Richard Gadd found fame as the writer and star of Baby Reindeer and several sources have recently revealed he’s secretly a millionaire. Gadd has made a significant amount of money through his comedy career, with the bulk of his net worth coming from the Netflix show.

As of 2024, Richard Gadd’s net worth is over $1.3 million.

Gadd’s story began long before the creation of Baby Reindeer. The Netflix show remained lowkey for years after its premiere at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

In addition to his comedy roles, Richard Gadd has a highly profitable business and makes a fortune from writing and acting. Let’s take a closer look at how he made his wealth.

How Much is Richard Gadd Worth in 2024?

  • Net Worth: Estimated at $1.3 million.
  • Netflix Earnings: Significant boost in wealth from Baby Reindeer series.
  • Company Profits (2022): £178,344 ($220,415).
  • Company Assets (2024): Over £1 million ($1.29 million).
  • Real Estate: Undisclosed investments.
  • Other Income: Earnings from writing, acting, and stand-up comedy.
  • Total Net Worth: $1.3 million.

6 Fun Facts About Richard Gadd

  • Fringe Success: Rose to fame with Baby Reindeer at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
  • Edinburgh Awards: Won several prestigious awards for his unique and innovative shows.
  • Personal Challenges: Has openly discussed his experiences with sexual abuse, which he incorporates into his work.
  • TV Roles: Appeared in shows like Clique, Code 404, and Wedding Season.
  • Charity Work: Ambassador for We Are Survivors, a UK-based charity.
  • Company Growth: His company’s assets quadrupled after his Netflix success.

Richard Gadd’s Net Worth: Full Breakdown

Since the release of his Netflix show in May 2024, Richard Gadd’s net worth has skyrocketed. His company now has four times the amount of assets it had two years ago, which automatically made its owner, Gadd, a millionaire.

While the details of where all of his earnings come from aren’t public knowledge, we uncovered that the comedian and writer has had several highly successful shows in his career, not to mention winning some highly prestigious awards for his creativity and acting talent.

Based on what we found, below you’ll see a net worth breakdown of his main assets and earnings:

Asset or Income Source Contribution to Net Worth
Company profits, 2022 £178,344 ($220,415)
Company assets, 2024 £1+ million ($1.29+ million)
Real estate Undisclosed
Total Net Worth $1.3 million

Richard Gadd’s Early Life and Education

Richard Gadd was born on May 11, 1989, in Wormit, Scotland. He studied at Wormit Primary School and Madras College, followed by his studies at the University of Glasgow, where he graduated in English literature and theatre.

In 2012, Richard Gadd completed another course, this time at the Oxford School of Drama.

During his time at high school, Gadd took the lead role in the production of Macbeth, planting the seed for his entertainment career. Afterward, when he was at college and university, he traveled across the country and performed stand-up routines.

The first time Richard Gadd performed at the Edinburgh Fringe was while at university. In 2010, he won the Laughing Penguin New Act of the Year Award. A year later, he was a finalist for the Student Comedy Awards by Chortle, going up against Glenn Moore, the Mock the Week star.

At around this time, Gadd was also part of a comedy group called Gadd, Kirk, and Winning. The trio performed with Scot Squad star James Allenby-Kirk and Gary: Tank Commander.

Personal Life

Richard Gadd identifies as bisexual, and previously dated a transgender woman as shown in his famed TV series. As a person who has been sexually assaulted in the past, he is an ambassador for a UK-based charity called We Are Survivors.

According to Companies House records, Gadd is registered under a second name, calling himself Dr Robert Stephenson. However, there is no official record of him changing his name or any explanation of this data.

Richard Gadd Net Worth: Comedy Career and Rise to Fame with Baby Reindeer

Baby Reindeer might have been Richard Gadd’s biggest success to date, but this wasn’t his first foray into the entertainment industry. Even before the famous Netflix show, he was popular in TV and comedy circles, both as an actor and a writer.

Below we’ll explore how he built his career in comedy and came to create Baby Reindeer.

Early Career

Gadd started his career putting on comedy shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, with his early shows including:

  • Cheese & Crack Whores (2013)
  • Breaking Gadd (2014)
  • Waiting for Gaddot (2015)
  • Monkey See Monkey Do (2016)

All of his shows were also played at the Soho Theatre in London and won several prestigious awards over the years. Waiting for Gaddot, for instance, won a Scottish Comedy Award and an Amused Moose Comedy Award. The same show was also nominated for a Chortle Award for Innovation and Malcolm Hardee Award for Innovation.

The Success of Monkey See Monkey Do

Monkey See Monkey Do, his most successful stage show to date, won the Edinburgh Comedy Award for Best Comedy Show. The show premiered in 2016 and was nominated for Off-West End Theatre Award and Total Theatre Award for Innovation.

From the Edinburgh Fringe to the London Soho Theatre, it proceeded to tour the UK and Europe and even had a run at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, where it was nominated for the Barry Award.

A year after its premiere, Monkey See Monkey Do was broadcast on the Comedy Central TV channel. It was also nominated for a Total Theatre Award for Innovation and helped Gadd win his Chortle Comedian’s Comedian Award.

richard gadd monkey see monkey do
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In this show, Gadd was running on a treadmill, telling people jokes. This was the first show in which he shared his experiences with sexual abuse, telling the audience he was raped at a house party when he was a student.

richard gadd performing
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“People in the industry would come and see the trilogy and maybe they found it funny and entertaining but there’s no way they could’ve seen me as someone they could put on TV. I think they thought, this guy has got to be mad,” Gadd shared about the success of his show.

With Monkey See, Monkey Do, it brought humanity to my work and contextualized the trilogy in a lot of ways

Writing and TV Roles

At the same time as performing as a comedian, Richard Gadd also appeared in several TV shows and wrote the scripts for several productions. His TV roles include:

  • Tripped, an E4 mini-series in 2015, as Callum
  • Against the Law, a BBC Two series in 2017, as Eddie McNally
  • Clique, a BBC Three thriller series in 2018
  • One Normal Night, in 2019
  • Code 404, a comedy-drama in 2020
  • Wedding Season, a Disney Plus series in 2022, as Conrad Lennox
ricahrd gadd tripped
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After his award wins for Monkey See Monkey Do, Gadd spent some time writing episodes for Jon Richardson: Ultimate Worrier and the Netflix hit Sex Education.

Baby Reindeer Success

Gadd’s next show would become his biggest success to date. Baby Reindeer is a show about Gadd’s experiences with being stalked. It premiered at the 2019 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, just like his previous shows, and won two awards that same year:

After its initial success, the show went on to a five-week run at The Bush Theatre, London. This is where it won its third award, the Off-West End Theatre Award for Best Video Design. Gadd was also nominated for the Best Performer award.

ricahrd gadd baby reindeer
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When the five-week run ended, the show transferred to play at the Ambassador’s Theatre in the West End, London. However, the COVID-19 pandemic prevented the show from happening, so Gadd had to cancel it for a few months.

A few months later, the show won the Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre.

 

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Even though Gadd’s Baby Reindeer show dates back to 2019, Netflix didn’t discover it until 2023, when it approached the writer and comedian with a contract. In May 2024, Netflix released a seven-episode drama based on the play, starring Gadd himself. Gadd later shared that he lost 28 kilograms (61 lbs) to play the fictionalized version of himself to appear more “vulnerable and fragile” in Baby Reindeer.

“To play Donny Dunn, I had to go back to that head space where I was at the time [in real life], which was very raw and very damaged. I lost a lot of weight because I wanted to feel vulnerable and fragile in my body. I went from 96 kilograms [211 lbs] to 68 [149 lbs]… Going back to that stuff is tough. It brings up stuff and makes you feel weird and a bit wonky,” he explained.

As the executive producer, creator, and performer behind the Netflix series, Gadd reached his “secret millionaire” status in less than a year.

The Story of Baby Reindeer

The limited series casts Gadd as Donny Dunn, a struggling comedian who meets a lonely woman in a bar where he works. He offers her a free cup of tea, which is followed by several months of Martha, the woman, stalking him. Over several years, Martha sends Dunn over 41,000 emails, 100 pages of letters, 744 tweets, and 350 hours of voicemails. She also sends him a variety of weird gifts such as sleeping pills, boxer shorts, and a reindeer toy.

richard gadd baby reindeer promo
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In the show, Martha is portrayed by Jessica Gunning. The character Martha ends up in jail at the end of the series.

During the show, the emails and transcriptions that Gadd received from the actual stalker, named Martha in the show, appear on the screen. Martha obsessively stalked him at his workplace, outside his home, and even on stage when he performed at comedy clubs. She harassed his parents and the trans woman he dated at the time, as well.

“At first everyone at the pub thought it was funny that I had an admirer,” Gadd said in an interview with The Times. “Then she started to invade my life, following me, turning up at my gigs, waiting outside my house, sending thousands of voicemails and emails.”

The first episode of the show Baby Reindeer was watched by over 3 million viewers in a single week in April, according to Deadline.

When Gadd decided to go to the police, he was blamed for “harassing the police about being harassed”.

The Real Martha

Even though Gadd never disclosed the real name of his stalker and said he is keeping all details private, 59-year-old Fiona Harvey recently came forward, claiming she is the real-life inspiration for the character in the show. After the show was released, the alleged stalker who inspired the character came forward and told the Daily Mail in April 2024 that she would be taking legal action.

Harvey insisted that, at this point, Gadd was obsessed with her, saying “He’s using Baby Reindeer to stalk me now. I’m the victim. He’s written a bloody show about me.” In addition to this, Harvey shared that she is receiving death threats and abuse from Gadd’s supporters.

On May 8, 2024, Piers Morgan shared Harvey’s photo on Twitter, saying “The real-life Martha from Baby Reindeer breaks cover and gives me her first TV interview about the smash hit Netflix show.”

In June, it was reported that Harvey was suing Netflix over the Baby Reindeer character, seeking $170 million in damages.

To date, Netflix is going to great lengths to protect the identities of the real people involved in the story, but there have been many speculations about who is who. At one point, there were rumors that Sean Foley, the British director, was the older man who sexually assaulted Gadd. Foley was mistakenly identified as Darrien from the show.

What Does Richard Gadd Invest In?

The famous Baby Reindeer star Richard Gadd makes the bulk of his fortune through his personal firm RRSG Ltd. He reportedly signed the contract with Netflix through this company, as well as using it for his other shows.

In 2014, Gadd was noted as a company director of a firm called Little Monkeys Production Limited, which is now dissolved.

The public discovered that Gadd was a secret millionaire with the release of financial records from Companies House. According to the records, RRSG Ltd. has assets totaling over £1 million ($1.29 million), which include £819,959 ($1.57 million) in cash reserves. The company’s profits grew tremendously in 2023, quadrupling even, when Netflix picked up Baby Reindeer.

In comparison, his company only made £178,344 ($220,415 at the time) in profits in 2022.

As for Gadd’s investments, he reportedly purchased a flat in Finsbury Park in 2020, though its value hasn’t been publicly disclosed.

What Can We Learn from Richard Gadd’s Story?

Richard Gadd’s story offers several key lessons. For starters, his success took time and didn’t come overnight. His journey began with performing stand-up routines and creating comedy shows, slowly building his reputation as a comedian.

Gadd’s work often involved innovative, personal storytelling.

His authenticity on the stage and his willingness to tackle the most delicate subjects eventually propelled him to incredible fame, resonating with audiences and critics alike.

Besides performing, Gadd has also written scripts and taken on various TV roles, showing the importance of diversifying one’s skills and opportunities in the entertainment industry – and any industry, for that matter.

Gadd has faced many personal challenges, including dealing with a stalker, which he transformed into a successful show. This demonstrates how personal adversities can be channeled into creative and professional achievements.

Despite the public nature of his work, Gadd has managed to maintain a great level of privacy, especially regarding sensitive personal matters. This shows the importance of setting boundaries, even in a public career.

Finally, Gadd’s financial success was significantly boosted by strategic business decisions, such as forming his own company and making profitable deals, like the one with Netflix.