Baby Reindeer is a darkly comic and chilling show based on Richard Gadd’s personal experiences with a stalker. It debuted as a one-man-show at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and was also filmed in Scotland, as well as the English capital of London, where the live show expanded after its initial success.
Allow me to walk you through some background details of the Netflix production that resulted from the live show’s success, with filming locations that include my native Scotland.
Filming Locations Explained
Edinburgh
Gadd would originally write the script for a one-man show to be performed at the world-famous Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, so it is no surprise that filming would take place in the capital of Scotland for some of this production. Gadd himself is also Scottish, like me, so filming there was probably comfortable and enjoyable for Gadd and the rest of the crew.
London
Donny and Martha meet in a London pub called The Heart
The story starts with Gadd telling the audience that he moved to London in an attempt to make a career in stand-up comedy, but his act does not go down too well, and he ends up working in a pub. It’s here where he first encounters Martha, his stalker.
In a strange life-imitating-art situation, Gadd’s original one-man play would do so well in Edinburgh that it would also have a run in London. Various London locations are used, including Hoxton Street. where Martha and Donny meet in Episode 1. Later we see Martha’s flat at a tower block before she reveals she lives at Belle Isle Park.
The pub where Donny works is The Heart, which the show tells us is in Camden, but this may be a fictionalized version of the real pub where Gadd worked.
Names and places were changed for the production, as it was based on a true story, and Gadd would want to avoid using real names.
Who produced Baby Reindeer?
The production company Clerkenwell Films is behind the show, and they would have previous success with another darkly comic show, The End of the Fuc#ing World.
The named producer on the series is Matthew Mulot and the executive producers are Petra Fried, Ed Macdonald, Matt Jarvis, and Wim De Greef.
Creator and writer Richard Gadd, who also stars, is an executive producer.
Production Timeline
I’ve broken down the path of Baby Reindeer from stage to screen to give a better sense of how the deeply personal story made its way to streaming:
- Gadd would write the play the series was based on and perform it in Edinburgh in 2019.
- The play was successful, transferring to London, and even had a run in Brooklyn, New York.
- In December 2020, it was announced that Netflix was interested in the material for a series, with Gadd on board to write.
- Weronika Tofilska was named as the director in August 2022, and casting for the leads was also announced in August.
- Filming started right away in August 2022 and would continue through until March 2023, when Nava Mau was cast.
- Baby Reindeer dropped on the streaming platform on April 11, 2024.
My colleague’s Baby Reindeer review provides a spoiler-free overview of our thoughts on the series, but if you’re interested in that fascinatingly ambiguous climax, he also broke down Baby Reindeer’s ending in considerable depth. I also rounded up a list of 10 shows like Baby Reindeer if you want more recommendations.
