Blake Lively, one of this year's TIME100 nominees, offered a deeply personal tribute honoring her mother Willie Elain McAlpin during the TIME100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 24. During her speech, Lively shared for the first time that McAlpin, who accompanied her to the gala, survived an attack by a work acquaintance before Lively was born.
Lively began by discussing the responsibility that comes with being named to the TIME100 list and said she wanted to take the opportunity to honor female survivors. "I have so much to say about the last two years of my life, but tonight is not the forum," she said. (Lively filed a complaint against Justin Baldoni, her co-star and director of It Ends With Us in December 2024. Since then, the two have been involved in dueling lawsuits related to her harassment and retaliation allegations, which he has denied.)
Instead, Lively focused on her mother, who, despite living with undeserved shame for years, encouraged Lively to use this moment to share her harrowing experience. "We can make it to the end alive, physically or emotionally, and we will, and we do, and we thrive. Even when it doesn’t feel possible. Even when we are in sharp pain," she said. "Never underestimate a woman’s ability to endure pain."
Lively concluded: "Thank you to every woman whose strength brought life to me and my four children, and thank you to every man—including my sweet husband—who are kind and good when no one is watching. And to all the communities across the gender, age, political, geographical, and racial spectrum who fight every day just to be safe, I see you."
Read the entire toast below:
Thank you so much for having me here tonight, to be an honoree amongst you all as well as those who’ve come before is surreal and deeply significant. In a time where the most valuable currency seems to be anger, it feels like an act of defiance to commune and celebrate all the good that is alive in the world, and the many here tonight who either challenge the systems, and/or who show us that magic exists on earth in their gifts, talents, bravery, art and life. So, tonight, I applaud each of you.
It’s an interesting thing to be called influential. It’s most definitely an honor, but what does influence mean? By definition it’s: the capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behavior of someone or something.
To have an effect. That’s not only an honor, it’s a significant responsibility.
How we use that, is what matters.
Who and what we stand up for... and what we stay silent about… What we monetize... versus what we actually live ...matters.
I have so much to say about the last two years of my life, but tonight is not the forum.
What I will speak to separately, is the feeling of being a woman who has a voice today, and since I could speak, because of the pain, cautions and fight of the many women who have paved the way, and the men who stood beside them. Millions I will never know the name of. Because every life, every act, big or small, affects another. Before I say more, I want to warn that what I will speak about covers trauma, so please feel free to step away if you need…
My life was influenced most by my mother, Willie Elain McAlpin, who’s here with me tonight, an eternal optimist who’s always leaving me messages, hoopin’ and hollerin’ sayin’, “life’s just a bowl of cherries.” It’s true, always, and she’ll get your number tonight, and she’ll leave you those messages, so please be warned.
But, at her urging and unwavering bravery, she wanted me to share with you that she is a survivor of the worst crimes someone can commit against a woman. I’ve watched her conceal her raw and undeserved shame my entire life, so, as her daughter, being asked to share this today is monumental. If we name it, we change it.
Just as our fellow TIME100 Honoree, the incredible Gisele Pelicot put it to every woman who understood, “It’s not for us to have shame, it’s for them.”
My mom never got justice from her work acquaintance who attempted to take her life when she was the mother of 3 young kids—years before I was born. She has always credited her beating heart today with the story she heard from another woman in a similar circumstance, speaking on the radio as my mom drove home one day, entirely unaware of the future ahead in which she would call upon this critical moment to save her own life.
The woman painfully and graphically shared how she escaped, and because of hearing that woman speak to her experience instead of shutting down in fear and unfair shame, my mom is alive today. She was saved by a woman whose name she’ll never know. I am alive, and standing with you all here today, being honored, because of a woman whose name I’ll never know. I am here, my mom is here, because that woman not only survived, but she told others how.
It’s a silent torch of womanhood that we come to know—a pact that privately we must show others how to survive, literally or spiritually. We don’t let our daughters know, but one day we break their hearts by letting them in on the secret that we kept from them as they pranced around in princess dresses: that they are not, and will likely never be safe, at work, at home, in a parking lot, in a medical office, online, in any space they inhabit. Physically, emotionally, professionally.
But why does that torch have to be our burden to carry in private? How can we not all agree on that basic human right?
I know the superpower of female triumph though, I have touched it, shaken hands with it, I’m looking at it in this room here right now. These are the happy endings we must see as women and girls. We can make it to the end alive, physically or emotionally, and we will and we do, and we thrive. Even when it doesn’t feel possible. Even when we are in sharp pain.
Never underestimate a woman’s ability to endure pain.
Life’s just a bowl of cherries.
Thank you to every woman whose strength brought life to me and my four children, and thank you to every man—including my sweet husband—who are kind and good when no one is watching.
And to all the communities across the gender, age, political, geographical and racial spectrum who fight every day just to be safe, I see you. And I share tonight, and my influence with you, for as long as I have the ability to affect even one other person.
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The TIME100 Gala is TIME’s annual celebration of the TIME100 list of the world’s most influential people. The Gala brings together icons, leaders, change-makers, and celebrities from across industries and nations for one lively evening of meaningful dialogue and celebration.
TIME is teaming up with ABC to bring viewers inside the exclusive TIME100 Gala with a special television event. TIME100: The World’s Most Influential People, produced in partnership with P&G, airs Sunday, May 4 at 10 p.m. EDT on ABC, and the next day on Hulu, featuring host Snoop Dogg, a performance by Ed Sheeran, and appearances by Demi Moore, Serena Williams, and more.
The 2025 TIME100 Gala was presented by Booking.com, Circle, Diriyah Company, Prudential Financial, Toyota, Amazon, Absolut, Pfizer, and XPRIZE.