Blake Lively Apologizes For Kate Middleton Joke

Blake Lively regrets joking about Kate Middleton's photo controversy after Kate shared her cancer diagnosis yesterday.

Last weekend, Blake shared a promotional photo for her Betty Buzz alcohol brand that showed her sitting near a pool with a drink and a large, seemingly Photoshopped lemon floating above her.

"I’m so excited to share this new photo I just took today to announce our 4 new @bettybuzz & @bettybooze products! Now you know why I’ve been MIA," she wrote in the post.

Blake was making fun of the poorly edited photo that Kate shared of herself and her children earlier in the month for Mother's Day in the UK. The picture came amid widespread speculation about her health after she was rarely seen since undergoing abdominal surgery in January, which only caused rumors about her condition to spread.

Amid ongoing speculation about her health, Kate spoke out yesterday to reveal that she's been diagnosed with cancer. "I am now in the early stages of that treatment," she said in a video. "It has been an incredibly tough couple of months for our entire family, but I've had a fantastic medical team who have taken great care of me, for which I am so grateful." View this video on YouTube TalkTV / BBC /  youtube.com

Knowing what she knows now, Blake said she's "mortified" by the joke she made.

She wrote on Instagram, "I'm sure no one cares today, but I feel like I have to acknowledge this. I made a silly post around the 'Photoshop fails' frenzy, and oh man, that post has me mortified today. I'm sorry."

"Sending love and well wishes to all, always," Blake added alongside a red heart emoji.

Fans had thoughts on Blake's post, too. While many felt it was never a laughing matter, some could "respect" her for at least speaking up and apologizing. "Honestly, I respect this," one person wrote on Reddit. "A ton of people, celebs and non-celebs, were making jokes about the whole thing, so I don’t really fault any individual who jumped on board (although it says a lot about society as a whole) but I respect that she immediately owned up to it," the person added, receiving over 5,000 upvotes.

Another agreed that it was a nice sentiment on Blake's part. "While this shows that we need to be careful with assumptions, to me it never felt like Kate herself was the target of the jokes," they explained. "When the photoshop fail came out, everyone was dragging the [royal family] for making Kate take the fall. Blake, Kim [Kardashian], etc. never mocked Kate herself, her frame, etc. 99% of the conspiracy theories were about the [royal family] who indeed managed this pretty badly. I do respect Blake for this statement though."

You can see her post here.