Baby Reindeer star reveals ‘life took a dark turn’ amid 10-year stalking ordeal
When Baby Reindeer first hit our screens, it’s safe to say that the chilling Netflix series didn’t hold any punches as it followed the ordeal of one well intentioned stranger after his simple act of kindness led to a sustained campaign of stalking and harassment.
Split across seven episodes in total, the show followed the life of Donny, played by show creator Richard Gadd and his stalker Martha, portrayed by Jessica Gunning, who became suffocatingly obsessed with him after he innocently bought her a cup of coffee at his place of work.
Yet while the series is an intense but captivating watch, it is also underpinned by one dark truth in particular: the same thing actually happened to Richard, when a stalker dominated his life for the best part of ten years. Ahead of the show’s launch, Scottish comedian Richard, took part in a special Q&A session where revealed that he had made the decision to revisit his ordeal in a fictionalised format to help him find some kind of “catharsis.”
He explained: “Back in 2016, I did a show called Monkey See, Monkey Do, which explored some sort of dramatic things that happened in my life and I got a great deal of catharsis from it.
“There was a period in my life where I thought my life was going so wrong so badly that I could no longer be the guy that went on stage with a silly hat, telling stupid jokes. I just couldn't do that anymore. So my life had taken this dark turn.”
Richard continued: "The only way to keep going with my career I think was to embrace what I was going through. Otherwise, you know, my life existed in this horrendous juxtaposition that I just couldn't keep going inside. So that was it!”
Finding comfort in bringing his story to the public, the star added: “I did a few live shows about incidents that, of negativity that happened to me. I got a great deal of comfort from that and now let's see how much comfort I get to do it to 260 million people.”
Initially, Baby Reindeer was produced as a stage play to great acclaim before being translated onto the small screen with the help of streaming giant Netflix. In addition to writing the story, Richard was also keen to star in the production too, but even that didn’t come without some residual trauma of its own.
“There were definitely points where the walls and the set and the camera disappeared and I was right back there. That’s for sure,” he bravely admitted. "It was such a surreal thing and an amazing thing as well. Like incredible, you know, to go through such a period of darkness because the darkness is yet to come - this is pretty light stuff by comparison to what’s come and…yeah.”
He then added: “I thought there was no way out, there was no way of getting through this and then suddenly you’d be in a position where you've got 200 people on a set running around, screwing things into walls. Fantastic, unbelievable actors, you know, reliving these characters from your life. It's kind of incredible.”
Baby Reindeer is available to stream now on Netflix
