CONVICTED con artist Anna Delvey will compete on the latest season of Dancing With The Stars.
Anna, whose life inspired the hit Netflix show Inventing Anna, has been given special permission to film the ABC reality series despite being on house arrest, according to a Page Six report.
DWTS contestants compete for the coveted Mirror Ball trophy[/caption]
Anna Delvey attends the Shao show during New York Fashion Week – September 2023[/caption]
Anna was jailed in 2019 after she was convicted of swindling multiple businesses and individuals out of $250,000 while posing as a German heiress.
She was placed under house arrest in 2022, before the rules of her imprisonment were further relaxed, reportedly allowing Anna to work and travel within 70 miles of her home.
Page Six reported that Anna, 33, has been allowed to travel to Los Angeles, where DWTS is filmed.
A representative for DWTS declined to comment on casting “rumors” in a statement to the outlet.
Fans reacted to the casting announcement on X, with one person writing, “My question about having that con artist is… how will they introduce her??
“Because they’ve had terrible people on the show before, but they were famous for something else.. Anna Delvey is literally just a con artist lmfao.”
The Russian-born swindler’s story garnered widespread attention following the release of Netflix’s drama series Inventing Anna, starring Julia Garner in the titular role.
The limited series followed how Anna turned herself into Anna Sorokin, a wealthy German heiress with a formidable Instagram presence, as she conned her way into the lives of New York’s most elite.
Despite initially refusing to watch the Netflix show, Anna later reflected on the way she was portrayed in an interview with Cosmopolitan in March 2022.
“I don’t think I ordered people around as much,” she told the magazine.
“I think I’m more self-aware of how I come across,” Anna continued. “Not all the time, but I just don’t think I’m so brazen and shameless.”
Anna praised Julia (previously best known for starring on Ozark) in a subsequent interview with the Forbidden Fruits podcast, describing her as “a very sweet girl.”
When the podcast’s co-host Julia Fox criticized Julia’s accent on the show, explaining “she did a little too much, Anna defended the actress.
“She was portraying me from like, 2015, 2016, 2017. So now I’ve spent the past four years just in the States. I was surrounded by Americans so maybe my accent was different,” Anna suggested.
However, her initial reaction to the show was to ignore Inventing Anna altogether, writing that “I can’t help but feel like an afterthought” in an open letter in February 2022.
At the time, Anna had been taken into custody by the ICE for violating the terms of her visa and was awaiting deportation back to Germany.
“Even if I were to pull some strings and make it happen, nothing about seeing a fictionalised version of myself in this criminal-insane-asylum setting sounds appealing to me,” she said.
“I was hoping that by the time Inventing Anna came out, I would’ve moved on with my life,” she continued, expressing her hope for the show “to be a conclusion of sorts.”
However, she was disappointed to learn that Inventing Anna was told, not from her perspective but, from the vantage point of Vivian Kent, the character based on journalist Jessica Pressler.
In 2018, Jessica wrote an article about Anna titled “Maybe She Had So Much Money She Just Lost Track of It” that formed the basis for the Netflix show.
“Nearly four years in the making and hours of phone conversations and visits later, the show is based on my story and told from a journalist’s perspective,” Anna outlined her contribution to the production.
“And while I’m curious to see how they interpreted all the research and materials provided, I can’t help but feel like an afterthought,” the host of The Anna Delvey Show continued.
“The sombre irony of being confined to a cell at yet another horrid correctional facility lost between the lines, the history repeating itself.”
Earlier this month, US Olympian Stephen Nedoroscik became the first celebrity contestant to be confirmed for season 33 of Dancing With The Stars.
Dubbed “pommel horse guy” for his impressive performance on the pommel horse at the 2024 Paris Olympics, Stephen told Good Morning America’s hosts he “can’t wait” to show off his dancing skills.
The rest of the cast will be unveiled during a segment on GMA on Wednesday, 4 September.
Meanwhile, co-hosts Julianne Hough and Alfonso Ribeiro are both expected to return to DWTS for the upcoming season, along with judges Derek Hough, Carrie Ann Inaba and, Bruno Tonioli.
