Richard Gadd has revealed that tears were shed on the set of Baby Reindeer during the filming of some of the show’s most heartbreaking scenes.
The Netflix show, which follows Richard’s character Donny as he is stalked by a woman called Martha, played by Jessica Gunning, has become a global hit since its release.
It shows Martha’s obsession developing as she emails Donny hundreds of times a day, showing up outside his house and harassing his family and friends. It is based on Richard’s real life experience.
Richard has opened up about filming episode four, in which his character is sexually assaulted by a TV writer who takes comedian Donny under his wing.
He said Variety: “We closed the set, but I was looking and I saw the prop guys wiping tears from their eyes as they put the props back where they should be.”
Richard Gadd has revealed that tears were shed on the set of Baby Reindeer during the filming of some of the show’s most heartbreaking scenes.
Richard opened up about filming episode four, in which his character is sexually assaulted.
‘The show was based on such trauma that everyone on set felt at times that it was something huge and weighty. And that’s why I think everyone had so much respect for everything. I was lucky to have this incredible team that felt it with me in many ways.”
In the same interview, Jessica shared how Richard works with We Are Survivors, a non-profit organization that supports men who are victims of rape and sexual abuse.
The organization has reportedly seen a 200% increase in the number of people seeking support, with 60% of them citing Baby Reindeer as the reason they reached out.
Jessica said of the show: ‘It’s not an easy, condensed story. In the end, not everything is tied up. I think it’s complicated, as life is. His dynamic is complicated and he’s very honest about it. “It’s very comforting to see.”
Richard said making the show with Netflix, based on two critically acclaimed shows he wrote and performed at the Edinburgh Fringe festival, was cathartic and helped him come to terms with what happened earlier in his life.
‘If people see it, they will know almost everything about me. “They may judge, they may disagree, and with that comes a certain amount of anxiety innately, but that’s what I signed up for,” he told The Times.
She pitched the show to Netflix after combining two critically acclaimed Edinburgh Fringe shows, Baby Reindeer and Monkey See, Monkey Do, which addressed her sexual harassment and assault respectively.
Over a period of four and a half years, the actor said he received 41,071 emails, 744 tweets, letters totaling 106 pages and 350 hours of voicemails. Richard told the Times that the police did not take his concerns seriously despite his concerns about how far Martha could go in real life in her devious activities.
He said: “We closed the set, but I was looking and saw the prop guys wiping tears from their eyes as they put the props back where they should be.”
The Netflix show, which follows Richard’s character Donny as he is stalked by a woman called Martha, played by Jessica Gunning, has become a global hit since its release.
She now says she is less likely to trust people after her adverse experiences with both men and women.
Richard concluded: ‘I used to approach situations with such abandon, never thinking about the future and putting my trust in people, and I burned out. It can be difficult to approach people now.”
Baby Reindeer has been a surprise hit for Netflix, having been viewed more than 60 million times in the first month.
Richard claimed that he went to great lengths to hide the identity of the woman who was stalking him in real life.
In the series, after Richard meets his stalker at the bar, things soon descend into chaos.
The chilling real-life drama was inspired by the ordeal suffered by Scottish creator and star Richard Gadd at the hands of ‘Martha’ (played by Jessica Gunning, right)
Richard was a struggling comedian who worked behind the bar of a pub in London.
He is seen to be regularly followed at home and at work, and tracked on Facebook using three fake accounts.
He said The times: ‘At first everyone in the pub thought it was funny that he had an admirer. Then he started invading my life, following me, showing up at my concerts, waiting outside my house, sending me thousands of voicemails and emails.’
He said it took “years” before the police finally took his complaints seriously – and six years before they finally intervened – something that prolonged the agony of everyone involved, including his relatives.
Police told her at the time that unless her harasser became physically violent, there was little they could do to resolve the problem.
He has said that he still finds it difficult to trust people and has followed “all the therapies.”
He added that years of being bullied have left him with something “like post-traumatic stress disorder.” For the Netflix role, he lost weight to match his “neurotic” 25-pound self at the height of his own bullying nightmare.
Gadd revealed that he first met ‘Martha’ when he was working in a pub and offered her a cup of tea because she was crying.
Richard said he is currently single and “more cautious” around people because of the campaign of terror Martha inflicted, saying, “It takes me a long time to trust them.” Before I would enter situations with so much abandon and it would burn me out.’
However, acting out a version of what happened to her has allowed her to have “ownership” of the trauma. Gadd won a Fringe Award for his stage show, also called Baby Reindeer, in 2019.
Speaking to the Telegraph in 2019 about the one-man show he wrote after the ordeal, which is currently playing at London’s Bush Theatre, he said: “It was debilitating beyond belief.”
‘I listened to his voicemails and felt my eyes fill with tears. They were tears of frustration. Proper stress for the brain.