History Series / InventingAnna

* DidntThinkThisThrough: It seemingly never occurred to Anna that anyone would ever actually try to verify her story of being a wealthy heiress, especially when trying to secure a loan for tens of millions of dollars, or that any of the hotels she stayed and didn't pay bills for would react or notify others of what she was doing.

%%* NeverMyFault: Anna, of course.

* OnlySaneMan: Between Vivian's focus on making the story as sensational as possible and Anna's narcissism, Anna's defense attorney Todd is the only one among the three to have his head on straight and try to impress upon Anna the realities of her situation and try to get her to make things as easy as possible for herself. Sadly, much of his advice is unheeded.

* TooCleverByHalf: Anna screws herself over by not taking a plea bargain due to {{Pride}} and believes she can talk her way out of any problem.

* BlatantLies: Anna is actually quite good at this, sticking to her story in many places but often throws in easily-verified details like Delvey being her mother's maiden name (which it is not).
** In her first interview with Vivian on Anna, Nora claims she "saw through her at once" and not fooled at all. Later, Vivian confronts Nora on how Nora was majorly scammed by Anna running up a huge bill on her credit card to the tune of $400,000. She declined to press charges because she didn't want anyone to know she was taken by Anna as everyone else.

* TheFashionista: Anna is very good at this and has been since she was about thirteen when she worked at a Vogue internship in Paris (or so it seems). It's one of the reasons she succeeded.

* {{Jerkass}}: Anna is described as one by even her close friends like Val, who claims she was self-centered, distant, blunt and anti-social and her interactions with Vivian confirm it as she is haughty, rude and generally deeply unpleasant. Rather than impede her cons, she was able to use this to her advantage with Val describing her as someone others were desperate to gain the approval of due to her coldness and those who did feeling especially trusting and protective of her.

* NeverMyFault: Anna, of course.

* SensualSlav: Anna is actually a poor Russian girl who moved to Germany as a teen and not a German heiress.

* UndyingLoyalty: Anna has the ability to compel this in her associates like Neff, Vivian, and her lawyer Todd Spodeck. Even Rachel has this until it becomes a BrokenPedestal.

* BelievingTheirOwnLies: Anna, especially during her trial.

--> '''Todd:''' Anna, shut up and listen. What is your problem? First of all, taking the stand would be legal suicide. Questions that you don't want to answer. Questions that make you look even more like a greedy, lying, sad-sack scammer with a creepy fucking accent. But that's not why you're not taking the stand. You're not taking the stand because that's my decision, not yours. You useless, incompetent excuse for a con artist. I've known a shit-ton of criminals in my day and you are below fucking average at crime so, fuck you and fuck your reputation. Fuck your fake life. This is my reputation, my identity, my ability to provide a life for my family you're fucking with, and now I look like a hack because I can't control my client. Can't get baby dressed in the morning. If I let you take the stand, it's the nail in your coffin and in mine. You will get the maximum sentence, and no one will ever hire me again. You're not stupid. So what is it? Full-on delusion? Do you believe your lies? Are they for me or for you? Must be you. Because everyone else in your life who hasn't abandoned you yet is way past believing them but don't care, as long as your checks don't bounce. Even your father is done with your shitty act of yours. Your delusion must be on some epic level to imagine for one second that your father would show up here, let alone pay for a fancy-ass stylist to dress you up like a courthouse Barbie doll.

* EveryoneHasStandards: Their brief interactions in episode four make it clear that even Anna doesn't like Billy McFarland and finds him a crass, unpleasant lout and his planned Fyre Festival gaudy.

%%* BelievingTheirOwnLies: Anna, especially during her trial.

%%* NeverMyFault: Anna, of course.

* BelievingTheirOwnLies: Anna, especially during her trial.

* NeverMyFault: Anna, of course.

* TheCharmer: Anna is allegedly this. By the time she's in prison, she's actually quite rude and mean.

[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/8429fe57aca1429ec97439c30a6f9143.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:250: Inventing Anna]]

!! Tropes found in ''Inventing Anna'':

** Rachel and Kacey barely knew each other and hadn't spent any significant time together before the Morocco trip. However, the series portrays the Morrocco trip fairly accurately.

* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: “This story is completely true. Except for the parts that are totally made up.” Among other variations of that line.
** Though it gets a lot more right then wrong. The early episodes involving Chase were largely fictional though Anna did have a tech Boyfriend around that time Chase was largely invented for the series. Plus Rachel and Kacey Barely knew each other and hadn't spent any significant time together until the Morocco trip which the series does portray fairly accurately. Also Vivian’s real counterpart Jessica Pressler was pregnant during the writing of the article but had finished it much earlier so she was not going into labor while finishing the article She had been banished to Scriberia for a very similar reason though some of the details are changed for the show but it still involved a teenager lying about making money.

* WhatTheHellIsThatAccent: Anna Delvey's accent that is supposed to be German but sounds ridiculous and fake. This is not bad acting by Julia Garner but almost identical to the real Anna's affected accent.

* WhiteCollarCrime: Anna sets up a steady set of cons which get bigger and bigger until she's indicted for multiple counts of attempted grand larceny in the first degree and theft of services.

* NotSoDifferent: Anna's defense attorney Todd admits he relates to her actions more than he'd like to admit, having struggled amidst the socialite scene that his wife was born into and he has been brought into as well, admitting that when he goes to such events, he feels like a waiter or valet rather than a guest.

* AssholeVictim: Anna's victims are uniformly snobs and have more money than they know what to do with. [[spoiler: Until she cons her friend Rachel out of $62,000.]]

* DidntThinkThisThrough: It seemingly never occurred to Anna that anyone would ever actually try to verify her story of being a wealthy heiress, especially when trying to secure a loan for tens of millions of dollars.

* {{Jerkass}}: Anna is described as one by even her close friends like Val, who claims she was self-centered, distant, blunt and anti-social and her interactions with Vivian confirm it as she is haughty, rude and generally unpleasant. Rather than impede her cons, she was able to use this to her advantage with Val describing her as someone others were desperate to gain the approval of due to her coldness and those who did feeling especially trusting and protective of her.

** In her first interview with Vivian on Anna, Nora claims she "saw through her at once" and not fooled at all. Later, Vivian confronts Nora on how Nora was majorly scammed by Anna running up a huge bill on her credit card to the tune of $400,000. She declined to press charges because she didn't want anyone to know she was taken by Anna as everyone else.

A journalist based on Pressler, Vivian Kent (Creator/AnnaChlumsky), with a lot to prove investigates the case of Anna Delvey (real name: Anna Sorokin) (played by Creator/JuliaGarner), the Instagram-legendary German heiress who stole the hearts of New York's social scene - and stole their money as well. The series was released on Creator/{{Netflix}} on February 11, 2022.

** Averted with the other Germans, who are played by actual Germans, but again played straight with Vadim (Anna's father), who is also played by a German.

* KarmaHoudiniWarranty: Anna gets away with fantastic amounts of fraud, lying, and cheating but is eventually sentenced to [[spoiler: twelve years. Possibly {{Subverted}} since she only served two of them, plus another two years in remand before the verdict.]]

** Though it gets a lot more right then wrong. The early episodes involving Chase were largely fictional though Anna did have a tech Boyfriend around that time Chase was largely invented for the series. Plus Rachel and Kacey Barely knew each other and hadn't spent any significant time together until the Morocco trip which the series does portray fairly accurately. Also Vivian’s real counterpart Jessica Pressler was not pregnant during the writing of the article but had been banished to Scriberia for a very similar reason though some of the details are changed for the show but it still involved a teenager lying about making money.