Blake Lively won’t be canceled, not if Taylor Swift can help it.
The pop mega-star hosted a 37th birthday bash for her good friend Lively at her Rhode Island estate over the weekend, the Daily Mail reported. Very conveniently for this apparent reputation-laundering exercise, paparazzi were able to capture photos of the embattled “Gossip Girl” star on the balcony of Swift’s seaside mansion with at least two of her four children with Ryan Reynolds.
Other photos showed Reynolds at the A-list gathering, along with some of Swift’s other famous, beautiful friends: Bradley Cooper and his supermodel girlfriend, Gigi Hadid, and Travis Kelce’s Kansas City Chiefs teammate Patrick Mahomes and his wife, Brittany Mahomes, the Daily Mail reported.
So, in the protected, rarefied bubble of Swift’s Rhode Island estate, Lively is still beloved and celebrated. But that hasn’t been the case outside of this bubble.
Lively has become the star of a new cautionary tale about a celebrity’s stunning fall from grace. The actor, producer, lifestyle entrepreneur and fashion influencer has sustained weeks of backlash over her public persona and her actions related to the production and promotion of her new film, “It Ends With Us.”
While the movie was a box-office hit, Lively has not been faring so well, with a source telling the Daily Mail that she’s “fearing” for her career and thinking she may need to take “a step back” to “reassess her future.”
“She thought this was her moment to shine but is now looking at it like the end of her career,” the source told the Daily Mail. “She’s fearing no one will want to work with her after this.”
The backlash began in the lead-up to the movie’s Aug. 6 release. Reports began emerging that she had an on-set feud with Justin Baldoni, the film’s director and her co-star. People began taking sides over who was to blame, as the tensions between the two became apparent when she didn’t allow him to join her and other cast members in any interviews or in any red-carpet photo ops for the film.
But attention soon turned to Lively’s marketing efforts on behalf of the movie. This attention resulted in another cascade of online gossip and reports about her being annoying, rude, insensitive or imperious over the course of her career. Much of the criticism stemmed from her “tone deaf” choice to publicly downplay the film’s serious narrative about her character, Lily Bloom, being abused by her husband. The film is an adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s best-selling dark romance about domestic violence.
Lively has been ripped on social media for doing interviews and social media posts that promote the film as if it’s a rom-com about a beautiful florist shop owner having to choose between two hot guys, or as if it’s a bubbly, “Barbie”-style story about fashion and a woman’s journey of self-discovery. In one of the most objectionable promotional pieces for the film, Lively was seen in a TikTok video, encouraging female fans to turn an outing to the movie as a fun, female-bonding activity. She declares, “Grab your friends, wear your florals and head out to see it.”
Further backlash erupted over Lively trying to “cross-promote” the film with plugs for her skin-care line or her brands of non-alcoholic and alcoholic drinks, as well as Reynolds’ brand of Aviation gin. Advocates of domestic violence survivors pointed out the link between alcohol abuse and intimate partner abuse.
Swift was out of the country for the initial backlash against her friend, as she was finishing the European leg of her Eras Tour. But she recently returned to the United States and headed to her estate in Rhode Island to spend quality time with her boyfriend, Kelce, and with her good friends. And, as she’s back in the United States, the singer appears eager to show her support for Lively.
Swift has shown such solidarity for embattled friends in the past, most notably Sophie Turner in the fall of 2023.
Shortly after Turner’s husband Joe Jonas filed for divorce in early September 2023, his “people” appeared to leak negative stories about the British “Game of Thrones” star being an irresponsible or absentee young mother. The leaks came as it looked as though a nasty, transatlantic custody battle over Turner and Jonas’s two young daughters was heating up.
Swift, who had her own reportedly unpleasant history of dating Jonas, immediately brought Turner into her fold and displayed her support by letting the actor stay in her New York home and by inviting her along to women-power dinner dates in Manhattan and to join her in her VIP suite at Kelce’s Chiefs games.
Swift’s legion of fans unleashed their social media wrath on Jonas, which helped turn the narrative around positively towards Turner. But Swift and the Swifties may have a more difficult challenge in making Lively likable again. That’s largely because the damage to the actor’s reputation was largely self-inflicted and based on her own statements and actions over the years, including her choice to marry Reynolds on a former slave plantation in South Carolina and to start of lifestyle brand that celebrated features of the antebellum South.
But, of course, one should never underestimate the power of the media-savvy Swift to shape a narrative, whether it’s about herself, the current state of American culture and politics, or an embattled celebrity friend.
