times, the lawsuit – which was filed on Friday, December 20 – (…)

Per New York Timesthe lawsuit included “thousands of pages of text messages and emails” that Lively obtained through a subpoena. In a message allegedly sent on August 2, a publicist who works with Baldoni wrote to a crisis management expert: “He wants to feel like she can be buried.”

The text messages are said to show that the crisis PR team worked to prevent stories about Baldoni’s behavior and increase negative stories about Lively. Per it NEW, Jed Wallaces digital strategy reinforced social media posts that supported their story.

“We’re crushing it on Reddit,” Wallace allegedly texted.

Lively also claimed in the legal filing that a meeting was held to address her claims that there was a “hostile work environment” on the set of It ends with us. Some of her demands for the meeting were “no more showing Blake nude videos or pictures of women, no more mention of Baldoni’s alleged past ‘pornography addiction’, no more discussion of sexual conquests in front of Blake and others, no more mention of the cast and crew’s genitalia , no more inquiries about Blake’s weight and no further mention of Blake’s dead father.”

In a statement to NEW Lively said of the lawsuit, “I hope my legal action will help pull back the curtain on these sinister retaliatory tactics to hurt people who speak out about wrongdoing and help protect others who may be targeted.”

Baldoni’s lawyer Bryan Freedman slammed Lively’s “completely false, outrageous and intentionally brazen” allegations in a statement shared with Us Weeklyand claimed that the actress filed the lawsuit to “fix her negative reputation” and “rehash a story” about the film’s production.

Family: Taylor Swift is mentioned in Justin Baldoni’s alleged Blake Lively Takedown Plan

(Photo by Emma McIntyre/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management) Justin Baldoni’s crisis management team mentioned Taylor Swift in his alleged plan to take down Blake Lively. Lively, 37, filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Baldoni, 40, on Friday, December 20, and her allegations against him, including creating a “hostile work environment” and causing the actress (…)

Freedman further claimed that Lively made “several demands and threats” while he was filming It ends with usincluding “threatening not to show up for the shoot, threatening not to promote the film, ultimately leading to it disappearing during release, if her demands were not met.”

In the wake of the bomb trial, several of Lively’s co-workers have expressed their support for her. A simple service director Paul Feig shared a statement via X on Sunday 22 December.

“I have now made two films with Blake and all I can say is that she is one of the most professional, creative, collaborative, talented and kind people I have ever worked with,” he wrote. “She really didn’t deserve any of this smear campaign against her. I think it’s terrible that she was subjected to this.”

Colleen Hooverwho wrote the novel of the same name that inspired It ends with usalso have Lively stood to the side.

“Blake Lively, you have been nothing but honest, kind, supportive and patient since the day we met,” Hoover, 45, wrote via Instagram on Saturday, Dec. 21. “Thank you for being exactly the person you are. Never change. Never fade.”