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On Friday, news broke that Shonda Rhimes first Netflix series would be about Anna Sorokin a.k.a. Anna Delvey, the Russian woman who conned elite New York establishments into financing her life as a grifter.
Sorokin, now 27, is in prison at Rikers Island, but the fact that her story is going to Rhimes and Netflix only deepens her notoriety, and will probably glamorize the time she spent expensing extravagant hotels and meals to financiers that didn't exist. She'll become the celebrity she was always pretending to be.
SEE ALSO:Netflix nabs Shonda Rhimes, commencing total TV takeoverShe will become the celebrity she was always pretending to be.
Sorokin was tracked down and convicted in 2017 of grand larceny and other charges, but her story resurfaced virally in spring with a damning recollection and a vivid retelling. The Cut's feature details how this grifter floated into New York's hottest hotels and restaurants and paid for everything with cash while supposedly planning a business venture that she knew would never come to fruition.
Her story is a tailor-made television logline, prime for Rhimes' adaptation. Sorokin occupied the New York of Gossip Girland Sex and the City, with the smooth criminality of White Collar. We're talking shopping montages on Fifth Avenue and piles of cash; Sorokin's days as a grifter are a peek into a lavish lifestyle most Americans can't even imagine, and which we will no doubt devour once it's streaming.
The fascination with Sorokin is an extension of audiences' obsession with true crime, but the difference is we can pore over her history without the byproduct guilt that accompanies something like Making a Murderer. If there's a cultural equivalent (or anything near), it might be Tonya Harding, who was implicated in but never convicted of a decades-old Olympic scandal by the time her story went to Hollywood and led her to walk some red carpets.
This is the culture that continues to keep Adnan Syed's case in the legal spotlight – and it wouldn't be surprising if Sorokin thinks she deserves the same treatment and delayed "justice". Dressing up for an awards show and mingling with celebrities – that sounds exactly like Anna Delvey's cup of tea.
“If they were doubting — ‘Oh, she can’t pay for anything’— why not give me bail and see?” Sorokin told The Cut. “If I was such a fraud, it would be such an easy resolution. Will she bail herself out?”
Sorokin is currently held without bail but returns to court June 19, and there's no denying public interest in her case has increased significantly since her last court appearance. Refinery29 treats her like a folk hero (or antihero), with descriptions of her "trademark" glasses and distinct hair.
Intriguingly, Variety reported that Sorokin has been making calls to people in Hollywood to have a say in who will play her on-screen. Another inmate at Rikers told The Cut that Sorokin pays for press, that articles about her are "strategic leaks," the only purpose of which would be to keep Sorokin's name on people's minds while she serves her sentence.
Media is the closest humans have come to achieving immortality, with biopics and documentaries that can and often do outlive their subjects. Whatever version of Anna Delvey Rhimes and Netflix release to the public, that will be the version that takes, that embeds itself in the cultural consciousness for years and decades to come.
This is far from the last we've heard of the elusive Anna Delvey, and it might be her longest con yet.
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