It Ends With Us author Colleen Hoover is opening up about how she feels about the ongoing legal battle between the movie adaptation’s stars, Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni.
In a new interview with Elle, Hoover says, “It feels like a circus. When there are real people involved, with real feelings and emotions. This actually truly has impacted some of the actors’ careers in huge ways. And I just find it all around sad.”
She says that even though she has her own story to tell, she’d rather “stay removed from the negativity.”
But she does admit that the controversy that followed the film has tainted the way she views her novel.
“I can’t even recommend it anymore,” she tells Elle. “I feel like [the lawsuit] has overshadowed it. I’m almost embarrassed to say I wrote it. When people ask what I do, I’m just like, ‘I’m a writer. Please don’t ask me what I wrote.'”
Hoover’s most recent film adaptation, Regretting You, is in theaters now. That will be followed by adaptations for Reminders of Him and Verity in 2026.
On Nov. 3 a federal judge formally ended Baldoni’s $400 million counterclaim against Lively. Baldoni and Lively have been locked in a bitter legal dispute since December 2024, when Lively filed a complaint against Baldoni with the California Civil Rights Department, accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of the film, which he also directed.
Lively’s case against Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios is still expected to go to trial in March 2026.
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