With a look of mild disbelief, comedian Richard Gadd stood before a cheering audience and proudly held up three Emmy Awards.
The winning hat trick was, of course, for writing, producing and starring in the Netflix smash hit Baby Reindeer.
This “true story,” as previewed in the opening credits, documented the dark experience of a struggling comedian (modeled and played by Gadd), who is stalked by an older woman, a character named Martha on the show.
Martha’s actress Jessica Gunning also took to the stage at the Peacock Theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday, taking home her own Emmy for best supporting actress in a limited series.
It was the jubilant culmination of what has been an astonishing run of success for the series that launched in April.
The seven-episode show has racked up some 88 million views worldwide, making it one of the streaming platform’s most successful hits. And “struggling comedian” is no longer a term that applies to Gadd, whose earnings from the company quadrupled in 2023 to a healthy £836,000 and who, we learned this week, has struck a new multi-year deal with Netflix for future projects.
As Gadd, 35, said onstage this week: “This is the stuff of dreams.”
Baby Reindeer stars Richard Gadd and Jessica Gunning with their awards at the Emmys last week
The seven-part show has racked up around 88 million views worldwide, making it one of Netflix’s biggest hits.
There is no mention of the drama that occurs off-screen and that has become, if not a nightmare, at least a severe headache for both Netflix and the Scottish writer.
At the centre of it all is Fiona Harvey, the 58-year-old Aberdeen law graduate who is said to be the “real life” inspiration for Martha.
In June, Harvey launched a no-holds-barred lawsuit against Netflix, demanding an astronomical sum of $170m (£128m), alleging she had been defamed “on an unprecedented scale and magnitude”. She is also suing for, among other things, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence and gross negligence.
While Netflix is fighting to have the case dismissed before it goes to trial in May next year, according to newly filed court documents, Ms. Harvey’s own account of her current life is admittedly miserable.
“I’m afraid to go outside for fear of being attacked. There are weeks when I don’t leave the house,” she explains. “I suffer from, among other things, constant panic attacks, chest pains, anxiety, nightmares, depression, nervousness, stomach pains, loss of appetite, fear and insomnia.”
Her attorney, Richard Roth, summed up the situation this way: “The unequal treatment they receive and the world they live in is obvious and glaring. Richard Gadd is now a multi-Emmy award-winning star, solely as a result of Netflix’s fictional ‘true story,’ while she continues to suffer.”
Her character was so thinly veiled that, as the Mail reveals, even Harvey’s hairdresser identified her after watching the first episode. In a statement filed as part of his lawsuit, Jon Hala, who runs his own hair salon in Canary Wharf, says he watched Baby Reindeer with his wife and realised the woman on screen was his client.
That conclusion was obvious for many reasons, she explained. Fiona, like Martha in the series, is a strong, spicy Scottish woman who used to live in Camden.
Mr Hala said: ‘Martha looks like her. Martha talks like her. Martha dresses like her. Martha is a lawyer, like Fiona Harvey. Martha is very intelligent and at times extremely funny and endearing, like Fiona Harvey. Martha, also like Fiona Harvey, is a very stressful person who has emotional problems…’
In June, Martha’s “real-life” inspiration Fiona Harvey launched a no-holds-barred legal attack on the streaming platform, claiming she had been defamed “on an unprecedented scale and magnitude.”
When contacted by the Mail this week, the stylist who has cut and dyed her hair for seven years said: “The last time I saw her was probably about eight weeks ago. She’s not well with what she’s going through. The problem is she’s finding it difficult to get out of the door.
“The last time she was here, she definitely suffered trauma. It’s a very busy salon and we have a VIP room and we put her there, away from everyone. We do this for her peace of mind. She is well spoken, very gentle and kind.”
Her job, she says, is to make her client “come out of the process feeling like a million bucks.” “She drinks a million cups of tea and we don’t talk about legal issues,” she adds. “She doesn’t tell anyone what’s going on in terms of money or whatever’s going on with Netflix. She pays about £350 in total.”
A fragment of (expensive) normality in a life that has clearly been plunged into chaos.
As observers know, where the line between drama and reality lies in this saga is the subject of intense debate.
Gadd maintained that while the timeline and some events had been “tweaked slightly to create dramatic climaxes”, the drama was still “very true emotionally, obviously – I was severely harassed and abused (the show also featured Donny’s abuse at the hands of an established comedy writer). But we wanted it to exist in the realm of art, as well as protect the people it’s based on”.
Unsurprisingly, a frenzy broke out in the real world to determine who the real-life Martha was and it didn’t take long for internet sleuths to figure out who she was. However, on some key details, truth and fiction diverged. While the fictional Martha is a twice-convicted stalker sent to prison at the end of the series, Harvey insists she has no stalking convictions, let alone served time.
Promoting the Baby Reindeer stage show in 2019, Gadd said that over a four-and-a-half-year period, the real “Martha” sent him 41,071 emails, 350 hours of voicemails, 744 tweets, 46 Facebook messages and 106 pages of letters.
Ms Harvey, speaking to Piers Morgan on his YouTube show Uncensored in May, denied this. Gadd’s own statement filed with the California courts, seen by the Mail, states: “While the series is based on my life and real events… it is not a blow-by-blow account of the events and emotions I experienced as they happened. It is fiction and does not purport to portray real events.”
However, the statement goes on to document a long list of “real-life experiences” with Ms Harvey, who he chatted to in 2014, offering her a cup of tea at the pub where she worked because he noticed she “looked distressed”.
Evidence in the form of transcripts, emails, etc. has been submitted to the court as evidence, which is uncomfortable and sometimes shocking to read.
Gadd’s statement says she “frequently attacked me personally and threatened me in her emails.”
Gadd describes his fear increasing to the point where he changed his daily routine to avoid her.
This newspaper’s own investigations have failed to find any evidence of a stalking conviction, but Ms Harvey is said, however, to have received a first-instance stalking warning from the Metropolitan Police in relation to Gadd.
The Scottish MP’s lawyer and ex-wife, Laura Wray, has also said she applied for an “injunction” (a restraining order) against Ms Harvey in 2002 after being “harassed”.
Backstage after the Emmys, Gadd, who has been open about his own battles with mental health issues, was reluctant to discuss events off-camera.
“It’s easier to focus on the negatives these days,” he said laconically. “What you have to keep in mind is what Baby Reindeer has done globally… It’s touched so many people’s lives.”
Painful words for Fiona Harvey.
One wonders if Richard Gadd’s future projects for Netflix will draw as much from his own personal experience.