Martha Stewart is speaking out to slam the new Netflix documentary about her life, Martha, which is currently streaming.
Stewart Sounds Off
Stewart, 83, blasted the documentary’s filmmaker R.J. Cutler over how the film turned out. She went so far as to say that it was “shocking” just how little of her archive he used despite the fact that she gave him “total access.”
“Those last scenes with me looking like a lonely old lady walking hunched over in the garden?” Stewart told The New York Times. “Boy, I told him to get rid of those. And he refused. I hate those last scenes. Hate them.”
The documentary, which dropped on Wednesday, takes an in-depth look at Stewart’s entire life. It includes her 2004 Alderson Federal Prison Camp stint, which she believes should not have been the movie’s second half.
“The trial and the actual incarceration was less than two years out of an 83-year life,” she said. “I considered it a vacation, to tell you the truth.”
Check out a trailer for Martha below.
Related: Martha Stewart, 83, Admits To Cheating On Her Husband Of 29 Years In New Documentary
Stewart Rips ‘Lousy’ Soundtrack
Stewart also took issue with the documentary’s soundtrack. Indeed, she claimed that Cutler got “some lousy classical score in there, which has nothing to do with me.”
Stewart went on to say that Cutler ignored her request that he “play rap music,” which she said is an “essential part of the film.”
And quite interesting, for an octogenarian cook.
Even so, Stewart admitted that she enjoyed the first half of the movie.
“I love the first half of the documentary,” she said. “It gets into things that many people don’t know anything about, which is what I like about it.”
“That’s what I wanted the documentary to be,” Stewart added. “It shouldn’t be me boasting about inner strength and any of that crap. It should be about showing that you can get through life and still be yourself.”
Cutler fired back at Stewart’s criticisms by saying that Martha is “a movie, not a Wikipedia page.”
“It’s the story of an incredibly interesting human being who is complicated and visionary and brilliant,” he said. “I am really proud of this film, and I admire Martha’s courage in entrusting me to make it. I’m not surprised that it’s hard for her to see aspects of it.”
Related: Martha Stewart, 81, Fires Back At Her Haters – Claims She’s Had ‘No Plastic Surgery’
Stewart’s History
Stewart is known for being the first self-made female billionaire in the U.S. She launched her media empire in the 1990s as Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. Stewart achieved billionaire status in 1999 after she took the company public. She later fell off the billionaire list in 2001, and Forbes last reported her net worth to be around $220 million in 2015.
“I had opposition, and that kind of opposition to a woman-built business was really outrageous,” Stewart told People Magazine in 2020. “Even my own lawyers were negative about the possibility of success. I remember one lawyer sending me an orchid, saying, ‘Oh, you did it. Wow. What a surprise.'”
“I had a very successful career in the stock market, and I sometimes regret not staying in that business, because becoming an investment banker would’ve been pretty fabulous,” she continued. “But I was lured to the home.”
If you want to learn more about Stewart’s life, be sure to check out Martha on Netflix!