Richard Gadd didn’t hold back when he hit the stage at Melbourne’s Future Vision television summit this week (July 14), opening up about sudden fame, radical honesty and the chaos that’s come with “Baby Reindeer.”
The Emmy-winning Netflix series, a raw retelling of Gadd’s real-life ordeal with sexual abuse and a relentless stalker, has won critical acclaim and multiple trophies, but it’s also landed him in the middle of a $170 million defamation lawsuit, limiting what he can say right now.
Rewind to 2017 and things looked very different. Gadd’s dark, self-lacerating comedy wasn’t exactly a hit with Melbourne crowds.
“Melbourne hated it,” he laughed, speaking at the summit hosted by Australians in Film, VicScreen and Screen Australia at ACMI. “I got the full review rainbow — 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 stars. So we put that on the posters. I actually sold loads of tickets because people wanted to decide for themselves.”
“Yeah, we don’t like awkward things here,” quipped moderator and fellow showrunner Tony Ayres (“Clickbait,” “The Survivors”).
Fast forward seven years and Gadd is back as a headline act. Released in April 2024, “Baby Reindeer” shot to No. 1 worldwide, with Gadd picking up three Emmys as creator and star.
The series grew out of his award-winning Edinburgh Fringe shows, where he first told the story on stage. But the overnight success brought fallout he never saw coming.
At one point, Gadd told Ayres, he was “the most Googled man on the planet.”
“It was like for three days straight when the show came out.. I think I was eighth overall that year, one behind King Charles, or something like that,” he said. “People just wanted to devour all the information, but it was very exposing. I was like, Jesus, this is a bit nuts.”
He called the ride from fringe comic to sudden celebrity “terrible,” “mad,” and “weird.”
“I’ve never craved fame. I’ve always wanted to write a piece of art that would inspire people and create conversation,” he said. “But all of a sudden I’m getting papped in the street, my friends are being papped, gossip columns… I never wanted or expected that.”
He likened the sudden fame to a scene from “Shaun of the Dead.” “I did the walk to my local shop the day before it came out, and then the second time, there were people all around coming up to me [like the zombies]… that was a big adjustment.”
As “Baby Reindeer” topped charts worldwide, Gadd found it tough to step out of the glare.
“Every time I went outside, people were outside my property, taking photos… my whole way of living just changed,” he said. “At one point, I never thought it would die down. It was pretty intolerable at certain stages.”
Growing a beard, wearing a cap and sunglasses helped. “It’s calmed down a bit now, and I’m definitely grateful for that.”
Asked how he stays grounded, Gadd said it helps to remember the difference between real life and the internet.
“The real world is very different to the online world and the press world. People tend to be fundamentally good,” he said. “For all the death threats I’ve had online, I’ve never had one to my face. Everything passes eventually. But it was a long hurricane.”
Social media, he admitted, still baffles him. “I’m not very good with it. But unfortunately it all comes into it now.”
Still, his advice for other writers was simple: focus on the work.
“I had about 2,000 followers when I did ‘Baby Reindeer.’ I was this kind of comedian that couldn’t get five minutes at the Glee Club. But if you write and do something special and unique, then nothing else really matters in a way,” he said.
“Art is a meritocracy. If you write something special, it can’t be ignored.”
A big part of “Baby Reindeer’s” power, he said, came from being brutally honest, including parts he’d rather have left out.
“There’s a level of honesty that hadn’t perhaps existed in shows before,” he said. “There were parts I would have loved to leave out — the complicity, the going back time and time again — but I had to put that in. That radical honesty is why the show got to where it was.”
When he feels stuck, he tries to remember that. “Every time I feel like I’m in a writing block, I ask, what am I avoiding here?”
Elsewhere, Gadd let slip there was once an eighth episode that didn’t make the cut.
And while the “Baby Reindeer” storm still swirls, he’s wrapped production on “Half Man,” a new six-part BBC and HBO co-pro starring Jamie Bell. The drama explores fractured family ties and marks his next chapter.