Justin Baldoni revealed ‘mental health’ struggle one month before war with It Ends With Us costar Blake Lively began.

Justin Baldoni talked about feeling ‘stressed’ in an interview released on Monday.

His chat on the Gent’s Talk podcast, hosted by Samir Mourani, was recorded in November and is only now seeing the light of day.

The interview is important because it took place just before he entered his vicious legal battle with It Ends With Us co-star Blake Lively.

The 41-year-old star, who also directed It Ends with Us, said in the teaser released last week that he had experienced an ‘intense’ 2024.

In the full interview, released on Monday, he goes deeper. Justin said that he was so ‘anxious’ about a problem that he was worried about his ‘mental health’ and he noted that he was ‘exhausted’ and the ’emotional stress’ was getting the better of him and his family.

All in all, he came off as very on edge and he even wiped away a tear.

The star used words like he was not ‘in the best place’ and need time to recover from something. He also said, ‘You don’t have to be perfect to be loved.’

One month after he gave the interview, Blake filed civil rights complaint followed by a lawsuit against Baldoni for his alleged sexual harassment and smear campaign against her.

During the podcast, he appeared to be alluding to their behind-the-scenes power struggle and creative differences with Lively.

‘I haven’t talked about this yet,’ he told Mourani as footage panned to him rubbing his eyes while seemingly trying not to cry.

At one point, Baldoni also revealed he ‘sent a text message’ earlier that morning that left him with ‘anxiety.’

The exact topic of the interview was not revealed, but the Gent’s Talk podcast usually focuses on difficult conversations around topics like relationships and mental health.

Lively alleged he improvised unwanted kisses while filming and spoke to her frequently about his past sexual encounters and pornography addiction.

Last week, Lively and her husband, Ryan Reynolds, raised new allegations in their hotly contested case against Baldoni in court on Monday.

Baldoni’s attorney, Bryan Freedman, pleaded with the judge to move the case forward as quickly as possible because his client was ‘suffering greatly.’

Lively’s lawyer Michael Gottlieb, however, vehemently denied the claim that Lively was purposely dragging her heels in the lawsuit.

Judge Lewis Liman denied a move from Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds to gag Team Baldoni following the series of bombshell claims made by his legal team.

But Gottlieb said they intend to hit Baldoni with fresh allegations in Lively’s sexual harassment case, and insisted that protecting the couple’s celebrity friends was going to be ‘very important.’

Last week, Baldoni updated his own complaint in his $400 million defamation case against the Gossip Girl star which accused Lively of giving The New York Times advanced access to her complaint of sexual harassment during the filming of the movie It Ends With Us.

Gottlieb attacked Freedman for making statements outside of court which had challenged the ‘character, integrity and truthfulness’ of Lively.

After complaining, Lively’s lawyers were told was that ‘we (Lively) started it’ with the New York Times article, Gottlieb said.

Gottlieb cited an interview in People magazine in which Freedman accused Lively of a ‘pattern of bullying.’

In another statement Freedman claimed that if Lively really was sexually harassed she wouldn’t have returned to the film.

A skeptical Judge Liman said: ‘isn’t that what’s stated in his complaint?’

Gottlieb said no and that lawyers were ‘not supposed to launch attacks on another party’s character’.

He added that the leaking of raw footage from It Ends With Us was ‘particularly concerning’ because it could start an ‘arms race’ whereby lawyers have to appear in the media to fire back at every disclosure.

‘If there’s no guard rails in place….we (the attorneys) have to and go out on shows arguing on shows what a particular document or video means’.

Freedman fired back that the statements had ‘not been a one way street’ and tried to walk the court through a number made by Lively’s lawyers.

After listening to them, Judge Liman said Freedman ‘went a little bit further’ than Lively’s lawyers.

The judge said that he was adopting rules for lawyers known as Rule 3.6 which bars both of them from making extrajudicial statements that could influence the jury.

Judge Liman said he was ‘hesitant to adopt it’ but after both sides agreed to it, he changed his mind.

He said: ‘My expectation is the parties will comply with their ethical obligations. I don’t expect this case to devolve into satellite litigation over the comments of a lawyer.

‘Both have said a lot in the pleadings that give the public plenty to feast upon’.

Freedman tried to protest and said: ‘Not to sound like a four year old fighting a four year old with ‘but they started it’ but once someone says something it becomes fact, there’s no way to fight against it.

‘You start to lose things without the ability to have the court’s adjudication. This was not started by us.’

Judge Liman also warned that if both sides didn’t behave themselves he could move the date of the trial forward from March next year.

He said: ‘I’m not going to do that, I’m convinced the parties need the time for discovery.

‘But if it turns out that this ends up being litigated in the press in a way that would prejudice the opportunity of a fair trial…one of the tools the court has is to accelerate the date of the trial.

‘That’s something that is out there. I don’t want to do that.’

Earlier in the hearing, Gottlieb, who also represents Reynolds, said that he would be seeking a protective order through the court for future filings to protect the couple’s celebrity friends.

While he did not name Taylor Swift, she would likely be one of those affected as she was referred to in Baldoni’s complaint.

Gottlieb said: ‘We do believe there will be provisions in a protective order that will be appropriate in this case given the nature of the allegations and the high profile nature of some of the individuals who will be involved.

‘There is a significant number of high profile individuals on both sides.

‘In particular addressing the interests and needs of third parties is going to be very important in this case.’

Gottlieb said he would plan to ‘seek protections we believe will be very important particularly in a case where there’s been a significant amount of leaking materials.’

He said: ‘We do intend to propose a protective order in this case.’

Judge Liman agreed and said that even before the other parties were named ‘you already got a lot of high profile people’ involved.