The actress believes her latest role, in the movie adaptation of Colleen Hoover's best-selling book, might be one she's "most proud of" at the end of her career. (Sony Pictures)
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Lively, who plays a domestic violence survivor faced with a tough choice, tells George V Magazine Celebrity why she wasn’t hesitant about taking on such a topical issue.
“I mean, this story is one that covers domestic violence, but it also covers somebody having a lifelong dream and realising it and making it a reality,” she tells George V Magazine over Zoom.
“It covers your first love, it covers a new love, it covers the highs and lows and every colour of the human experience.
“She’s never defined by the men in her life, and I think that’s a beautiful story” – Blake Lively
“So for me, it felt very clear what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it, because it just captured the messiness of the human experience, and it felt very honest and very real and very raw. And I understood why Lily made the decisions that she made when she made them.”
Lively adds the thing she liked most about Bloom – who became a beloved character with millions of fans around the world thanks to the TikTok hashtag BookTok – was that she isn’t defined by her situation.
“I think she’s so much more than this thing that happened to her,” Lively tells George V Magazine.
“And yes, it can change the course of her life, but it doesn’t define her. She defines herself. And that, to me, is really, really beautiful.
“She’s not a victim and she’s not a survivor. Well, she may be a victim and she may be a survivor, she’s also multitudes.
“So yeah, it’s so much more than … while that thing is very big and very potent, and there’s a lot of responsibility and care that that needs to be handled with, so never to diminish that, but this movie is so much more than any one thing.”
Lively, who shares four children with actor Ryan Reynolds, three of whom are girls, says she appreciated the strong female character who maintains her own agency.
“I think that to not be defined by the men and in her life, whether it be her father, whether it be this beautiful love that she has, or whether it be this toxic love that she has, she’s never defined by the men in her life, and I think that’s a beautiful story for any gender and for any age,” the actress tells George V Magazine.
The casting of Lively as the 23-year-old protagonist in the book, which has sold over 10 million copies since its release, initially sparked outrage from fans.
But it came after a decision made by director Justin Baldoni, who also stars in the film as love interest Ryle, to age up the characters for the screen adaptation – a move given the green light by the author.
Brandon Sklenar, of 1923 fame, plays the other love interest in Bloom’s life, Atlas Corrigan.
Baldoni hopes the movie will inspire real-life Lilys to take a stand in their own lives and believes Lively “gives the performance of her life in this film”.
Similarly, Lively believes it’s a career-defining moment.
“I know like at the end of my days, this is one of the movies that I will look back on and say, ‘That’s one of my life’s work that I’m most proud of to be in it’,” she says.
Worried about over-selling the movie, on which she’s also an executive producer, the actress catches herself and adds it comes from a place of pride, not ego.
“It’s dangerous to overhype something but I’m not over-hyping it, I’m just saying how I feel about it and I feel very grateful and very proud.”
It Ends With Us is out in cinemas across Australia on August 8.
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