When Donny Dunn (Richard Gadd), the protagonist of the autobiographical Netflix sensation “Baby Reindeer,” recalls the act of kindness toward a stranger that would come to derail his life, his initial explanation is deceptively simple: “I felt sorry for her.”
Donny is a fledgling comedian in his late twenties, tending bar at a London pub to make ends meet. Martha ( Jessica Gunning) is a heavyset, middle-aged frump who claims to be a high-powered lawyer but simultaneously insists that a cup of tea is beyond her means. Donny— maybe amused, maybe intrigued, definitely pitying—gives her one on the house. She becomes a regular and, after finding his e-mail address on his personal Web site, inundates him with dozens of missives a day, many of them brimming with lust and misspellings. She follows him home and to his gigs. Her convictions about their relationship—first and foremost the belief that they’re in one—are pure delusion. But Martha also senses a truth about Donny that no one else does. Early on, she asks, “Somebody hurt you, didn’t they?”
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