Flaawsome Talk with Kjersti Flaa - OMG, It's Getting Worse !!

00:00:00.000 We just got another lawsuit connected to the Lively vs. Baldoni drama.

00:00:10.540 Hi and welcome to Flossom Talk. I'm Jashti Flohr, journalist, Hollywood truth teller and your voice of reason in a town built on the illusion.

00:00:18.860 okay we have another lawsuit another lawsuit connected to blake lively and her lawsuit

00:00:27.600 against justin baldoni and the wayfarer parties this time it is the daily mail reporter james

00:00:35.400 you might remember him he kept changing his story up he kept filing sworn statements saying one

00:00:44.020 thing one week and the next week the story changed and we got to learn about his correspondence with

00:00:50.340 Blake Lively's publicist Leslie Sloan and his sworn statement had big consequences for the case.

00:00:58.880 Now he's suing the Daily Mail for firing him and for pressuring him to sign a sworn statement that

00:01:05.840 he didn't agree with. This lawsuit is crazy and very interesting. Also we have to talk about

00:01:13.760 Brad Pitt who just came out in Esquire magazine with a very heartbreaking interview. He talks

00:01:20.680 about how devastating it has been for him to not have any contact with his children basically at

00:01:27.580 one point considering ending things. He also admits that he started having a drink now and

00:01:35.200 then again after seven years sobriety. So yeah there's a lot to talk about. Anyways let's start

00:01:40.900 with James Satushka here. What happened with this Daily Mail reporter is super confusing. I've been

00:01:46.760 trying to explain it before and I'm going to try to do it again. So James Satushka worked for the

00:01:51.760 Daily Mail and he was one of the people covering the Blake Lively Justin Baldoni saga from the

00:01:57.060 beginning. He was fed information from Leslie Sloan from the set of It Ends With Us and he wrote

00:02:05.040 stories about it, saying that an insider told him this and that, that Justin was the problem,

00:02:11.400 blah, blah, blah. And then when Blake filed a lawsuit, she accused, as you know, Justin Baldoni

00:02:17.260 of SH. And when that happened, James Vitushka sent a text message to Melissa Nathan,

00:02:24.360 Justin Baldoni's PR crisis manager. And he said to her, and now she's saying that Blake was S-Aid,

00:02:32.640 which is much more serious than S-H, as you know, I can't say these words here on YouTube,

00:02:37.760 why wouldn't she say anything about that then? So he was basically saying to Melissa,

00:02:45.240 why is this coming up now? Why didn't Leslie Sloan tell me about this back then when I spoke to her

00:02:52.640 about what happened on the set of It Ends With Us? This text message, he claims, was taken out of

00:02:59.480 context by the Wayfair parties who used this text message in their legal filings, said that Leslie

00:03:07.780 Sloan had basically told him that Blake Lively was S8. So from the context that they were

00:03:15.080 presenting his text message, it insinuated that Leslie Sloan had previously told Vitushka

00:03:21.640 that Blake had been S8 by Baldoni. Then James Vitushka said, that's not what I meant with that

00:03:29.080 text message I wasn't talking about what Leslie had told me back in August when this when the

00:03:37.220 story came out of what have happened on the set of It Ends With Us I was talking about my reaction

00:03:43.120 to the lawsuit and saying basically why am I hearing about this now if this occurred back on

00:03:51.380 the set why wasn't I informed about that which is a good question and as you know Justin Baldoni

00:03:56.280 sued Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds and Leslie Sloan. And now James Wytushka was in the middle of this

00:04:03.140 war from both sides here. So first he was served a subpoena from the Blake Lively camp. And the

00:04:09.980 Daily Mail was like, we do not want to get dragged into this legal war because of you, James Wytushka.

00:04:15.660 And according to James Wytushka, they pressured him to sign a sworn statement to make the record

00:04:23.160 straight saying that I never meant to say as a I meant as age so he made that correction

00:04:31.060 in the legal filing saying that I didn't mean this I meant that and also my text message was

00:04:38.560 taken out of context and now he's claiming in this lawsuit that the Daily Mail coordinated

00:04:44.780 with Leslie Sloan to get him to sign a sworn statement and that they agreed that if he did so

00:04:52.280 she would drop the subpoena against the Daily Mail and James.

00:04:57.180 And she did drop the subpoena against the Daily Mail and James Svitushka.

00:05:01.940 He also said that he never authorized Friedman to use this text message

00:05:06.080 in their filing in their lawsuit against Leslie and Blake and Ryan.

00:05:10.960 Then he gets subpoenaed by the Wayfair parties.

00:05:14.260 And James Svitushka starts freaking out.

00:05:16.420 So he wants to hire an attorney to represent himself and not an attorney that Daily Mail

00:05:23.280 picked out for him.

00:05:24.680 So he goes out and he hires Mark Garagos, which is very interesting because Mark Garagos

00:05:29.460 and Brian Friedman are very close friends.

00:05:33.420 So, and Mark Garagos is a shark.

00:05:35.940 He is known to be a shark.

00:05:38.220 And James Wytushka gets Mark Garagos to send the Daily Mail a letter saying that you can't

00:05:44.980 retaliate against James Tutushka because he's protected legally for being a whistleblower.

00:05:51.400 Then he's claiming that Blake Lively added him to the list of witnesses, something that the Daily

00:05:58.860 Mail obviously did not appreciate. The Daily Mail doesn't want their methods and their communications

00:06:05.440 to be public knowledge. They want to protect their sources and of course they really wanted

00:06:12.520 to avoid that from happening. Then 11 days, I think after Mark Garagos sent them a letter saying

00:06:20.880 that James Utushka is protected here, he's a whistleblower, they fired him anyways. And then

00:06:28.040 they destroyed all public records of him ever working for the Daily Mail. So if you search up

00:06:35.560 his name and the Daily Mail, you can't find any articles. Even the first article he was fed by

00:06:42.700 Leslie Sloan, by the way, which is this one, The Disturbing Truth Behind Why Blake Lively and Her

00:06:49.620 It Ends With Us Stars Are Feuding with Justin Boldoni, where his name used to be, it now says

00:06:56.300 N-A. So there's not even any signs that he ever used to work for the Daily Mail. Reading this

00:07:02.700 article now is so crazy by the way because of course it's so obvious that he was fed all of

00:07:09.720 this information by Leslie Sloan and now we've actually seen the text exchange between him

00:07:15.400 and Leslie Sloan we got to see that in discovery so we know that he was in close communication with

00:07:22.820 her and how she instructed him even to say that pretend that there's more sources here not only

00:07:29.160 one source. So she's referred to as an insider here. And she is basically saying here in this

00:07:35.840 article that Justin Baldoni was the problem. And there were several women who had an issue with

00:07:41.860 him. And mainly the reason for that is because Justin Baldoni couldn't detach himself from the

00:07:48.440 character that he was playing. And he wasn't listening to the women on set. He never wanted

00:07:54.360 to hear Blake Wiley's opinion about anything,

00:07:57.800 which is really funny now that we know,

00:08:00.100 especially when we saw her letter

00:08:01.600 to the Producers Guild of America.

00:08:03.840 All of this makes me laugh.

00:08:06.760 She said, amongst other things,

00:08:08.440 that just his behavior extended beyond the main players.

00:08:12.160 Once he felt ganged up on,

00:08:13.640 he became even less empathetic.

00:08:16.000 Now he's speaking praises like out of fear

00:08:19.060 that they'll call him out.

00:08:20.740 He knows it's coming

00:08:21.800 and might try to blame his actions on being a method actor she says

00:08:26.900 imagine being a method actor and a director at the same time and you're playing this abuser

00:08:34.200 i mean of course this was the perfect storyline or narrative for blake lively to be told through

00:08:40.900 her publicist to fit what she was planning to do later you know filing this lawsuit against

00:08:48.040 Justin and the Wayfair parties. Anyways, in this article, they also mentioned what Justin said

00:08:53.200 about Blake, that he was only praising her in interviews. So it was a balanced article. They

00:08:58.680 did report of what this source said, but on the other hand, they did also add information from

00:09:04.500 Justin Baldoni's side. And that is the job of any journalist. You have to hear both stories

00:09:11.220 and you're supposed to not take sides with anyone. Anyways, as I said, now he is suing

00:09:17.640 the Daily Mail for firing him and basically destroying his career. I didn't know that this

00:09:23.660 was a thing that publications would do if they go separate ways with someone under circumstances

00:09:29.640 like this, that they would do something so public as to remove the person's bylines for all the

00:09:35.380 years that they worked there. I mean, James is making some really interesting points in this

00:09:40.580 lawsuit that is going to be a bit challenging for Daily Mail if this goes forward, if it's not

00:09:46.520 dismissed. I mean he does say here that evidence exists that the Daily Mail was putting pressure on

00:09:53.160 him to sign an affidavit or sworn statement that he did not know or he did not believe to be true

00:10:00.760 and that is pretty serious. If he can prove that, that's bad for the Daily Mail. So I don't know if

00:10:06.900 that evidence exists. The Daily Mail's excuse for firing him was that he repeatedly demonstrated a

00:10:14.460 lack of integrity and poor judgments, and we therefore cannot rely on you as a reporter going

00:10:20.140 forward. Rytushka is saying in this lawsuit that they actually raised his salary just eight months

00:10:28.440 before this happened. He got a salary raised from $100,000 to $122,000. And the reason for them

00:10:37.160 doing that was because they said his work was so excellent. So the fact that they said that he

00:10:42.620 lacked integrity and had poor judgments they have to prove that that happened in those eight months

00:10:49.860 and this of course is kind of a headache for the daily mail because they do not want to get into

00:10:55.100 discovery as i said they do not want their communications to become public here and he also

00:11:02.300 by the way is suing them for sh he's claiming that one of the deputy editors i think his name

00:11:11.000 is Mr. Ellis, approached him at a Christmas party, very suggestive and flirtatious, saying that we

00:11:19.060 need to find a way for you to repay me for the elevator. So he was accused of vandalizing the

00:11:25.900 elevator at the office. He denies that. And he also showed that there was communication with Mr. Ellis

00:11:34.160 who said, you know, okay, let's just leave this. Let's move on. Let's not talk about it. I will

00:11:40.000 just pay the bill for two thousand three hundred and fifty dollars or however much it was for the

00:11:45.900 repair of the elevator door that he allegedly had scratched so much it needs to be fixed and then

00:11:52.980 he's saying that mr ellis came up to him at this christmas party very suggestive he's blaming this

00:11:59.780 on his gender and his disability by the way i don't know what his disability is here and he's

00:12:05.620 saying that after he rejected Mr. Ellis at the Christmas party, Mr. Ellis' behavior towards him

00:12:12.000 started changing. I'm just saying what he's saying here. I don't know where the truth lays here, just

00:12:16.580 to put that out there. It's going to be interesting to see how the Daily Mail responds to this. As you

00:12:22.140 might notice here, James Wytushka is not Team Lively. He's not Team Baldoni. He's not Team

00:12:29.200 Daily Mail, he's team James Futushka only. Yeah, I'll keep you posted on what happens here. It

00:12:36.100 should be interesting if this gets to discovery, obviously, because I'm sure we're going to learn

00:12:40.620 a lot more from what Leslie Sloan was up to. If she has to sit down for a deposition again, 1.00

00:12:47.280 I don't know if you remember, but she was deposed by Justin Baldoni's team and it came out from that

00:12:53.380 deposition what kind of person she really is. She was just like, I think Baldoni is a creep because

00:12:57.980 I believe he's a creep. I never felt so uncomfortable reading someone's deposition

00:13:02.980 as I felt when I read what she was saying about Justin and how she felt so comfortable

00:13:08.760 just denying things that she had said previously in text messages and basically standing by the

00:13:15.740 fact that Justin Baldoni is an abuser. I mean, yeah, that woman is a piece of work. 1.00

00:13:23.100 Anyways, let's get into Brad Pitt here.

00:13:26.700 A lot of outlets have picked up this story from Esquire.

00:13:30.700 So Brad Pitt sat down for a lengthy interview.

00:13:33.900 I read it all and I really felt for Brad when I was reading this.

00:13:38.100 I have to say that I met both Brad Pitt.

00:13:40.760 I've interviewed him several times.

00:13:42.600 I've also interviewed Angelina Jolie several times.

00:13:46.360 And back in the day, Sony used to invite a lot of journalists down to Cancun and spend a week in a hotel there.

00:13:52.540 doing a lot of press junkets back to back and it would be such a relaxing environment for everyone

00:13:58.920 so the celebrities or the movie stars that came there they often brought their entire families

00:14:05.300 and had a little mini vacation as well and Brad Pitt did that so he brought I think he brought

00:14:10.900 four of his kids when we were there and Angelina did the same thing and I remember sitting down

00:14:17.120 in the restaurant and I saw his kids were sitting there having pizza and Brad went out on a balcony

00:14:22.480 just having some fresh air between interviews and they were waving up to him like hey dad come down

00:14:28.060 we're having pizza and he's like hey guys so sorry daddy has to work and it was just this sweet

00:14:34.640 little interaction and then also when Angelina was there she was so sweet with the kids and I just

00:14:40.560 really feel that I like both of them my experiences with Angelina sitting down with her she always

00:14:48.320 feel so warm, so authentic, so present and so willing to share. She's so sincere and she's

00:14:57.180 really trying hard to give you a good answer. And that doesn't happen that often when you're

00:15:01.900 a journalist from a foreign country and you have five minutes with someone. She's really there.

00:15:07.880 I remember one episode when I was interviewing her and I was asking her a question from the movie.

00:15:14.880 I was asking how her kids reacted when she's when they saw her dressed up as a man.

00:15:20.460 And one of the people in the room was interrupting, saying, we can't talk about that as that was some spoiler or something.

00:15:26.860 And Angelina was like, no, we can talk about that.

00:15:30.360 And then she gave me this really long personal answer, which I really appreciate because most celebrities don't bother to really make an effort,

00:15:38.200 especially if you're just a foreign journalist and you just have five minutes there they would

00:15:42.940 just like give you some re-rehearsed answer and they definitely wouldn't call someone out in the

00:15:49.180 room saying like you know what I'm gonna answer that question so I'm not like team Angelina I'm

00:15:54.440 not team Brad here because I feel like I don't know enough about this situation but I did love

00:16:00.260 them together as a couple I mean can you imagine anything more beautiful than those two people

00:16:05.320 anyways now Brad Pitt is sitting down with Esquire talking about a lot of really serious stuff he has

00:16:15.040 a new movie coming out where he's playing this guy who has to survive in the wilderness with his dog

00:16:19.960 anyways I feel like Brad is this kind of happy-go-lucky guy and he's inviting this journalist

00:16:26.260 into his home where he introduces him to his doodles whatever and they're watching a soccer

00:16:32.000 match i think this was obviously done during the world cup and brad is joking about how bad all

00:16:37.140 these soccer players are at acting which i totally agree with by the way something i mentioned

00:16:42.980 something i noticed as well when i was watching i was like these guys can't act they're pretending

00:16:48.000 that they're injured all the time rolling around and it just looks so fake but anyways as you know

00:16:53.460 after the incident on the plane with angelina when brad was drunk throwing things at her throwing a

00:17:01.320 glass of wine at her and i think he threw stuff at the kids too it was really really tragic

00:17:06.080 he stopped drinking and he's been now sober for seven years and he's admitting in this interview

00:17:13.420 that he started drinking again i got sober because of this guy and every day has been happier ever

00:17:20.460 since he's saying here that he can handle a couple of glasses of wine but not any more than that i

00:17:26.900 was thinking when I read this I was like okay he stopped drinking for his kid's sake and now as you

00:17:32.980 know four of his kids has legally dropped Pitt from their last name which must be so devastating

00:17:41.740 for him and I think I don't know this is just speculation that's why he was like okay now I can

00:17:48.400 have a drink again my kids are grown-ups and I don't have any contact with them which is so sad

00:17:56.100 I don't know if Angelina has told her kids not to have contact with their dad or said so many bad things about him that I don't want to be in touch with him or what happened there.

00:18:06.240 But I just found it to be really, really sad.

00:18:08.980 He also talks about the loss of his mom.

00:18:11.640 His mom passed away last year and he says loss is certainly the most profound thing a human can endure.

00:18:18.240 And the loneliness that can ensue is the greatest torture.

00:18:22.760 Yeah, that makes sense to me.

00:18:24.200 I lost both my parents and it was like the darkest period of my life.

00:18:28.600 Obviously, both of them died within a year.

00:18:30.720 So I had a fair share of dealing with grief.

00:18:33.740 Then he also talks about how he visits his dad and they sit on the porch together and

00:18:39.220 they talk about his mom, but just small little things because he says, but we're country

00:18:44.060 people.

00:18:44.680 We don't go in depth.

00:18:45.840 You know what I mean?

00:18:47.100 Every now and then I'll just be on one line that cuts to the core and then we kind of

00:18:52.080 skip on.

00:18:52.780 also talks about how he sometimes can be too emotional and that maybe he wished that he

00:18:57.760 wouldn't be so wildly angry or wildly ecstatic and he wishes he could be more even out and then

00:19:04.800 he talks about that he says those soul crushing lows i don't know if soul can be crushed but it

00:19:11.320 can feel that way and when it feels that way we might never feel those extreme highs again or

00:19:17.140 Rather, those extreme highs can feel as if they're only for other people to experience.

00:19:23.440 People who haven't known our lows or their depths.

00:19:28.060 I've never been this word I can't say when you want to end things,

00:19:32.460 except for one little period.

00:19:34.920 And in that one little period, I just thought, I just couldn't.

00:19:38.500 I just couldn't.

00:19:39.460 I didn't see a way out.

00:19:40.820 The pain was so oppressive that I wasn't going to act on this, but I could feel.

00:19:46.480 I could feel the cold steel of the bullet in my head and it felt like relief and I thought oh okay

00:19:53.620 now I understand I understand that feeling in the sense that it's just relief it's just looking for

00:20:01.700 relief from the pain but I also think we have incredible survival instincts and for me

00:20:06.820 not immediately kicked in but it was just yeah and he continued to say yeah like listen this 0.98

00:20:14.780 shit ain't easy and you're talking to a guy who won the lottery then he admits that what he's 0.98

00:20:20.840 referring to here is family stuff and I'm sure it's been crushing for him how his kids now doesn't 0.99

00:20:27.480 want to have his name and I don't know if anyone of them are in touch with him I think maybe there

00:20:34.420 were rumors that one of the twins Knox Knox and Vivian but Knox maybe had some contact with him

00:20:40.880 I'm not sure about that.

00:20:42.220 But as a dad, that must be one of the toughest, most heartbreaking things to deal with in life.

00:20:49.380 It's interesting.

00:20:50.580 I was thinking that the other day.

00:20:52.460 Same thing happened to Tom Cruise lately when Suri decided to remove his last name from her name.

00:21:00.640 And she has no contact with her father whatsoever.

00:21:03.320 ever isn't it interesting that two of the biggest stars that we have in hollywood are not in touch

00:21:11.180 with their children i don't know what that says about hollywood or what it says about them or

00:21:16.920 what it says about their exes as you know tom cruise is a scientologist so of course that explains

00:21:22.760 a lot but i just found that to be an interesting coincidence anyways that's it for me today you

00:21:29.480 guys. Thank you so much for watching. I really appreciate it. And thanks to Oscar. He's resting

00:21:35.020 in the background here. He is in love right now. He met this female dog that looks like him and

00:21:43.140 she's in heat and he is going crazy. He wants to go out all the time. He's running around the house

00:21:48.700 crying all the time for her. And yes, I'm making sure there's not going to be any babies, by the

00:21:54.060 so no worries about that but he's very sweet how their instinct is so strong so yeah he's taking a

00:22:02.040 little nap but he's still my executive producer and as you know i couldn't do this show without

00:22:07.200 him so anyways if you haven't subscribed yet please do and hit the notification bell so you

00:22:12.460 never miss an episode of blossom talk and i'll see you soon bye how are you

00:22:17.960 I met you for salt, but that's a long time ago in Cancun.

00:22:22.960 Oh, in Cancun, right.

00:22:24.960 Yes, that was nice.

00:22:25.960 That is fun when they do those, yeah.

00:22:27.960 I hope they do it again sometime.

00:22:29.960 Okay, so he had a little rebellious past,

00:22:32.960 and I think sometimes that makes people even stronger

00:22:35.960 and give them more character when they're older.

00:22:37.960 Do you agree with that?

00:22:38.960 Oh, completely.

00:22:39.960 Completely.

00:22:40.960 There's that fire in all of us,

00:22:42.960 and so often when you're young or at different times in your life,

00:22:44.960 you think that there's something wrong with that.

00:22:46.960 a bad thing because it's misdirected and you don't know if you're a good person and you

00:22:51.720 don't know what you're contributing. You feel like, and that it is that fight and that fire

00:22:58.420 and that little bit of trouble that if directed in the right way it can be a force for good

00:23:03.720 and brave and wonderful. And I think that's a, and I say that to my kids when if they

00:23:10.540 get in trouble because they've done something and they feel like they did something wrong

00:23:14.600 and bad, that there is a right and a wrong,

00:23:17.140 but it's also not to feel like they're bad,

00:23:20.000 and it's fire, like Louis has fire.

00:23:22.800 Do you think about that now when you're gonna have

00:23:24.480 teenagers at one point in your house?

00:23:26.980 Yeah, I have one so far.

00:23:29.080 Yes, it's complicated.

00:23:31.780 And if they're anything like I was,

00:23:32.980 it's gonna be really difficult.

00:23:44.600 Amen.

Flaawsome Talk with Kjersti Flaa - August 11, 2026

OMG, It's Getting Worse !!

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