We've all seen those 2am texts between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni - and we all know what they REALLY mean: AMANDA PLATELL

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Amid the toxic Blake Lively versus Justin Baldoni psychodrama, in which she is suing her co-star and director in the film It Ends With Us for sexual harassment, one question keeps coming back to me.

Why was she sending him what appear to be flirty texts at 2am? Which brings me to the next question: What kind of relationship was this, exactly?

Take the text from Lively to Baldoni on May 11, 2023, at 2.46am, once production had started: 'It's such a good feeling to get work done that we're proud of. And to do it together,' she wrote. 'It just clicks when we find it.

'And that's just as rewarding as filming it,' she added. 'I'm really proud of what we're doing.' All followed by a big red love-heart emoji.

They seem like the words a soppy infatuated teenager texting her boyfriend at all hours to get validation from him.

Baldoni replied: 'I like sentimental Blake.' She texted back: 'Never met her.' He said: 'I also like asshole Blake, OK goodnight.' To which she responded: 'I've met her. So have my suppositories. Good night!' followed by a laughing emoji.

Which is all very bewildering given her accusations that he sexually harassed her while they were filming the movie.

Blake Lively is suing her co-star and director Justin Baldoni (right) in the film It Ends With Us for sexual harassment

The text message exchange between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni on May 11, 2023, at 2.44am, once production had started

Of course we have no idea what truly happened on set, and given their grave nature, her claims deserve to be treated with the utmost seriousness.

All I am saying is the tone of those texts sits oddly alongside the nature of the charges she's made.

'You're absolutely the best,' she said in one message sent a month earlier, on April 4 2023, admittedly ahead of shooting the film. 'And what you did inspired me. I love what we're gonna do.'

This was followed by her texting him: 'If you knew me [in person] longer you'd have a sense of how flirty and yummy and ball busting [the sex scenes] would play. It's my love language. Spicy and playfully bold, never with teeth.'

Jolly good, but are these the kind of texts you'd expect from a professional colleague?

Baldoni is married to Swedish actress Emily. I'm not sure how happy any wife would feel knowing her husband was receiving such texts from a fellow worker late at night. Nor, indeed, how any husband would feel on learning his wife was texting her colleague in the early hours of the morning.

Wouldn't they be outraged? To my mind these messages are as deeply personal as they are inappropriate.

Which again leaves us wondering - what was going on? Did Lively have feelings for her co-star? Was she flirting? Was life imitating art? After all, her character Lily Bloom falls madly in love with Baldoni's character, the delectable neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid, only for her to discover his dark side. 

Whatever the case, Lively seemed to adore Baldoni to begin with.

Could old-fashioned jealousy be the reason Lively's husband Ryan Reynolds reportedly reacted so explosively during a showdown at the couple's New York penthouse. Reynolds is said to have aggressively accused Baldoni of fat-shaming his wife on set by questioning her weight, though texts later seemed to reveal Baldoni had done nothing of the sort. Instead, he had urged her 'not to stress about her body' and told her she would 'look amazing'.

Did the ugly green monster appear before Reynolds as he saw his lovely wife being filmed getting hot and steamy in the arms of another man?

Let's face it, the sexual chemistry between Lively and Baldoni is electric in the movie. And although the sex scenes were not explicit - the film's rated PG-13 - they were intensely erotic.

Especially when they are kissing on the dance floor, a scene she cites in her lawsuit against him claiming it involved 'unwanted touching'. Having reportedly declined to meet an intimacy coordinator as Baldoni suggested, she insists he went too far and didn't have her permission for him to move his lips down her neck nor take her lip gently between his teeth.

This, too, is surprising - for an exclusive recording obtained by the Daily Mail suggested that far from being upset by the kissing scene, Lively was laughing and joking with Baldoni when they made it. And that, in between the three takes involved, the two of them were talking about how they spent their time with their spouses.

Amanda Platell asks: Could old-fashioned jealousy be the reason Lively's husband Ryan Reynolds reportedly reacted so explosively? 

Lively cites a scene in which they are kissing passionately on the dance floor in her lawsuit against Baldoni, claiming it involved 'unwanted touching'

In my opinion this was one of the best, most tender scenes in the film, yet it has become central to Lively's case. Crikey! Whoever said a kiss is just a kiss?

It is all such a pity - and so baffling. How could these two, who started out as besties exchanging intimate messages and talking openly about their spouses and all manner of other things, end up such sworn enemies, with Baldoni now counter-suing Lively and Reynolds for damages in a $400million suit.

We can only guess who in this tawdry affair is the wronged party. But what is certain is that, in the court of public opinion, Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds come off worse.

Both are scorned in vitriolic comments online, and some in Hollywood believe the reputational damage has already harmed Reynolds and his nice guy image irredeemably.

Lively, meanwhile, is dismissed on social media as having 'zero talent', of being 'a narcissist and a 'terrible actress', and even more cruelly of her being 'a liar'.

In contrast, the mood has been almost universally supportive of Baldoni.

Who knows where this will all end? Is Baldoni guilty of sexual harassment? Is Lively telling the truth?

The one thing we can guarantee is that no one in this sad Hollywood saga comes out a hero.