Man confronts his twisted relationship with a stalker in Netflix's Baby Reindeer. The series follows an aspiring comedian as he deals with being stalked, and ultimately has to face his own buried trauma.
Baby Reindeer creator Richard Gadd has detailed the alleged abuse and harassment he suffered at the hands of the so-called real-life Martha Scott in legal documents backing Netflix 's bid to have her $170million defamation lawsuit thrown out.
Harvey, a Scot living in England, filed a lawsuit in federal court in Los Angeles last month alleging she was defamed over her portrayal as a stalker in the hit mini-series. She also alleged that the streaming giant was negligent, intentionally subjected her to emotional distress and violated her right to publicity.
'Overall, it was an incredibly stressful and worrying time, with a sustained period of relentless behavior taking place over several years,' he wrote in the court documents. Citing a message from January 2015, Gadd wrote in the document: 'Harvey sent me an email with the subject line"yummy mummy," which stated"I see your mum is on twitter . . . I looked up yours to see what was going on in your head and you retweeted her".'
'I never intended the Series to identify any real person as Martha Scott, including Harvey,' he wrote the documents. 'Martha Scott is not Fiona Harvey. Like all characters in the Series, Martha is a fictional character with fictional personality traits that are very different than Harvey's.' He also claimed that in 2016 he 'obtained a First Instance Harassment Warning against Harvey' from police in the UK, the court documents revealed.
The company, in the court filing which was obtained by DailyMail.com, argued the creation of Baby Reindeer falls under 'core free speech activities protected by the First Amendment'. The streaming service further argued that Harvey's conduct in real life was 'far worse than Martha's cinematic actions' meaning that any resemblance in Baby Reindeer was 'substantially true'.
'Rather, it was Harvey who thrust herself into the spotlight and identified herself as the supposed inspiration for Martha'. Netflix argued Harvey's claims should be dismissed because the series was not based on real life. Gadd echoed Netflix's claim, stating in his court filing that the series is 'not a documentary representing literally true details and imagery'
'I did not write the Series as a representation of actual facts about any real person, including Fiona Harvey. Harvey is never mentioned in the Series.' Harvey, unlike the character on the show, also never previously stalked a police officer, the lawsuit says.
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