In the weeks leading up to the premiere of Inventing Anna, a nine-part series about the ersatz heiress Anna Delvey, Netflix’s marketing team posted a giant receipt on one of the perimeter walls of the Gansevoort Hotel.
The bill included, among other things, three bottles of Dom Perignon totaling $6,300, five bottles of Domaine Ponsot at $9,750, 12 orders of a dozen oysters each which cost $288, and four orders of foie gras at $240.00. Next to it was an equally large poster of star Julia Garner as Delvey, with a line proclaiming in all caps: “SPENT $36,000 ON A SINGLE DINNER. BUT NEVER PAID THE BILL.”
It was a well-chosen marketing tool; Delvey’s story, which was first reported in New York magazine in 2018 by journalist Jessica Pressler, focuses heavily on the ways Delvey financially terrorized New York’s most stylish hotels and socialites. The poster tactic was downright ingenious, as far as I was concerned, since it was located directly on my daily lunchtime walk. While carrying home my overpriced salads, I’d fantasize about indulging in the show, watching someone scam their way into luxury and guzzle down all that champagne.
Sadly, though, Inventing Anna, isn’t as good as its poster.
The show certainly provides indulgence (if maybe not enough for my taste). Its failure is in the framing of Delvey’s story: It’s depicted as a quasi-feminist, girlboss-adjacent revenge fantasy. Delvey does the things she does, we’re told, because she’s a product…
