‘Surgical manipulation’: Details as Tyra Banks sues Netflix over America’s Next Top Model series

Tyra Banks is suing Netflix over the America’s Next Top Model documentary that was released earlier this year. She is said to be unhappy with how her interview section on Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model was shown.

The lawsuit was reportedly filed on June 13th, and claimed the series “was sold to viewers as a documentary series.” It added: “Netflix called it ‘the definitive, must-watch chronicle of America’s Next Top Model.’ The genre matters. Viewers of a documentary do not expect manufactured drama or constructed narratives. They expect facts.”

However, the lawsuit has claimed what viewers got was instead a “defamatory narrative”. The lawsuit said: “Because they were promised a documentary, that is exactly how viewers interacted with the Netflix series.” It said many of the clips used in the show had been “stripped of context and reassembled to support a false and defamatory narrative unrelated to what she [Tyra Banks] actually expressed.”

According to E! News, the lawsuit expressed that Tyra Banks  “believed viewers deserved a candid conversation about the show’s legacy—its successes and its shortcomings” but has claimed moments where she took accountability for ANTM’s controversies were edited out.

via Netflix

It said: “The false narrative the producers constructed—through selective editing, deliberate omission, and surgical manipulation of continuous footage—included that Ms. Banks knowingly allowed a contestant to be s*xually assaulted on her show, exploited that contestant’s trauma for ratings, and then could not even remember it when asked. That narrative about Ms. Banks is a complete fabrication—one that Netflix streamed to a global audience of millions.

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“Her answers were very honest. But the story that viewers heard was the deceptive story producers chose to tell.”

Following the release of the documentary, people noted that Tyra Banks didn’t exactly come across well. So, people questioned how much control she had over the final edit. Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model producer Vanessa Golembewski told Tudum the most important thing about the documentary was that it told the stories truthfully, and fairly.

“Tyra’s perspective was always important to the series, but it was just as important that her involvement was as an interview subject only,” she said. “She afforded us the same level of trust as everyone else who participates in the documentary. She never asked to have any creative input or control, and she’s seeing the footage for the first time alongside the rest of the world.”

Jay Manuel, who also featured in the doc added: “Tyra ultimately chose to participate without creative control. To me, that speaks to growth.”

Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model is available on Netflix now. For all the latest Netflix news and drops, like The Holy Church of Netflix on Facebook.