Rachel Williams , the formerVanity Fair photo editor who allegesAnna Sorokin scammed her, criticized the upcomingNetflix show about her exploits.- She said "
Inventing Anna " unfairly lionized the woman who failed to repay her $62,000 for a lavish Morocco trip.
Rachel DeLoache Williams, the former best friend of Anna Sorokin — AKA
"For Anna and Netflix alike, attention is stock-in-trade," Williams wrote in an essay for Air Mail published Friday. "Consider that whatever scruples audiences may have with 'Inventing Anna,' whether they celebrate or scrutinize its dubious dramatization, any controversy that ensues is sure to attract an even wider audience."
Sorokin, a German national, was found guilty in a 2019 trial for a scheme where she pretended to be an heiress with a $60 million trust fund to bilk money from banks and other institutions. Among the people she fooled was Williams, who said in her essay that "Inventing Anna" was "effectively running a con woman's PR."
Prosecutors also alleged Sorokin stole $62,000 from Williams for a lavish trip they took to Morocco in 2017, but jurors didn't find Sorokin guilty of that particular charge. A former photo editor at Vanity Fair — which was at the time run by Graydon Carter, who now edits Air Mail — Williams befriended Sorokin under the impression that she was a wealthy heiress. Williams also wrote a Vanity Fair story about her experience with Sorokin in 2018.
Williams's essay comes as a retort to an essay Sorokin wrote herself for Insider, published Wednesday.
In her Insider essay, Sorokin writes about her time behind bars and apprehension of seeing her story told onscreen.
"In case anyone had any doubts, Anna is characteristically unapologetic in her piece, titled 'Erasing Anna,'" Williams writes. "Instead, she asks for our pity — 'Did I mention I'm the only woman in ICE custody in this whole jail?' — while appealing to the social-media set who will inevitably help her story go viral: 'Tell me I'm special without telling me I'm special.'"
Sorokin sold her life story rights to Netflix for $320,000 and used the money to pay back the institutions she was convicted of scamming, as well as her legal fees.
She was released from New York state prison in February 2021 after completing three-and-a-half years of her four-to-12-year sentence, but was re-arrested a month later for overstaying her visa, and remains in immigration detention.
"Inventing Anna," due for release on Thursday, is produced by Shonda Rhimes and stars "Ozark" actress Julia Garner as Sorokin. Williams is played by "Scandal" actress Katie Lowes.
The real-life Williams was instrumental in Sorokin's earlier arrest on criminal charges.
In her book "My Friend Anna," published in 2019, she writes about working with police on a sting operation to arrest her in Los Angeles, while she worked to set up photoshoots for Vanity Fair's New Establishment summit. Sorokin was later extradited to New York and was jailed at Rikers Island.
"Whether Anna's own self-stylings would have been sufficient to re-invent her brand is something we'll never know, because a juggernaut of Netflix marketing pros took the reins the minute she was released from prison in early 2021, repositioning the character of 'Anna Delvey' from fraudster to front-row," Williams writes in her Air Mail essay.
In Sorokin's trial, Williams testified about the horror of being stuck with a $62,000 bill for the Morocco trip, believing Sorokin would pay her back.
"I'm losing it. I'm up every night having attacks and I'm late for work," Williams testified through sobs. "I'm getting phone calls from AMEX, which just causes more panics attacks, because I'm just telling them the same things Anna's telling me, which is, 'It should be just any day now, it should be any day now.'"
She also testified about the deals she made herself with HBO and her publisher Simon & Schuster, which had the potential to net her up to $625,000. She said she would have preferred to have never met Sorokin in the first place.
"This is the most traumatic thing I've ever been through," she testified. "I wish I never met Anna. If I could go back in time and change things — I wish I could."