Businesswoman and TV personality Martha Stewart has taken issue with a major new documentary about her life and work, which has premiered on Netflix.

Stewart (83), one of the most prominent media personalities in the US, criticizes the production, focus and editing of RJ Cutler’s Martha. She participated in the making of the film and contributed extensive contemporary interviews.

In an interview with The New York Times, Stewart expressed disdain for the product she was nominally promoting, saying that while Cutler was given “full access” to her archive, he “actually used very little. It was just shocking.”

She particularly had problems with the final section of the film, which she unsuccessfully lobbied the director to change. “Those last scenes where I look like a lonely old lady hunched over in the garden?” she said. “Boy, I told him to put that away. And he refused.

“I hate those last scenes. Hate them. I had torn my Achilles tendon. I had to undergo this horrible operation. And so I walked with a little limp. But again, he doesn’t even mention why – that I can survive that and still work seven days a week.”

Cutler’s previous work includes biographical studies of Billie Eilish, Elton John, John Belushi, Dick Cheney, and Anna Wintour. His first film credit, The War Room, about Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign, was nominated for the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.

Other criticisms of Martha by Stewart included the “crappy” score and the unflattering cinematography.

“I told RJ,” she said, “An essential part of the film is that you play rap music.” Dr. Dre will probably score it, or Snoop or Fredwreck. I said, ‘I want that music.’ And then he gets a crappy classical score on top of that, which has nothing to do with me. (Stewart co-hosted a TV series, Potluck Dinner Party, with Snoop Dogg from 2016 to 2020.)

The director also refused to follow her instructions about cameras, she said, despite using three. “He chooses to use the ugliest angle,” she said. “And I said to him, ‘Don’t use that corner! That’s not the prettiest angle. You had three cameras. Use the other corner.’ He wouldn’t change that.”

Meanwhile, Stewart believed Cutler chose to focus disproportionately on her high-profile 2004 trial, which led to her felony conviction related to stock trading.

“It wasn’t that important,” she told the New York Times. “The trial and actual incarceration took less than two years of an 83-year-old life. I thought of it as a vacation, to tell you the truth.”

However, Stewart said she liked the first half of the film because it “touches on things that a lot of people don’t know about”, and said she had received cheering feedback from young female viewers.

“So many girls have told me that watching it gave them a strength they didn’t know they had,” Stewart said. “And that’s what I like most about the documentary. It really shows a strong woman standing up for herself and going through both horror and great success.”

“That’s what I wanted the documentary to be,” she added. ‘I shouldn’t brag about inner strength and that kind of nonsense. It should be about showing that you can get through life and still be yourself.”

The director responded to his subject’s criticism by telling the publication: “I’m really proud of this film and I admire Martha’s courage in commissioning me to make it. I’m not surprised it’s hard for her to see aspects of it.

In 2021, Alanis Morissette disowned a documentary about her life and career, Jagged, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, and accused director Alison Klayman of betraying her trust.

“I was lulled into a false sense of security and their lustful agenda became immediately apparent when I saw the first cut of the film,” Morissette said. “This wasn’t the story I wanted to tell.”