Ryan Reynolds Rates Blake Lively’s First Onscreen Kiss—Find Out What He Gave Her!

Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively’s romance may have had an unconventional start, but one thing is clear: their chemistry was undeniable from the very beginning. In fact, their first kiss on-screen happened long before they ever became a couple. And, as expected from Reynolds, he wasn’t shy about rating the experience for all to hear.

The two stars met in 2010 while filming Green Lantern, but romance wasn’t immediately on the table. At the time, Lively was dating her Gossip Girl co-star Penn Badgley, while Reynolds was still married to actress Scarlett Johansson. However, their professional bond led to an unexpected on-screen kiss, which Reynolds later addressed with his signature humor. In a June 2011 interview with Mediacorp’s Channel 5, Reynolds was asked to rate Lively’s kissing skills, and without hesitation, he gave her a solid 8.5 out of 10. Lively, who seemed surprised by the rating, repeated it back to the interviewer, clearly expecting a higher score.

At that point, Lively’s relationship with Badgley had already ended, and she had briefly moved on with Leonardo DiCaprio. But by 2012, Lively and Reynolds had become an item, tying the knot in a surprise wedding. It turns out that Reynolds’ 8.5 was just the beginning of something much more significant.

While Reynolds and Lively’s on-screen kiss was one of their first shared moments, Lively had some experience with kissing scenes in Hollywood. In 2008, she admitted in an interview with Cosmopolitan that she had kissed only three people in real life before stepping into the world of scripted romance. However, her first love scene with Ben Affleck for The Town in 2009 proved to be an especially awkward experience. “The sex scene was really awkward. It was my first day, so thank you for that,” she joked during a 2010 Interview magazine chat. Despite the awkwardness, Affleck praised her professionalism on set.

Looking back, Lively acknowledged the potential pitfalls of working with costars on kissing scenes. During a 2018 interview with Good Morning America, she joked about the awkwardness of kissing someone for the first time on screen, quipping, “It’s always confusing when you kiss a costar. Nobody wants to be the story of… like dragon mouth.”

Despite the occasional awkwardness Hollywood kisses may bring, it’s clear that Lively and Reynolds’ on-screen chemistry was just a glimpse of what was to come in their real-life relationship. They eventually became one of Hollywood’s most beloved couples, proving that an 8.5 out of 10 was more than enough to spark a long-lasting bond. Whether or not Reynolds ever revisited his score for Lively remains a mystery, but given their undeniable chemistry, it’s safe to say Lively likely earned an extra point or two over time.