‘Dancing With the Stars’ Producers Defend ‘Fascinating’ Anna Delvey

Fake heiress and “fascinating” fraudster Anna Delvey deserves her spot on Dancing With the Stars, insists its showrunner Conrad Green, defending his decision to cast the convicted felon on the long-running reality TV competition’s 33rd season.

“We’ve always tried to be a very broad church when it comes to the types of people, the types of backgrounds, the types of stories we have on the show," Green said in an interview with Variety. “A lot of people have watched the dramas of her life, and have followed her story, so I think there is an inherent curiosity about her.”

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“Yes, she had the issues she’s had, but we’ve had other people on the show who’ve had criminal issues in the past,” Green continued. “She served her time. I think it’s perfectly valid for her to be on the show, and I think people have been really curious to see how she performs.”

Past DWTS contestants who have been, or become, sources of controversy include Tucker Carlson, former White House press secretary Sean Spicer, Carole Baskin, Ryan Lochte, Andy Dick, Nancy Kerrigan and Nancy Grace, to name just a few.

In addition to (presumably) learning some fancy footwork, Delvey has in recent days been appearing at New York Fashion Week, both as a front row guest and a show producer—and showing off some fancy footwear along the way. In particular: a bedazzled take on the ankle-bracelet-slash-tracker she has been ordered to wear by federal authorities.

Delvey, real name Anna Sorokin, was born in Russia. She moved to Germany as a teen—ostensibly the inspiration for her “German heiress” spiel— and later the United Kingdom and the United States. She was convicted in 2019 of charges relating to about $275,000 that she swindled from various friends and financial institutions in New York City. (This was conveniently less than the $320,000 Netflix reportedly paid her for the rights to adapt her story for the Shonda Rhimes-produced Inventing Anna, which came out in early 2022 and went on to earn Emmy and Golden Globe nominations.) Delvey ultimately served three years of a four-to-12 year sentence, before being released on bond in October 2022. Since then she's been living under strict house arrest conditions—with electronic monitoring, hence the ankle bracelet.

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According to the Daily Mail, the terms of Delvey’s house arrest were amended in recent weeks so she could participate in the dance show, a development blasted by Whoopi Goldberg during a recent episode of The View. (Both The View and Dancing With the Stars air on ABC.)

In a newly released trailer for the show, Delvey claims that “the only time” she has previously seen it was while in prison. “I was forced to watch it,” she added. Dancing With the Stars premieres on ABC on Sept. 17.

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