Fiona Harvey believes she was “set up” by Piers Morgan in ‘Baby Reindeer’ interview

10 May, 2024

baby reindeer

Fiona Harvey, the woman allegedly behind Baby Reindeer’s Martha character, has said she was “set up” by her interview with Piers Morgan.

Harvey gave her first television interview to Piers Morgan Uncensored, which aired last night (May 9), after confirming her identity for the first time earlier in the week.

Baby Reindeer is a semi-autobiographical series written by the comedian Richard Gadd that claims to tell the “true story” of a struggling stand-up (played by Gadd) who is maliciously stalked by an older woman named Martha.

In the interview, Harvey denied many aspects of the Netflix show’s narrative, saying that she did not stalk Gadd, attack his girlfriend, destroy the bar he worked in or contact his parents.

Morgan pressed Harvey on a number of the show’s assertions, including that she sent Gadd over 41,000 emails, over 100 handwritten letters and 350 hours of voicemail messages.

In response, Harvey claimed that she sent him “less than 10” emails, adding: “That’s simply not true. If somebody was sending somebody 41,000 emails or something, they’d be doing how many a day? Lots.”

Harvey has now given her reaction to the interview to the Daily Record, saying: “I wouldn’t say I was happy. It was very rapid to try to trip me up. He did it fast paced to catch me off guard. It seemed to me that I was set up. I feel a bit used.”

Elsewhere in the Morgan interview, Harvey was asked what her message for Gadd is now. “Leave me alone please,” she replied. “Get a life, get a proper job.”

She added: “I am horrified at what you’ve done.”

Harvey also confirmed that she will “absolutely” be taking legal action against both Gadd and Netflix, saying that she is “exploring all the options out there”.

Harvey, who is a qualified lawyer, had previously asserted that she intended to represent herself in any legal case. “I’m a perfectly capable lawyer so I will represent myself,” she told the Daily Record. “Gadd needs to prove I went to jail which just didn’t happen. I’ve never been sent to jail.”

She did confirm that Gadd had reminded her of a baby reindeer toy that she had as a child, which went on to inspire the title of the show, and recalled meeting Gadd at a pub in London “five or six” times and knew him for two or three months, but she says she did not have his number and they were not friends.

Netflix or Gadd himself have yet to comment on claims the woman is the ‘real-life’ Martha. Netflix’s policy chief Benjamin King said that Netflix and the production company “took every reasonable precaution in disguising the real-life identities of the people involved in that story”.

Almost immediately after the show premiered on Netflix last month, some viewers attempted to uncover the real identities of characters in the show, including Martha. Gadd himself subsequently urged people to refrain from speculation, saying, “that’s not the point of our show”.

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