Richard Gadd in “Baby Reindeer.”
Netflix’s controversial series Baby Reindeer scored 11 Emmy nominations Wednesday, including acting nods for stars Richard Gadd and Jessica Gunning, as well as a nod for Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series or Movie.
Gadd was nominated in the lead acting category for playing Donny Dunn, while Gunning earned a supporting actress nomination for playing his alleged stalker, Martha Scott.
Baby Reindeer co-star Nava Mau also received a supporting actress nomination for playing Donny’s girlfriend, Teri, while Tom Goodman-Hill received a supporting actor nomination for his role as Darrien—a television writer who sexually abuses Donny.
Gadd also received a writing nomination for Baby Reindeer, while Weronika Tofilska was nominated for Best Direction.
The nominations for the 76th Annual Emmy Awards were announced by actors Sheryl Lee Ralph and Tony Hale at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood. The Hulu series Shōgun scored the most nominations with 25 nods, while the streaming service’s The Bear was next with 23.
The Primetime Emmys will be handed out on September 15 in a live broadcast on ABC.
Why Is ‘Baby Reindeer’ So Controversial?
Based on Richard Gadd’s 2019 one-man autobiographical stage play of the same name, Baby Reindeer caught fire quickly with Netflix viewers when it debuted on the streaming platform in April. Among Baby Reindeer’s supporters was legendary horror author Stephen King, who wrote an essay praising the series.
Baby Reindeer begins with a prologue that notes, “This is a true story,” and recalls Gadd’s harrowing encounter with an alleged stalker who he named Martha (Jessica Gunning). Since Gadd had fictionalized the story of Baby Reindeer for Netflix, he plays himself but names his character Donny Dunn.
Netflix, Gadd and the series have since been met with a firestorm of controversy. Claiming she was receiving online death threats after she was outed by internet sleuths, the woman purported to be the “real Martha” revealed her identity to be Fiona Harvey in a YouTube interview with journalist Piers Morgan on May 9.
Morgan’s hour-long interview with Harvey has nearly 14 million views to date.
Per Variety, Harvey sued Netflix in June, seeking at least $170 million in damages.