Blake Lively’s Ex Shares Why Dating The Actress Was A ‘Struggle’

Blake Lively‘s ex-boyfriend, Penn Badgley, has revealed how playing the role of Dan Humphrey on “Gossip Girl” affected his relationship with the actress.

The duo began dating on the set of the six-season series after hitting it off when Badgley was cast.

Blake Lively and Penn Badgley’s relationship lasted for a short period of time and remained mostly private due to their involvement in the show.

Between 2007 and 2010, Badgley and Lively dated while filming the hit series “Gossip Girl,” where they played on-screen love interests Dan Humphrey and Serena van der Woodsen.

In a new interview, Badgley has revealed that he found it a “struggle” to date the actress due to his inability to separate his real-life identity from his on-screen character as his fame grew.

“It was the struggle,” the “You” star admitted during his appearance on the Call Her Daddy podcast on Wednesday. “What starts to happen when you’re in this one role for a long time — the aspect of celebrity being a part of it, a huge part of it — there is not enough separation, I think, for anybody,” he added.

The actor continued. “You’re seen as this person, you’re called their name out on the street. You also constantly have to be that person at work.”

Reflecting further on the experience, Badgley admitted that he lacked the “emotional maturity to understand how to differentiate” himself from his “Gossip Girl” character when he played the role.

He claimed it was a “self-worth” issue, as “what people seemed to think of Dan seemed to be what people thought of me.”

Meanwhile, Lively has previously shared a similar sentiment about struggling to separate herself from her on-screen character. At the time, she hinted that this blurred line may have contributed to their breakup after three years together.

“I was wearing the same clothes and doing fashion shoots, and dating the same person as my character was dating,” Lively said during a 2017 retrospective of the show published by Vanity Fair, per The List.

She added, “What people were projecting onto me was that I was Serena.”

Despite the “struggle,” there were some upsides to Badgley’s relationship with Lively.

He once described their time together on and off screen as “fun and fast-paced,” though he admitted there was a “dark undercurrent that would bottom out in my later 20s.”

According to him, being with Lively, who didn’t drink alcohol, helped steer him away from turning to substances while navigating the personal struggles he was facing at the time.

“To be honest, I never struggled with substance,” Badgley said in an interview with Variety. “Blake didn’t drink, and I think our relationship in some ways saved me from forcing myself to go down that road.”

During the interview, Badgley also clarified that the personal struggles he was dealing with were “nothing short of a spiritual crisis.”

“Like anybody who experiences some degree of fame and wealth,” he added. “I was presented with the universal truth that not only does it not make your life better or easier, it actually can greatly complicate things, and make you quite unhappy.”

Years after separating, Lively and Badgley have since moved on in their romantic lives and have been in long-lasting relationships.

Lively is married to Marvel star Ryan Reynolds, with whom she has four children: James, Inez, Betty, and Olin.

On the other hand, Badgley is married to singer Domino Kirke, with whom he shares a son, James. The actor is also a stepfather to Cassius Riley, Kirke’s son, and is expecting a set of twins with her.

Lively is currently involved in a legal battle with Justin Baldoni, who is reportedly close pals with her ex-boyfriend Badgley.

Lively and Baldoni played leading roles in the romantic drama “It Ends With Us,” after which she shocked many by filing a sexual harassment and defamation lawsuit against her co-star.

Since Lively filed the suit, the duo has been locked in a messy legal back-and-forth, with Baldoni countersuing the actress and her husband, Reynolds.

Several other individuals, including superstar Taylor Swift, have also been pulled into the fray.

Now, Lively and Baldoni are set to face off in court when the trial begins at the U.S. District Court in Manhattan in March 2026.