Revealed: The missing episode of Baby Reindeer, and why it was cut

2 days ago 11

Richard Gadd, the writer and star of the seven-part hit Netflix series Baby Reindeer, has for the first time revealed the existence of an eighth episode, which was cut from the show before release.

Speaking at the Future Vision television summit, presented by Australians in Film and Screen Australia at ACMI in Melbourne, the triple-Emmy-winning Scot told interviewer and fellow showrunner Tony Ayres (Clickbait, The Survivors, Stateless) that an entire episode set in Scotland was scrapped – at his insistence.

Richard Gadd as Donny Dunn in Baby Reindeer.

“I really fought to cut an episode of Baby Reindeer,” Gadd told a stunned audience. “I really wanted to cut it.”

The episode had been written as a pressure release of sorts, as Gadd’s hapless standup comedian Donny Dunn is reeling from the relentless attention of former lawyer-turned stalker Martha Scott (Jessica Gunning), a woman he met while working in a London bar.

“I remember when we were developing it, there was the note [from Netflix] that kept coming in – and probably rightfully so – that the show was just too dark, you need to give the audience a respite from it all,” Gadd said.

“And so there was an episode where I escape London to get away from Martha and everything, and I go and visit my parents [in Scotland]. There’s a whole episode where I go to the football with my dad, I spend a day with my dad, and stuff kind of happens.”

Richard Gadd won outstanding lead actor, Jessica Gunning won outstanding supporting actress and Baby Reindeer won outstanding limited or anthology series last month.

Martha was “sort of relentless”, he said, and the advice that the audience needed a break from her seemed reasonable. But Gadd said: “When we got to the edit, I felt you miss her every time she’s not on screen, and I felt in a lot of ways, the sooner you get back to her, the better. And so episode three is an amalgamation of a few episodes.

“The episode that’s missing ended with her in my kitchen, which is actually how we started [the final version of] episode three. So the edit was almost a complete rewrite of what was in the script.”

The decision clearly worked for the series, which has been viewed 96 million times on Netflix, won three BAFTA awards and six Emmys (including three for Gadd personally). But it doesn’t come without regrets.

“It’s a shame, because Mark Lewis Jones, who plays my dad, is one of the best actors I’ve ever worked with,” said Gadd. “He’s astonishing. And it’s a shame because people will never quite realise how much he gave to that project.”

Baby Reindeer is based on two stage shows Gadd produced, Monkey See, Monkey Do, which won the top comedy prize at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2016, and Baby Reindeer, which debuted in Edinburgh in 2019.

Both shows draw on his own experience of sexual abuse and stalking, and in its marketing for the TV series, Netflix insisted everything in it was true.

Scottish lawyer Fiona Harvey, whom the internet identified as the real-life Martha, is suing the streamer for defamation, in part because the show claimed she had twice been convicted of stalking, and had spent five years in jail for the crime, which is not true. She is seeking $US170 million ($259 million) in damages.

Though he is not named as a defendant, Gadd is unable to speak about the case for legal reasons.

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