6 major times The Act strayed from the real story

The Act — ” ” — Dee Dee Blanchard (Patricia Arquette), Gypsy Rose Blanchard (Joey King) shown. (Photo by: Brownie Harris / Hulu)

1. Downplaying Dee Dee’s control over Gypsy

Let’s start with the most egregious offense: making Dee Dee’s mental and emotional control over Gypsy less than what it really was.

Here are some things that Kristy and Macelli told In Touch never happened. Gypsy never snuck off to buy her own laptop or cell phone. She had a cell phone, but it was on her mother’s plan and the laptop was shared as well.

Gypsy wasn’t manipulated into signing away her medical guardianship. Dee Dee didn’t even give her the chance. Dee Dee just forged the signatures. In fact, according to Macelli, forging signatures was par for the course for Dee Dee when it came to Gypsy.

Then there’s the tying Gypsy up to a bed incident. Hoo-boy did that not happen the way The Act claims it did.

First, Gypsy never ever spat in her mother’s face. According to Kristy’s interview with In Touch, Gypsy was constantly way too scared to ever fight back.

Now, Gypsy did try to run away a few times, including the time we see her run away with the guy from the convention. But each time (well, at least the two times outlined by Macelli in the In Touch article), Dee Dee responded in a frightening manner.

After the convention guy attempted to escape, Dee Dee chained Gypsy to her bed for days (plural, multiple days). And yes, not tied with a nice scarf while verging on tears like it’s portrayed in The Act, she chained her daughter up.

Regarding that incident, Gypsy told People, “She physically chained me to the bed, and put bells on the doors, and told anybody that I probably would have trusted that I was going through a phase, and to tell her if I was doing anything behind her back.”

And another time, well, here’s what Macelli told In Touch: “There had been another incident where the cops brought her back and her mom presented documents saying she was incompetent, she was younger than she was, and all these different things. …  When she smashed that computer, she told Gypsy, ‘If you do this … I’m going to do to you exactly what I did to this computer.’ … All of that played into a psyche for Gypsy in a real way of, ‘I can’t leave. I’m never gonna get to leave.’”

This completely changes Gypsy’s entire personality. She wasn’t this person with growing confidence that allowed her to disobey her mother more and more. Gypsy was broken, completely. She was emotionally, physically and mentally beaten to a pulp by Dee Dee.

But hey, I promised seven major changes, so we’re just getting started. Dee Dee’s manipulation (and The Act‘s minimization of it) doesn’t stop with Gypsy.