I love television dramas, I really do. But there’s nothing more compelling to me than a drama based on a true story. I love sitting on my couch wondering — and eventually Googling — what is real, and what is fake. And now that the tides on Netflix’s Baby Reindeer have turned, I’ve got the next “based on a true story” drama for you to binge: Fake.
Fake is a new psychological thriller series starring Asher Keddie and David Wenham. It was released on July 4, and quickly took the title of Paramount+’s biggest first-week release of any local drama since Paramount+ landed on Aussie shores. Not too shabby!!!
So what is this show about and what is the true story behind it? Let’s find out.
What is Fake about?
Fake follows a magazine features writer named Birdie Bell (Asher Keddie) who has been out of the dating game for five years before deciding to give online dating a crack. But when she rocks up to her first date with a man named Joe Burt (David Wenham), she’s not too impressed.
After a lacklustre date at a cocktail bar, she intends on never seeing the architect-turned-farmer ever again. However, he’s persistent and eventually — after Birdie is reminded that she’s not getting any younger by her mum (we’ve all been there, sis) — she decides to give Joe another crack.
They quickly find themselves as a couple but soon, Birdie starts to become worried when she realises that her new boyfriend isn’t really the man she thought he was.
Compelling, no?
Is Fake based On a true story?
Fake is inspired by a memoir of the same name by journalist Stephanie Wood which was released in 2019. It was based on Wood’s own experience falling for a man who turned out to be a serial scammer known for seducing and manipulating women.
“I wrote a book to try to make sense of a devastating relationship I had with Joe, a man who turned out to be a mendacious fantasist,” Wood wrote in an article for The Sydney Morning Herald.
“Countless solitary hours at my computer, pouring out words for more than a year, turned into this, this huge, unimaginable things.”
Unlike the one we see unfold on screen, Wood’s relationship with Joe took place in New South Wales (not in Victoria) in 2014. After ending the relationship in 2015, she began to investigate who Joe truly was — and discovered he was a serial scam artist.
“There were red flags frequently from very early on, but these guys are just masters at manipulation and they are masters at dissembling and making up stories and inventing the most complicated reasons that seem logical to hose down your concerns,” Wood told the Daily Mail in 2019.
“I would raise things with the real guy and he would always have such intensely good explanations for things. There were red flags, but he was very good at putting them down.”
She found out that Joe had never been an architect, nor did he own a gorgeous rural property like he claimed. To make matters even worse, she discovered that he was seeing another woman at the same time as her.
Where can I watch Fake?
You can catch every episode of Fake on Paramount+.
I started binging it on the weekend and let me tell ya, I am bloody HOOKED. I reckon if you give it a chance, you’ll be too.
The post The True Story Behind Fake Is Even More Bone-Chilling Than The Asher Keddie-Led TV Show appeared first on PEDESTRIAN.TV .
