Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds are spending Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s wedding weekend a couple of hundred miles away from the festivities — another indication that Blake and Taylor’s once close friendship is over. While Selena Gomez and music producer Jack Antonoff headed to the wedding rehearsal on Thursday night, the Gossip Girl alum was doing something way less glamorous: cheering on her daughter at a horse show.
Blake and Ryan were spotted in Lake Placid, New York watching their daughter Betty compete in a horse show Thursday, and Betty rode well enough to earn a second-place finish. Lake Placid is closer to the Canadian border than it is to New York City — it’s a nearly 5-hour drive between the two cities. While Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce were getting married at Madison Square Garden on Friday July 3 — with about 1,000 people expected to attend the main celebration — Blake was still posted up upstate on what should’ve been one of the biggest celeb nights of the summer.
This isn’t subtle. This is Lively and Reynolds basically saying: “We’re not coming,” without saying a word. And the internet immediately understood the assignment. Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds were reportedly not invited, following a public falling out between Lively and Swift.
The beef between these two wasn’t always this cold. Before the It Ends With Us lawsuit dragged Taylor into the mix, Lively and Swift were once among Hollywood’s closest friends, regularly appearing together at football games, parties, and family celebrations. But then the Justin Baldoni situation happened. Taylor was frustrated after being pulled into Blake’s legal battle with Justin Baldoni, feeling she’d been unnecessarily dragged into the dispute. Taylor was subpoenaed in the case before the subpoena was later withdrawn. Court documents exposed Blake’s private texts to Baldoni that referenced Swift in ways that didn’t sit right.
Now here’s where it gets real: Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds, fresh off the former’s settlement of her It Ends With Us legal battle, allegedly owe more than US$2 million to contractors working on their Upstate New York mansion, with multiple mechanics liens placed against the estate. So while they’re hosting horse shows upstate, they’re also dealing with unpaid contractor drama on their same Upstate NY property. The optics are rough.
Meanwhile, Taylor’s wedding is moving like a military operation. Swift’s wedding is expected to cost at least $20 million, and the A-list guest list is stacked. Selena Gomez, Jack Antonoff, Sabrina Carpenter, and Ed Sheeran were all rolling through for the rehearsal. This is the wedding of the moment — the moment — and Blake and Ryan’s answer is: “Nah, we’re good in the Adirondacks.”
Here’s the thing that hits different: Blake and Taylor once represented that ride-or-die celebrity friendship. But after a lawsuit, leaked texts, and all the collateral damage, that’s gone. And now, as one of the biggest wedding weekends in pop culture happens a short drive away, Blake’s literally choosing a horse show. You can’t make this narrative up.
The 16BARS take: When a friendship that deep dies in public, the most brutal move isn’t a diss track — it’s just… not showing up. Blake staying upstate while Taylor’s wedding lights up MSG? That’s the loudest statement yet.
