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Five days ago, a journalist publicly called out Blake Lively for an interview, which she claims to be “the most uncomfortable interview situation” she’s ever experienced. Reporter Kjersti Flaa shared her “nightmare” interview that made her want to quit her job on the internet, and the clip inevitably did huge numbers and went viral, especially since the Gossip Girl actress is at the centre of the disastrous movie promotions of her latest film, It Ends With Us.
Further posing the question in the caption if it’s “not ok to congratulate someone on their pregnancy or to ask another woman about costumes she is wearing in a film,” Flaa hit the publish button on YouTube and gained quite the attention online. This 2016 interview from the time Lively was promoting the Woody Allen directorial Cafe Society resurfaced at a time when the Gossip Girl star is facing flak and accusations for glamourising the “tone deaf” promotions schedule of a movie that finds the sombre theme of domestic violence at its centre.
Both Lively and the original book’s author, Colleen Hoover, have faced unforgiving blowback for projecting the film’s image as a romantic saga and refraining from discussing its serious undertones. Meanwhile, the film’s marketing has also attracted more eyeballs than the movie itself has, with an apparent feud brewing between Lively and her co-star Justin Baldoni, who also directed It Ends With Us.
What’s the new controversy about?
While a significant number of fans were initially #TeamBlake, an army of netizens shortly jumped on her hate train, with the re-emergence of this 2016 and other more recent interviews, in which Lively is seemingly caught slamming down the seriousness of the conversation around it. However, a new development has seen someone close to coming to her rescue.
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As comments like “Never thought I’d start to dislike Blake Lively of all people” found new momentum on social media,” a source close to the actress has rubbished all claims of Lively and her then-costar Parker Posey snubbing Kjersti Flaa during the 2016 interview.
The resurfaced clip shows Flaa congratulating Blake on her “little bump” as the interview was filmed when the Cafe Society actress was pregnant with her and Ryan Reynolds’ daughter Inez. She immediately responds to Flaa’s comment, “Congrats on your little bump.”
Posey also quipped about her “bump,” as the conversation soon got restricted to one side of the camera with Parker and Blake turning the whole thing into a tet-a-tet about “lovely lady lumps” between each other. After their side chat, Posey redirected the focus back to the movie, asking the reporter, “You like the movie or a you a Woody Allen fan?”
Flaa dug into the film’s “visually amazing” aspect, threading her next question into the conversation: “Did you guys love wearing those clothes?”
“Everyone wants to talk about the clothes, but I wonder if they would ask the men about the clothes,” Lively shot back at Flaa, who then responded, “I would.” Without looking back at Flaa, Lively focussed her gaze on her costar and continued talking about the topic. “It’s not just the women that have the clothes, but I feel like the women get the conversation.”
Source close to Blake Lively defends her amid interview backlash
A source close to the actress recently told PEOPLE that while they haven’t talked to her about the 2016 interview, they see eye to eye with her reaction. “You’re a female journalist in Hollywood interviewing a working mom, and you can’t come up with anything better to kick off the interview with than ‘Congrats on your little bump?’ Of course Blake got annoyed,” they said.
Slamming it as a “rude statement,” the source added, “She is pregnant with a child… If you feel the need to acknowledge that she’s pregnant, at least do it respectfully.”
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Although many people clearly warmly responded to Flaa, as hinted by her Instagram Story on Wednesday, which read: “Thank you to all you wonderful people out there who have sent me so many messages with support after I posted this interview. I am truly touched,” some also jumped into question why such an old interview was being brought up now.
Even though many people still support the actress on the internet, many others can’t seem to agree with her marketing campaign style for this movie. However, the issue especially blew out of proportion when mentions of Blake and Ryan’s controversial wedding venue again flashed on social media. The couple hosted their lavish wedding and reception at the Boone Hall Plantation in South Carolina in 2012, which had its own slave-holding past. Reynolds later apologised for what was “impossible to reconcile.”
“What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. What we saw after was a place built upon devastating tragedy,” he added in an interview.
Blake Lively takes the heat for another more recent interview
While discussions about the 2016 interview were still up for debate, another interaction took centre stage. Alongside her It Ends With Us costar Brandon Sklenar, Lively sat down for a chat with Emmy-winning reporter Jake Hamilton, giving fans “a major ick.”
The video sees Hamilton highlighting how people who related to her It Ends With Us character’s story could to talk to her if they saw her in person. Nevertheless, Lively instantly took a different route to answer the serious question, which didn’t sit well with many netizens.
“For people who see this movie and relate to the topics of this movie on a deeply personal level, they’re really going to want to talk to you,” Hamilton said.
“The movie is going to affect people and they’re going to want to tell you about their life.
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“So if someone understands the themes of this movie and comes across you in public and they want to really talk to you, what’s the best way for them to be able to talk to you about this? How would you recommend they go about it?”
Instead of addressing the question at hand, Blake channelled a more joking tone and remarked, “Ask for my address or my phone number.”
“Or I could just share my location with you and then we could…”
Although she trailed off after that, she did dig into the heavy implications of people being a part of a toxic relationship. “The story is told with such empathy that I feel like this movie can be healing,” she said eventually.
“‘It can be a cautionary tale and it can be inspiring. The movie itself and Colleen’s work itself does that work.
“If anyone ever comes up to you and says that your work meant something to them outside of just having that collective experience in a theatre where you laugh and cry and feel together, what a blessing. The fact that we get to do this and it gets to mean something is significant,” she added.
However, the damage had already been done. An X user shared the exchange online, captioning it, “A major ick. Finally seeing who Blake Lively is an individual and it’s ugly. She might as well have said not to go up to her or talk to her. Brandon looks so uncomfortable.”
Someone else commented on the post, “Blake Lively literally embodied her role from Gossip Girl and never moved on. The way she acts like a girl’s girl but is SILENT on the plight (THE FOCUS OF HER MOVIE) of women who are in unfortunate situations.”
Meanwhile, others again drew upon reminders of her getting married on an old plantation.
A third person wrote, “Appalled at how she turned a deep, personal, serious question into a joke.”
On the contrary, some others sided with her for setting “clear boundaries,” as users also pointed out that she was neither a therapist nor “your friend” with whom to engage in such personal conversations directly.
