Martha Stewart is considered quite a polarizing figure by superfans, defenders, critics, and skeptics alike. However, whichever way you might fall on the Stewart spectrum, most of us can agree that her life and career are undeniably fascinating.
From spending five months at a minimum-security prison in 2004 and 2005 to her public friendship with rapper Snoop Dogg, Martha Stewart never fails to keep people on their toes.
That seems to be why Netflix and director R.J. Cutler decided that Stewart’s story needed to be told, releasing the documentary “Martha” on the streaming platform on October 30. While it’s received mostly positive feedback from viewers, Stewart herself was decidedly unimpressed.
In an interview with The New York TimesStewart heavily critiqued Cutler for not using any of the material she’d allowed him access to.
“R.J. had total access, and he really used very little,” Stewart told the publication, referring to her archive. “It was just shocking.”
While Cutler turned down the opportunity to address Stewart’s annoyance, he insisted that he was “really proud of this film” and “admired Martha’s courage” in trusting him to tell the story of her life for millions of people to watch. “I’m not surprised that it’s hard for her to see aspects of it.”
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“Those last scenes with me looking like a lonely old lady walking hunched over in the garden? Boy, I told him to get rid of those. And he refused. I hate those last scenes. Hate them,” Steward emphasized to the New York Times.
Stewart explained that she had surgery done on her Achilles tendon and was “limping a little” afterward, but noticed that Cutler didn’t even mention why in the documentary. She pointed out that it was a testament to her strength — the fact that she could go through that surgery and “still work seven days a week.”
Stewart recalled telling Cutler that the most “essential” part of the documentary was playing “rap music.”
It’s no secret that Stewart is a fan of the genre, considering one of her closest friends is Snoop Dogg and the two have collaborated many times over the years. In fact, she figured that Snoop Dogg would score her movie.
“Dr. Dre will probably score it, or (Snoop Dogg) or Fredwreck. I said, ‘I want that music.’ And then he gets some lousy classical score in there, which has nothing to do with me,” she said.
Cutler added Snoop Dogg’s “Beautiful” to the end credits after Stewart watched the unfinished cut and took issue with the lack of rap music.
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She explained that during the filming process, Cutler had “three cameras’ on her, and yet she was quite unhappy with the final shots that ended up in the documentary. She told The New York Times that she explicitly told Cutler not to use any of the angles because she wasn’t a fan of how she looked in them.
“I told him, ‘Don’t use that angle! That’s not the nicest angle. You had three cameras. Use the other angle.’ He would not change that,” she recalled.
Stewart’s magazine, Martha Stewart Living, was something that she put her blood, sweat, and tears into. It featured a variety of lifestyle topics, including recipes, crafts, and home decor. Ultimately, the print edition of her magazine was discontinued in May 2022instead deciding to focus on its digital presence.
However, Stewart was adamant that her magazine should’ve been included more in the documentary, telling the New York Times, “My magazine, my Martha Stewart magazine, which you might say is traditional, was the most modern home magazine ever created.”
“We had avant-garde photography. Nobody ever showed puff pastry the way I showed it. Or the glossaries of the apples and the chrysanthemums,” she stressed. “We prided ourselves so much on all of that modernism. And he didn’t get any of that.”
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Stewart has two grandchildren, Jude, 13, and Truman, 12, through her daughter Alexis. While it was agreed that the kids wouldn’t be physically featured in the documentary, Stewart insisted that she’d spoken about them numerous times, and yet, that wasn’t included.
“There’s not even a mention. And these grandchildren are utterly fantastic,” she said. “My daughter was very against the children being included. But I could have talked about them, and I did. I’ve taken them to the most unusual places in the world, and they’re only 12 and 13. My love of travel wasn’t mentioned. My trip up Kilimanjaro wasn’t mentioned!”
Dershowitz is a well-known attorney who has represented a variety of celebrity clients like Mike Tyson, Patty Hearst, and Jim Bakker. However, Stewart told The New York Times that he’d flirted with her during the 1960s while she was married, and the story wasn’t included in the doc.
“He would be dribbling on the table,” she recalled. “That was the fun part, all of these stories. R.J. didn’t get any of that in the movie. Can you imagine?”
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Notably, the most infamous part of Stewart’s career and legacy was the five months that she spent behind bars for lying about a stock trade. She was convicted of conspiracy, obstruction, and lying to federal investigators about a stock sale. However, Steward doesn’t agree that her time in prison was important enough to even be included in the doc.
“The trial and the actual incarceration was less than two years out of an 83-year life. I considered it a vacation, to tell you the truth,” she said. “The trial itself was extremely boring. Even the judge fell asleep. R.J. didn’t even put that in. The judge was asleep at the bench. I wrote it in my diary every day.”
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Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.
