Actor and director Justin Baldoni is suing the New York Times for libel and fraud for its story on his co-star Blake Lively allegations of sexual harassment on the set of the ‘It Ends with Us’.

Baldoni has accused the newspaper of working with Lively to damage his reputation by publishing information to support her version of events on the set.

Both Lively and Baldoni starred as the lead actors and directors in the 2024 movie It Ends with Us, which was based on a Colleen Hoover novel.

Lively filed a civil lawsuit in New York on Tuesday in which she accused Baldoni, and of sexual harassment and initiating a scheme to “destroy” her reputation.

It was noted in the US legal filings that Lively, through this complaint, seeks to set the record straight and to “shine a light on this new form of retaliation so that it will not be used against any others who seek to stand up and speak out against sexual harassment”.

Back in December she filed a legal complaint with the California Civil Rights Department, where the New York Times published a 4,000-word article containing the contents from that complaint.

Now Baldoni is suing the newspaper over this article titled ‘‘We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine‘.

As revealed by the New York Times he is seeking $250m in damages from the newspaper as he accused the media outlet of uncritically accepting a “self-serving narrative” by Lively.

It was also noted that he accused the paper of deliberately omitted portions of text exchanges and other information in that December article that contradicted Lively’s version of events.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the New York Times said: “We plan to vigorously defend against the lawsuit.”

“The role of an independent news organisation is to follow the facts where they lead. Our story was meticulously and responsibly reported. It was based on a review of thousands of pages of original documents, including the text messages and emails,” they added.