A prominent executive lost his $1.1-million-per-year job after telling the truth during a “trust exercise” at a work retreat.
According to the New York Post, Netflix executive Kevin Baillie, formerly vice president and head of creative at Eyeline Studios, has filed suit against the streaming juggernaut after his frank admission to having taken ketamine under medical supervision led to his termination.
The supervised drug use occurred in October and November 2022 at a clinic in Santa Barbara, California.
In January, Netflix held a work retreat at its Sendero Ranch in Northern California. There, during a “Vulnerability-Trust” exercise, Baillie revealed that he had received the treatment for depression after his mother’s death.
Afterward, according to Baillie’s lawsuit, Netflix investigated him for “recreational drug use.”
The lawsuit also alleged that Netflix’s attorney confirmed: “the ketamine therapy issue has factored into the termination.”
Netflix exec goes ballistic after being fired for stunning ‘trust exercise’ confession at retreat: suit https://t.co/omSZI3rRXL pic.twitter.com/TfYzj6EIK1
— New York Post (@nypost) July 27, 2026
Elsewhere in the suit, the now-former executive also described an alcohol-friendly company environment under Eyeline Studios CEO Jeff Shapiro.
According to his biography on the movie database IMDb, Baillie got his start in visual effects. In fact, at age 18, he worked as a pre-visual artist on “Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace.”
From there, he built a career that included work on the “Pirates of the Caribbean” and “Harry Potter” franchises.
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Baillie filed his lawsuit against the backdrop of Netflix’s plummeting stock price.
In fact, according to Yahoo Finance, the company’s stock has fallen 41 percent in the last 12 months and 26 percent in 2026 alone.
The streaming service also finds itself in a legal dispute with the prediction market Kalshi over a newly released documentary, “The Prediction Games,” according to CNN.
Still, investors have struck a bullish tone on Netflix. Rick Munarriz of the investment-focused website The Motley Fool, for instance, acknowledged the bad news but insisted on remaining positive.
“It’s not a good place to be,” he wrote, “but this doesn’t have to be where the story ends.”
Likewise, investor Mike Khouw touted the stock in an opinion piece for CNBC.
“Netflix’s stock price may have lost the plot,” he wrote, “but its fundamental narrative remains intact.”
CNBC published Khouw’s advice on Monday, one day after the Post’s exclusive story about Baillie’s lawsuit. But Khouw made no mention of the suit’s potential impact on investor confidence.
Baillie seeks “jury trial, compensatory damages, lost wages, damages for emotional distress, and punitive damages,” the Post reported.
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