Baby reindeer, now streaming on Netflix, has become a viral sensation both in its home country of Britain and beyond in the week since its largely unheralded release. It’s easy to understand why; This true story about a struggling comedian and his stalker – written by and starring Richard Gadd and based on his own life – is darkly funny, propulsive, tragic and peppered with incredible twists and turns of events. It combines the voyeuristic thrill of true crime with the emotional underbelly of memoir. It’s almost impossible not to find this miniseries bursting with fascinated horror.
Gadd’s extraordinary story, based on his one-man show of the same name (and, to a lesser extent, an earlier show called Copycat), is part of a trend in British television where young stars boost their careers with intimate, if fictionalized, autobiographies, often adapted from confessional shows or stand-up routines. The best-known examples are those of Phoebe Waller-Bridge Flea bag and that of Michaela Coel I can destroy you; another recent one was Mae Martin’s Netflix show Feel gooda much lighter proposition – it’s basically a rom-com – that still has striking similarities Baby reindeerboth in its depiction of London’s small stand-up scene and in some of the darker elements of Martin and Gadd’s backstories.
Photo: Ed Miller/Netflix
The story Gadd has to tell, however, is slightly different. says Gadd the events of Baby reindeer have been changed to create more climactic moments and to protect the identities of the people it’s based on, but they remain ’emotionally true’. Gadd plays a version of himself named Donny Dunn, who works as a bartender while struggling to launch a flying comedy career. (Gadd doesn’t spare himself in the cringe-worthy unfunny portrayals of Dunn’s act.)
One day, a nervous woman named Martha (Jessica Gunning) enters the pub where Donny works. She seems upset and wants to sit at the bar for a while, but can’t afford a drink (despite claiming to be a successful lawyer), so Donny gives her a cup of tea on the house. She is deeply moved and immediately clings to him. Donny senses danger, but also likes the attention. It isn’t long before Martha bombards Donny with unreadable, explicit emails, stalks him, and sits at the bus stop in front of his house for hours. Her pet name for him is ‘baby reindeer’.
Crucially, Baby reindeer isn’t a straight-up ‘stalker from hell’ thriller that demonizes the stalker – or lets Donny off the hook completely. With excruciating candor, Gadd describes the many mistakes Donny makes in dealing with the situation, whether driven by naivete, pity for Martha, or his own twisted vanity. He only makes matters worse, and the escalations that follow are startling. Every possible solution is thwarted one way or another. Donny and Martha can’t seem to escape each other; Martha seems to sense something traumatic in Donny’s past that others don’t notice, and it gives her a strange power over him.
Photo: Ed Miller/Netflix
Baby reindeer explores fascinating gray areas around consent, compassion, responsibility, masculinity, mental health and gender power dynamics, always avoiding giving glib, easy answers. It’s a well-structured and gripping show, even if it relies heavily on voiceover speaking through every constriction of Donny’s spiraling state of mind. Gadd plays a naked honesty in scenes that must have been very difficult for him to personally re-watch, while Gunning is truly extraordinary: she is volatile in a way that is frightening, but can also be perceptive, tender and even heartbreakingly open. Tom Goodman-Hill also stands out, playing a crucial figure from Donny’s past with chilling awkwardness.
Baby reindeer is irresistible quality TV. It’s worth watching. But by the end, you can feel uncomfortable in a way the show didn’t necessarily intend. While later episodes detail Donny’s difficulty in letting go of the situation even as an apparent escape presents itself, it’s hard not to think that Gadd has now parlayed these events from his own life into one stand-up show, and then another , and now this series. Nearly a decade after his real stalker started persecuting him, he’s still talking about it. It has brought him success and his intentions seem sincere. But what about the intentions of the TV executives who create a buyer’s market for the personal traumas of young performers and an assembly line to turn them into entertainment? It’s notable that Waller-Bridge and Coel, two of the greatest talents of their generation, have struggled to follow through on their breakthroughs. Perhaps all this display of soul comes at a creative cost. Baby reindeer is great, but I hope Gadd can move on now.
Baby reindeer is now streaming on Netflix.