Justin Baldoni On ‘It Ends With Us’ And His Journey With Masculinity

For many, Justin Baldoni is perhaps best known so far in his career for his five memorable seasons on the beloved television series Jane the Virgin, but over the past few years, Baldoni has been very busy expanding upon his opportunities in Hollywood, leading with a desire to tell stories that have a lasting impact on audiences from all walks of life.

He has even stepped behind the camera, directing two feature films in recent years – 2019’s Five Feet Apart, which had a theatrical release, and 2020’s Clouds, which became Disney’s first acquisition for Disney Plus with his co-founded independent production studio, Wayfarer Studios.

Being also Chairman at Wayfarer, Baldoni’s latest passion project, It Ends With Us, is now playing up on the big screen. Based on the bestselling book by Colleen Hoover, Baldoni had a pivotal hand in what he says has been a five-year film adaptation process – from it being developed at Wayfarer, choosing to team up with Sony, becoming the film’s director and ultimately acting alongside Blake Lively as main character Lily Bloom’s complicated love interest, Ryle Kincaid.

So, how did Baldoni handle juggling his many responsibilities during the It Ends With Us filmmaking process, specifically having to be both the director and an actor, often times simultaneously?

“It’s very tricky,” Baldoni told me during my recent visit t0 his Wayfarer Studios office in Beverly Hills, California. “So much of that work is done before you start production. A lot of it was character work and figuring out who Ryle was and how to live in that body, so that I was able to put that away and then focus on the directing on the day. So, once ‘Action!’ was called, I could go into that part of me where he was living. I wouldn’t have to create this whole character – that was really important. The other thing is I love collaboration, so I’m a director that loves to know how something lands with the people around me. I believe that art needs to be expressed collaboratively.”

As for working alongside Lively, not only as an on-screen scene partner, but with her being a producer on the project, Baldoni said of Lively, “She’s a creative force and she has got really good ideas. She had the ability to see things at some points that I couldn’t see. Always the best idea wins – always – I think that’s the way great art is created. She touched every aspect of this production when she came onboard and I genuinely believe she made every aspect better.”

He went on to praise his other It Ends With Us co-stars, including Jenny Slate, who plays his on-screen sister, Alyssa, saying of Slate’s character and performance, “Her purpose was not comic relief – it was lightness and levity. She was such a brilliant creative. She just knocked it out of the park.”

Baldoni also spoke highly of actor Brandon Sklenar, who plays Atlas, Lily’s first love, who pops up in her life again years later. He said of Sklenar, “He was so brilliant and so good. One of the first things we shot was the ending of the movie, when he tells her he loves her. I just remember looking around and everybody was just like in tears – just blown away. Their chemistry was through the roof. He has got a stillness to him that is really rare as an actor and a presence, and he’s hilarious. It was such a dream directing him because he took direction so well and he was just so willing to try anything. I’m just so excited for whatever this movie is going to do for him.”

In this beloved book-turned-film, the character of Ryle seems so collected and confident on the exterior, yet is quietly not dealing with past trauma, which in turn, makes him lash out in ways that hurt those closest to him.

In reality, Baldoni has spent the last few years speaking very openly about his own spiritual and emotional journey, to address what masculinity does mean within our modern society and how we all can better support one another moving forward. In 2021, Baldoni wrote and published his book Man Enough and also started The Man Enough Podcast that same year with his Wayfarer team.

Baldoni said, “As it relates to my work with masculinity, there are so many men walking away with unhealed wounds that don’t realize that they are hurting so badly, that they are hurting the people they love most. I had to find the ways that I could relate to that and relate to him – and as somebody who is healing my own traumas, I have been doing very serious work for years.”

As for how his work benefitted how he better approached his portrayal as Ryle on-screen, Baldoni said, “It allowed me to play a character, not as a villain, but as somebody in pain, because I want men who have maybe gone through traumas, that they don’t think were traumas, to see what happens when you make a particular choice – the choices that Ryle made and how deeply that can hurt everybody and themselves. Maybe after seeing the movie, they make a different choice.”

As I concluded my conversation with Baldoni, I asked this ever-evolving man and creative professional what he would say to Ryle, after playing him in It Ends With Us, if only he could.

Baldoni said, “In relation to what happened to him as a young boy, I would say, It’s not your fault. I would say, if I had a chance to talk to him now after the movie, I’d say, Do the work. There is nothing more important – do the work.”