The real Martha Stewart is on display in new documentary. She's a ‘complicated narrator,' director says

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.

“It was so horrifying to me that I had to go through that — to be a trophy for these idiots in the U.S. attorney's office,” Stewart said. “Those prosecutors should have been put in a Cuisinart and turned on high. I was a trophy — a prominent woman, the first billionaire woman in America. ‘We got her.’”

Cutler spoke at the screening about looking with a modern lens at the way prosecutors “went after Martha” for a relatively minor crime and whether the ramifications would have been the same had she been a man.

“It was relatively easy to get a conviction,” Cutler said of Stewart’s case, which saw her get absolutely skewered in the press. (A New York Times article talked about how the designer Birkin bag she brought to court “cemented an image of her as a pampered fat cat.”) “Now, did she lie? Did she not lie? You saw [the film], you've seen the evidence. You've seen that she went to this interview and she was asked questions, and she said she couldn't remember, and they were certain that that meant she was covering up.”

She lost over a billion dollars amid fallout from conviction

While Stewart fought her way back professionally after her conviction, she ended up selling her namesake company in 2015 at a fraction of what it was once worth.

In an archival interview in the doc, she estimated that she lost “probably more than a billion dollars.” That’s a staggering sum, but even more for Stewart, who, in a new interview in the doc ruminated, “What is more important: a marriage or a career? I don't know.”

Cutler said at the screening, “I say and I think this film says that Martha suffered a loss. She has come back. … She’s doing amazing things at 83 and is tireless. … But she lost. ... You hear how much money she lost. That's a lot of money. And she lost her company, which was the thing she created. ... She lost a lot.”

She said her affairs were 'nothing' but felt Andy 'betrayed' her

Cutler questioned Stewart about her two affairs. She claimed her publisher husband never knew about them, but Cutler said Andy did know — and that Andy claimed he only strayed after finding Stewart did.

“Oh, that's not true,” Stewart replied. “I don't think … I had a very brief affair with a very attractive Irish man, and it was just nothing. It was nothing in terms of I would never have broken up a marriage for it. It was nothing. It was like the kiss in the cathedral.”

Stewart talked about how Andy — with whom she has now-59-year-old daughter Alexis — had an affair with her flower arranger Robyn Fairclough. The TV personality blamed herself for allowing Fairclough to move into the barn on their property when Fairclough needed somewhere to live.

“When I was traveling, Andy started up with her,” Stewart said. “It was like I put out a snack for Andy … Andy betrayed me right on our property. Not nice.”

Stewart told Cutler the topic was “hard for me personally to talk about,” explaining, “Some people revel in self-pity, etc., etc. I just don't. I handed over letters that were very personal” in her archive that detailed the breakup of her marriage. “So guess what: Take it out of the letters.”

After Stewart and Andy divorced, he married Fairclough, but the marriage later ended. He was married for the third time, to Shyla Nelson Stewart, in 2016.

Nelson Stewart wrote about the doc on Facebook on Oct. 12. She claimed her husband was in an “abusive marriage” with Stewart, and he’s moved on while Stewart continues to “publicly relitigate the marriage.”

Nelson Stewart added, “We both wish everyone, including Martha herself, the experience of loving and being loved deeply and fully, and the peace that comes from such a love.”

Stewart revealed that boyfriend of 15 years dumped her to marry a younger woman

Stewart said her life became “less exciting” after prison and it “affected my relationship with Charles Simonyi," the billionaire tech tycoon who worked for Microsoft. She claimed they were “in bed together” when Simonyi announced he was marrying someone else.

“He said, ‘You know, Martha, I'm going to get married … to Lisa,’” Stewart recalled.’” I said, ‘Lisa who?’ He hadn’t told me a word.” Simonyi married Lisa Persdotter, the daughter of a Swedish millionaire, who is 32 years his junior.

“I thought that was the most horrible thing a person could do,” Stewart said. “How can a man who spent 15 years with me do that? What a stupid thing to do to someone that you actually care about.”

She referred to it as her “second divorce.”

In the doc, Stewart was asked if she ever had a relationship in which she talked about her feelings. She said no.

“That's probably why I haven't had very many personal relationships with men, for example, because I couldn't care less,” she replied.

Stewart has opinions about how the documentary turned out

Based on some of Stewart’s answers, it’s probably no surprise that she has a tough critique of Cutler’s film.

According to the filmmaker, Stewart said she “wouldn’t change a frame” leading up to the trial, which is the centerpiece of the doc. She felt that especially her early years — growing up in Nutley, N.J., in a modest home with a father who had similar emotional restrictions — were “depicted with what she felt was great clarity” and in a way she hadn’t seen before.

That said, “If Martha was making the film, it would be a different film,” Cutler said. He said Stewart wanted to know, “‘Why isn’t this movie about all the things I’m doing now?’” versus her life story.

“Martha moves forward,” he said. “Martha does not reflect. Martha told me once that she went to therapy, and 10 minutes into the session, she got up and as she was walking out the door, she said, ‘Don't send me the bill.’ That’s Martha. She’s figuring out the future to this day.”

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.