Justin Baldoni’s body double in It Ends With Us, Thomas Canestraro, has spoken out about his experiences on set. His comments come in the throes of the legal battle between the film’s two stars, Baldoni and Blake Lively, who have filed lawsuits against one another and are due to meet in court next March.

In December, Lively accused Baldoni of sexually harassing her on the set of the Colleen Hoover adaptation and of launching a calculated smear campaign against her during the press run. Baldoni countersued in January for $400 million (£296m), alleging defamation, false light invasion of privacy and extortion, not just against Lively but her husband Ryan Reynolds too.

Since then, matters between both parties have only worsened. Baldoni has published his lawsuit online to make it available for the public to read, including alleged text messages between him and Lively during production, while Lively has spoken out about the case in interviews and described the past year as full of ‘the highest highs’ and ‘the lowest lows’ of her life.

‘You could tell that the set was tense,’ Canestraro told The Daily Mail. ‘There was some discomfort from everybody.’ The actor and boxer told the publication that shooting took ‘longer than expected’, prompting him to wonder, ‘what’s happening here? Why are we taking so much time to film all of this scene? Why are we not on schedule?’.

Canestraro revealed he has worked with Lively before on A Simple Favour in 2018 and had ‘an extremely easy time’ on set with her. During It Ends With Us, however, he said she appeared ‘more closed off’. The body double added, ‘It makes sense that she would be closed off given her allegations.’

Despite his remarks, Canestraro explained that he doesn’t ‘want to be on any team’ when it comes to siding with Lively or Baldoni, and ‘hopes they can find an agreement’.

‘We don’t need that in the industry,’ he went on. ‘At the same time, you can’t discredit anybody’s feelings, and anybody’s experience.’

Canestraro is not the first person to comment on the legal dispute. Last month, Baldoni’s co-star from Jane the Virgin, Brett Dier, shared his support for the actor in an interview for Fan Mail newsletter. He admitted he gets asked about Baldoni’s legal case ‘a lot’ and called it a ‘really intense situation’.

‘I probably shouldn’t say much, but I’ll say this: I always loved Justin,’ Dier said. ‘He’s always been an amazing friend to me.’ Adding that he’s ‘just hoping everything resolves in time’.

When Lively first filed her lawsuit, Hoover, the author of It Ends With Us spoke out to offer her support. ‘@Blakelively you have been nothing but honest, kind, supportive and patient since the day we met,’ she wrote on Instagram. ‘Thank you for being exactly the human that you are. Never change. Never wilt.’ However, the following month Hoover deactivated her Instagram, reportedly in response to the barrage of questions and commentary she was receiving about her stance on the saga.

Jenny Slate, who played Baldoni’s sister in It Ends With Us, also offered Lively her support when her lawsuit was filed. ‘As Blake Lively’s cast mate and friend, I voice my support as she takes action against those reported to have planned and carried out an attack on her reputation.’

‘Blake is a leader, loyal friend and a trusted source of emotional support for me and so many who know and love her,’ she added. ‘What has been revealed about the attack on Blake is terribly dark, disturbing and wholly threatening. I commend my friend, I admire her bravery, and I stand by her side.’

Since Baldoni’s counterclaim, however, the situation seems too complicated for anyone to draw conclusions. Many people are choosing not to comment at all and one such person is Lively’s close friend, Taylor Swift, whose name was brought into the drama through Baldoni’s lawsuit. He alleged that Lively leveraged the influence of her ‘mega celebrity friend’, widely thought to be Swift, to push her edits of a scene in the film.

Baldoni’s legal team issued Swift a subpoena in an attempt to obtain messages between lawyers representing Lively and the singer, but it was dropped after Swift’s legal team objected that the order was an ‘unwarranted fishing expedition’.

A representative for Swift said she ‘never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, [and] she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film’. They added the singer did not even watch It Ends With Us until ‘weeks after its release’ and the subpoena was ‘designed to use Taylor Swift’s name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case’.

It is a complex legal situation and anyone putting their head above the parapet is brave to do so. As for Lively and Baldoni’s own testimonies, we will have to wait until the case heads to trial in March 2026.