Carrie Ann Inaba wants Dancing With the Stars fans to give Anna Delvey a chance. The fake heiress and con woman whose crimes inspired Netflix’s hit Inventing Anna made her debut on Season 33 of the ABC dance competition show on Tuesday, Sept. 17, earning some support from Inaba after dancing the cha-cha to Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” with her bedazzled ankle monitor on full display.
As Delvey scored an 18 out of 30 alongside her partner Ezra Sosa, Inaba urged the audience to “give this a chance” after noticing a “shift in the energy” of the unenthusiastic crowd. “I would just like to say, let’s all give this a chance because I can imagine that this was scary for you,” Inaba said during her critique of Delvey’s first performance. “And I’m not pro or for anything that you’ve done, but this is about your dancing here. Let’s all give her that space, please.”
Delvey and Sosa told Us Weekly after their performance that they didn’t notice any kind of negativity in the way the audience reacted to them. “When we go out there and we’re dancing, it’s just us two on the floor, and we honestly don’t,” Sosa told the outlet after the live premiere. “Even when we finished the dance, we’re not really thinking about applause or anything.”
“It’s hard to say because we just moved fresh off the stage,” Delvey agreed. “I’m not sure what the public’s reaction was yet, so it’s hard to say.”
During her intro package, Delvey, who was previously convicted of grand larceny, didn’t shy away from her infamy. “In 2017, I was accused of multiple kinds of grand larceny,” she said. “I did serve my time. And Dancing With the Stars is a way for me to show people a different side of me. My prior history shows I’m pretty determined. It’s a quality to channel into something positive.” She added of her ankle monitor, “I overstayed my visa, because I was in jail, so it was hard to leave.”
The fake socialite concluded, “I hope that everybody who feels negatively about me, that I will be able to turn their opinion of me around. I’ve reinvented myself many times, and this time, I’m going to be a ballroom dancer.”