Supermodel and television host Tyra Banks is officially taking Netflix to court, hitting the streaming giant with a high-profile defamation lawsuit over her controversial portrayal in a recent viral project. As originally reported by Entertainment Weekly, the legal battle centers on the three-part docuseries Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model, which debuted in February 2026 to take a critical look back at the iconic reality competition’s complicated legacy.

Following the release, viewers heavily criticized Banks for an apparent lack of accountability regarding the show’s historical treatment of its contestants, but Banks claims the streaming platform manufactured that exact narrative through deceptive editing.

In the lawsuit filed on Saturday, the former Victoria’s Secret model alleges that producers “stripped of context and reassembled” her extensive sit-down interview into a completely false narrative.

Banks notes that she intentionally entered the interview with no topic restrictions, spending real time taking accountability for the historical missteps of America’s Next Top Model. However, the legal complaint claims that only 16 minutes of her three-and-a-half-hour interview actually made the final cut, meaning her moments of accountability were left entirely on the cutting room floor.

Consequently, Banks is suing for defamation, false light, and additional claims, demanding a jury trial to determine damages for lost business opportunities, lost income, and mental anguish.

The absolute centerpiece of the legal battle involves a highly sensitive segment regarding America’s Next Top Model cycle 2 contestant Shandi Sullivan.

In the original reality show, Sullivan was filmed having a drunk encounter with a male model that was framed at the time as a cheating scandal—an incident Sullivan has since described as a sexual assault.

According to the lawsuit, the Netflix docuseries features Sullivan describing the event as an assault, a revelation Banks claims she had never heard before and was never informed about during her own filming session.

The complaint alleges that Banks’ interviewed answers were completely misled by producers to believe she was participating in a standard discussion about regret and infidelity.

Furthermore, while the final Netflix edit strongly implied that Banks could not even remember Sullivan’s storyline, the lawsuit asserts that the unedited full footage clearly shows Banks nodding and explicitly stating that she does indeed remember her story.