Martha Stewart is a complicated woman — and narrator — in the new documentary about her life.
Director R.J. Cutler knew he had a big job telling the story of a woman people have always had a lot of opinions about, the first female self-made billionaire in American history, the lifestyle guru whose fall from grace was widely celebrated, the person who marched out of federal prison — in her poncho to a private jet — and built her brand back up again, the original influencer who continues to stay relevant at 83.
“Martha’s story’s been told a lot, but it’s never been told by Martha,” Cutler said of Stewart’s participation in this film during a Q&A on Oct. 17 at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, N.Y.
The September Issue director filmed Stewart over approximately 15 days, with five days of eight-hour on-camera interviews. She turned over her personal photo archive, prison diaries, footage recorded leading up to her 2004 incarceration and letters she wrote about the end of her marriage to Andy Stewart.
Cutler said Stewart let him “know this was not going to be easy for her.” A friend notes in the documentary that she’s “not good” at expressing her emotions and has always been a “bit chilly.” So having her in the hot seat makes for a compelling watch.
“One of the things you see is that she’s a complicated narrator,” Cutler said. “In literary terms, she’s an unreliable narrator, right? There are different versions of things. It’s complicated. She’s complicated. Unreliable narration is maybe what [former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and later FBI Director] James Comey indicted her for.”
An example, shown in the trailer, is Stewart giving women whose “piece of shit” husbands are unfaithful advice to “get out of that marriage.” Cutler asks, “Didn’t you have an affair early on?” She replies — as calmly as ordering escargot — “Yeah, but I don’t think Andy ever knew about that.”
Stewart admitted in the doc to straying more than once — including on their honeymoon when she kissed a German stranger at the Duomo in Florence. Her explanation to Cutler was: “I was emotional. … [The cathedral] was unlike anything I had ever experienced. So why not kiss some stranger. … I wish we could all experience such an evening.”
“Who does that on their honeymoon?” Cutler said. “And talks about it? I didn’t know that was coming. There it was — and she wishes it on all of us.”
Here’s what else we learned watching Martha.
Stewart addresses securities case that put her in prison
Stewart was sitting atop her Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc. empire when investigators questioned her sale of ImClone Systems stock in 2002. Stewart and her stockbroker, Peter Bacanovic, maintained they had no insider information before the sale.
“I wasn’t scared,” Stewart, a former stockbroker herself, said in the doc. “I hadn’t done anything wrong that I knew about. My lawyers didn’t think I had done anything wrong. I did exactly what my lawyers had told me — answer everything as truthfully and as honestly as I could possibly — and when I didn’t remember, I said I didn’t remember.”
With charges brought by Comey’s office, Stewart went on trial — with her ex-best friend Mariana Pasternak testifying against her — and was found guilty of conspiracy to obstruct, obstruction of an agency proceeding and making false statements to federal investigators. The more serious securities fraud charge was dismissed. She served five months in prison, five months of home confinement and two years of probation for lying.
However, he added, “For somebody who doesn’t like to look back, she gave it up. She went there in so many ways.”
Martha is in theaters Oct. 25 and starts streaming on Netflix Oct. 30.
