With secret scandal, dodgy dating history and a million in the bank – does Baby Reindeer star deserve praise?
FOR some he is the brave storyteller who has brought the serious issues of stalking and male sexual abuse to a global stage.
Yet to others, Richard Gadd has mined his personal traumas in order to satisfy his ego — sparking one of the biggest online witch hunts ever seen.
His smash-hit Netflix drama Baby Reindeer, based on his real-life experiences of being stalked by a woman after a chance encounter, has quickly become a hot topic, with horror legend Stephen King calling it one of the best things he has ever seen on TV and in the movies.
But Richard’s conduct has divided opinion, with critics accusing him of not doing enough to mask the identities of the real people who inspired his story, such as apparently using the original wording of emails sent by his stalker.
And law graduate Fiona Harvey, who has been accused of being the real stalker — named Martha in the drama — has accused comedian Richard of stalking her via the serial.
She said: “I’m not writing shows about him or promoting them in the media, am I?
“If he wanted me to be properly anonymous, he could have done so. Gadd should leave me alone.”
Even Richard appears shocked at how huge his creation — originally a stage show — has become. Last month he said: “It’s clearly struck a chord.
Masculinity crisis
“I really did believe in it, but it’s taken off so quickly that I do feel a bit windswept.”
And he added: “Who knew this weird story about a self-sabotaging comedian getting stalked and living in the aftermath of abuse would go on to touch so many people’s lives?
“Inspiration, hopefully, for those in a similar quagmire to keep going.”
But legal experts have warned that Richard and Netflix should have done more to protect the identities of people depicted in the drama — and online speculation could risk legal action for defamation.
Even presenter and author Richard Osman has joined the debate over the identity of a man who Richard Gadd claims sexually abused him in the drama.
The former Pointless co-host said: “He [Gadd] has been very open to people in the industry about who that person was, so people in the industry know who that person was.”
It followed internet sleuths wrongly naming the attacker as Richard Gadd’s pal, theatre director Sean Foley, who contacted police about the false accusations and has received death threats.
Richard has since urged the public not to speculate on who any of the real-life people could be and said innocent parties, including Sean, were “unfairly getting caught up” in the online witch hunt.
Richard, who identifies as bisexual, faced further controversy today when transgender actress Reece Lyons, who had hoped to play Richard’s lover Teri in Baby Reindeer, claimed to have had a fling with him in 2021.
She said she was “hurt” by his “conflating a work opportunity with a dating dynamic” and after calling it off after four dates felt “conflicted”, believing that turning him down could damage her chances at auditions.
Reece, who didn’t get the part, has since written about her interactions with Richard on X.
He declined to comment on her claims and Clerkenwell Films, who made Baby Reindeer, cleared him of any wrongdoing after an investigation, according to entertainment website Deadline.
I feel like I’m constantly in a state of flux with my sexuality
Richard Gadd
Richard said the sexual abuse he suffered led to a “masculinity crisis” and before it, he had always assumed he was straight.
He told Attitude magazine: “I feel like I’m constantly in a state of flux with my sexuality.
“Every time I land on one, my brain flies off to the other. It’s almost like a restlessness. But maybe that’s what bisexuality is.”
Richard was already an award-winning comedian, writer and performer before Baby Reindeer was picked up by Netflix.
It has been revealed that he is already a millionaire and is now tipped to win an Emmy for the serial, adapted from his award-winning Edinburgh Fringe play of the same name.
Born in Wormit, Fife, Richard, 34, grew up in a liberal family. His dad worked in a university lab and his mum was a school secretary.
He became interested in stand-up comedy while studying English and theatre at the University of Glasgow, though he said: “I was terrible.
“I was at mainstream comedy clubs doing comedy that was arguably quite bad, pressing the wrong buttons, alienatingly subversive.”
He then trained at the Oxford School of Drama in 2012.
His early Edinburgh Fringe shows demonstrated his promise before he had breakthrough success in 2016 with Monkey See Monkey Do, a harrowing account of being sexually assaulted by an older man he met earlier in his career, a subplot in Baby Reindeer.
In 2019 he said: “I remember feeling daunted as I was making it, thinking, ‘I’m going to have to make the ramifications of sexual abuse funny’.”
He won the Edinburgh Fringe comedy award with the one-man show, then three years later came Baby Reindeer, inspired by his four-and-a-half-year stalking.
I remember feeling daunted as I was making it, thinking, ‘I’m going to have to make the ramifications of sexual abuse funny’
Richard Gadd
He has revealed it was the shocking 2016 murder of teenager Shana Grice by an ex-partner after he had stalked her that inspired the play, which became a sell-out and talking point.
Asked in 2019 if publicising his story might cause his stalker’s activity to escalate, he said: “I have to admit that it hasn’t.
“Maybe seeing this in the press has made her think twice about her behaviour.”
For Richard, the process was cathartic. He said last month: “It was a weird thing to tell people.
“But I couldn’t keep it all in any more.”
As well as his stand-up career, Richard has also written an episode of another hit Netflix series, Sex Education, and has starred in Outlander and Code 404.
Latest accounts for his company RRSG, which he set up in 2018, show assets of more than £1million for 2023 — a huge jump from the previous year’s figure of £262,071.
He is already working on his next series, Lions, for the BBC. Set in Glasgow, it is about toxic masculinity.
Up to now Richard has been writing from his own experiences but last month he admitted: “I don’t have a limitless backstory of pain to go off — I’m not going to start walking through dodgy areas just to see what happens.
“I don’t want to be known as the guy that just plumbs the depths of his soul, but every writer writes from within.
“I almost think you could have ‘based on a true story’ before every show, because all the best shows come from a certain place within someone.”
And he said in 2019: “I think people see me as slightly mad. Almost like a quarantine section — good to look into for a while, but best not to open it up fully.”
