Credit: Netflix
Under Her Eye
Inventing Anna: this powerful scene in the premiere episode brilliantly cracks Anna Delvey’s code
3 years ago
2 min read
Filled with outrageous stories and true crime drama, Netflix’s new series Inventing Anna has landed – and it gives a compelling explanation of what really went on in the mind of the “fake heiress”.
There’s a moment in the first episode of Netflix’s Inventing Anna when you can’t help but feel an immense wave of sorrow, sympathy and total frustration. Not for Anna Delvey, aka Anna Sorokin, an enigmantic twenty-something who fooled New York society into believing she was a German heiress with a $65 million trust fund. But for Vivian Kent, a magazine journalist who is doing her utmost to secure an exclusive interview and tell Delvey’s real story to the world.
Perfectly played by Ozark Emmy winner Julia Garner, we first find Delvey in Rikers Island prison, where she is being held before her trial. Kent (Anna Chlumsky), a determined, sharp-eyed reporter, has sought out Delvey after spotting a small news article in the NY Post about her arrest and shrewdly surmising that there is a far more interesting story to the public than the one currently in print. As Kent tries repeatedly to persuade Delvey to open up, she is met with arrogant jibes about her weight, clothes, and manner of travel. “Why do you dress like that?” she says with pursed lips of disdain. “You look poor.”
It’s just the kind of attention-grabbing introduction that befits a woman who has been in the spotlight ever since news broke of her outrageous scam in 2018. Four years later, and Delvey is now set for pop culture immortalisation in super producer Shonda Rhimes’ hotly anticipated miniseries. Based on the juicy New York Magazine feature by Jessica Pressler, the nine-episode series unravels the fascinating story of a New York con artist who successfully posed as a globe-trotting German heiress between 2013 and 2017. Mixing in high-end circles, she proceeded to swindle hundreds of thousands of dollars from power players under the pretence that she was building an exclusive social club and art gallery. The reality was, of course, that she was funding a lavish lifestyle.
Credit: Netflix
In 2017, Delvey suffered a spectacular fall from grace when she arrested on multiple charges of grand larceny and theft. During her 2019 trial, in which she caused a tabloid frenzy by hiring a courtroom stylist, she was found guilty on eight counts, and sentenced to four to 12 years in prison. Now, Delvey has served her jail term, but is back in ICE detention for overstaying her US visa, and has remained in its custody since as she waits to see if she’ll be deported to Germany. Last week, she published an essay in Insider declaring that she has no intention of watching Rhimes’ series.
“Nothing about seeing a fictionalised version of myself in this criminal-insane-asylum setting sounds appealing to me,” she wrote. “I can’t help but feel like an afterthought, the somber irony of being confined to a cell at yet another horrid correctional facility lost between the lines, the history repeating itself.”
Credit: Netflix
Viewers might find it interesting to compare the sentiments expressed in Delvey’s essay to those in the premiere episode of Inventing Anna, especially given that Delvey was consulted on the project, and had multiple phone conversations and visits with staff during the making of the show. One thing that is evident from the outset is that Delvey is a master chameleon. She can persuade a socialite to purchase a valuable Cindy Sherman photograph at a gallery one moment, and be dancing on the deck of a luxury yacht in Ibiza the next. When Kent doggedly chases down her former friends and acquaintances in an attempt to connect the dots, she only winds up feeling more confused. Staring at her apartment wall papered in photos and post-It notes, she turns to her husband and asks:”Who the hell is Anna Delvey?”
Credit: Netflix
Though the series is based on Pressler’s article, Inventing Anna is not only about Delvey’s exploits while she was masquerading as a socialite, but about pinpointing what really makes her tick. Thanks to Garner’s superb performance, we quickly get a strong character sketch: she’s a young female immigrant, a haughty aesthete, an aspiring businesswoman. She’s also got a pathological desire for power.
During Kent’s visits to prison, Delvey manipulates the reporter like a pawn. We know she’s intrigued by the possibility of an exclusive story in a well-known publication; we know that she wants an opportunity to change her public image. But she persists in toying with Kent, refusing to answer her questions and even walking off during one conversation while announcing that she’s considering accepting a plea deal from assistant district attorney Catherine McCaw (Rebecca Henderson).
Credit: Netflix
It isn’t until Kent meets with Neff (Alexis Floyd), the real-life hotel concierge who Delvey befriended during a long-term stay, that she cracks the code.
“Everyone here is running a game,” notes Neff . “Everyone here wants something. Money, power, image, love.”
Contemplating Neff’s words, Kent admits to her that she really wants to secure an exclusive interview with Delvey so she can salvage her career, which has stalled after she was involved in a journalistic scandal. She tells Neff that she doesn’t need her to convince Delvey to give her the interview; but that she does need to know what Delvey really wants.
The new line of attack works, and when Kent next visits Delvey, she knows exactly what to say to seal the deal: that if Delvey accepts the plea deal, she’s effectively agreeing with everyone who’s called her a scam artist and a dumb socialite. But if she rejects the plea, she’ll be able to rewrite her narrative. Kent rounds off with a proposition too tempting for Delvey to resist: that if she lets her tell her story, she’ll make her famous and “everyone will know the name Anna Delvey”.
Credit: Netflix
It’s a brilliant power move from Kent, and in the next scene, we see Delvey rejecting the plea in court and declaring that she wants a chance to rewrite her reputation. For all Delvey’s peculiar mix of arrogance, charm, deceit and laser-focused ambition, the most intriguing thing about Inventing Anna is how the series peels away an outrageous storyline to reveal a young woman whose goal in life isn’t so dissimilar from that belonging to many people watching the show: to make a name for herself.
Images: Netflix
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