Baby Reindeer. What to say about it? It is an absolutely brilliant TV show that is ranked #1 in several countries on Netflix! It is a dark drama-comedy based on real-life events that skilfully and unashamedly explores the nuances of the human condition and how we deal with abuse and emotional trauma.
But which aspects of this harrowing and disturbing story are true, and which are fiction?
The series focuses on the life of the main character, Donny Dunn, which is based on the traumatic life experiences of Scottish comedian Richard Gadd. In his mid-twenties, on his journey to become a comedian, he experiences a harsh reality, to the point that he gets tangled with a serial stalker: Martha, played marvellously by Jessica Gunning.
The original play was a one-man show in which Gadd played all the characters. Adapting it into a six-limited-episode TV series was no easy task. Baby Reindeer was a big challenge.
As the scriptwriter, Gadd and the production’s creative team had to take some artistic licences to create drama and tension. An entire cast was obviously included to fit the one-man show into a broader narrative.
Baby Reindeer’s process involved including a whole cast and modifying some facts and the timeline of events. So, which are the facts, and which are the dramatic licences?
Baby Reindeer Meets His Stalker
When it comes to when Donny and Martha met, the show remains loyal to what happened in reality: Gadd offered a cup of tea out of kindness to his to-be stalker.
With a couple of scenes shot in the bar where Donny worked, it is possible to understand that that single act out of pity triggered an obsession in Martha. “At first, everyone at the pub thought it was funny that I had an admirer,” Gadd told The Times.
The Obsession
This gentle act out of pity starts a series of events that includes Martha obsessively showing up at Gadd’s workplace and sending thousands of emails, letters, and voicemails. Every eerie email that Donny receives in the show is real. The real stalker sent Gadd 41,000 emails that were far more intense than depicted on screen.
Something that was not featured in the Netflix series is that the real stalker also sent a reindeer toy, sleeping pills, a woolly hat, and boxers. Through almost five years, his stalker sent him 350 hours of voicemail, 744 tweets, 46 Facebook messages, and 106 pages of letters.
Taking it to the Police
As Gadd told The Guardian, it took six years, almost seven, until the police took things into the matter. In the TV series, the police initially don’t believe that Donny’s claims about Martha are a real threat. They dismiss him as fast as he gets to the police station. Gadd explained in several interviews that dealing with police matters is nothing like on TV.
The Eerie Detail
Every email the stalker sent to Donny was signed with the phrase “sent from my iPhone”, although she didn’t own that type of phone. A lot of those with spelling mistakes, such as “iphon”. This is the case depicted in the show, as it was in reality.
What Other Dramatic Licences Prevail Over the Real Story?
Names were changed and fictionalized to protect the identities of the individuals involved in the story. “What’s been borrowed is an emotional truth, not a fact-by-fact profile of someone“, Gadd told HQ.
Gadd has emphasized in different interviews that, for him, stalking and harassment are forms of mental illnesses and that this is the reason that explains the script and his intentions of portraying her stalker, not as a monster or psycho, but as someone who the system failed her.
The same goes for his role in Baby Reindeer, where he depicts the difficulties victims of abuse experience when dealing with new traumatic experiences, such as having a stalker.
In the show, Martha is sentenced to a couple of months in prison. However, whether the real-life ‘Martha’ ever went to prison remains unclear. We also don’t know if his father’s abuse in the past is true or fiction.
The TV show simplifies the timeline and adjusts some main events to fit into a seven-episode series. Unlike Netflix Baby Reindeer, the original timeline spun over several years more than what’s displayed.
Thoughts on the Adaptation
Even though the show explores harrowing personal traumas, Baby Reindeer’s dark humour has managed to captivate a massive international audience. The balance between humour, tension-filled scenes and traumatic moments is very well done—a significant and indispensable element of this dark drama-comedy.
Gadd gives the typical black & white bad-stalker good-victim a twist by offering a straightforward look at the effects of stalking and reflecting on the complicated elements of abuse, which can sometimes create an attachment to their abuser.
Being able to tell the difference between the series’ real and fictional events can enrich our experience as viewers, as we can appreciate the creative work behind the adaptation, as well as the limitations of Baby Reindeer.
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