Netflix Responds After Tyra Banks Files Defamation Lawsuit Against Streamer

The legal battle centers on how much control, if any, Banks should have had over her own interview footage. Netflix insists she signed away that right before cameras even rolled.

Netflix is firing back after Tyra Banks filed a defamation lawsuit against the streaming giant earlier this year, involving the now-controversial docuseries "Reality Check: Inside America's Next Top Model."

The former host of "America's Next Top Model" filed suit in June, alleging Netflix's portrayal of her in the docuseries was defamatory and edited to support a false narrative. The company responded with a motion to dismiss the case, submitted Friday, August 14.

Netflix argued that Banks' complaints are "about ordinary editorial decisions," according to court documents obtained by People. Netflix and EverWonder Studio have also filed an anti-SLAPP motion, a legal tool intended to dismiss lawsuits that are without merit.

"After the interview, [Banks] signed an agreement granting the filmmakers the right to edit her interview footage, acknowledging she had 'no right to review or approve' the finished documentary, and releasing claims arising from it — including for defamation and false light," Netflix's motion read.

"She now alleges the documentary...defames her — not because it says anything false about her, but because she wanted advance notice of what another interviewee would say, more of her interview included, and her perspective presented differently."

A Netflix spokesperson issued a statement affirming the company's full support for the docuseries and the team behind it. "Directors Daniel Sivan and Mor Loushy are respected documentarians who thoroughly interviewed the people behind America's Next Top Model," the statement read.

"Tyra Banks was given the opportunity to speak openly about her experience and the creators fairly presented her perspective alongside those of every other participant shown in this documentary. We stand behind Reality Check: Inside America's Next Top Model and will continue to vigorously defend it."

Sources close to the company also told People that from the earliest stages of production, the creative team made clear how much they valued Banks' perspective, while also being upfront that she would have no editorial control over the finished series.

Banks hosted "America's Next Top Model" for 23 cycles, beginning with its 2003 premiere. In the three-part docuseries, she was asked to confront some of the more contentious chapters of the show's run head-on, including cycle 2 contestant Shandi Sullivan's alleged sexual assault.

In her lawsuit, Banks claims that only 16 minutes of her three-and-a-half-hour interview made it into the final cut, and that the clips used were "stripped of context and reassembled to support a false and defamatory narrative unrelated to what she actually expressed."

"Tyra Banks participated in the Netflix documentary series America's Next Top Model (ANTM) because she believed viewers deserved a candid conversation about the show's legacy — its successes and its shortcomings," the lawsuit states.

"There are aspects of the show for which Ms. Banks takes accountability, and she wanted ANTM viewers to hear that from her directly." The model is now seeking a jury trial to determine the "appropriate" damages she should be awarded.