Inventing Anna

[Anonymous]

Anna never had a shot at getting the 20 million loan right? Are there banks out there that wouldn’t send someone, in person if need be, to verify that her trust exists?

Her getting the 200k line of credit was genuinely but I couldn’t believe she spent it all on stupid stuff. She should have used it to set up her next con because this one was never going to pay out more. I guess I don’t understand what her strategy was or how she thought she’d get that 20 mil. She seemed surprised when she was turned down for the loan and by then she had blown all the money on tips.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was sadden when the reporter went to Germany and in the small town at the shop the man said he didn’t trust Russians. Then Anna, who is really untrustworthy, ended up being a scammer. She knew it never would have been feasible in Germany because no one would have believed her. Now her story is being reported in Germany and it leads credence to people who believe all Russians immigrants are scammers. So all the trustworthy Russian immigrants are really getting hurt by her.

Bad timing with what is happening in the world right now.

[Anonymous]

After watching the first episode of the Drop Out (the Elizabeth Holmes show with Amanda Siefried) I'm more annoyed than ever with how they chose to frame this show. I simply do not understand WHY you would take a fairly interesting story about a scam artist and frame it entirely through the lens of the journalist who wrote the exposé about her. Like the Drop Out isn't the best show on TV or anything, but it's decent and interesting. And it would be significantly less so if it was the story of a podcaster researching Elizabeth Holmes for a podcast, instead of just the story of Elizabeth Holmes.

I am a writer and one of the first rules of writing is Cut. To. The. Point. Sure, stories need textures and layers and setting to draw the audience in and help them identify with the story. But you do that by focusing on the most interesting and relevant elements of the story and expanding on them. You don't do that by fixating on peripheral issues that aren't particularly interesting or unique to the story. Like, for instance, the marriage of the journalist who is writing about your main character.

I think they had this idea that the journalist's story would be relevant by creating a parallel with Anna's story -- they are both trying to prove themselves, and both trying to overcome unpleasant things in their pasts by inventing a new, better version of themselves. I think if the journalist's (sorry, refuse to learn her name because I care so little about her) story was more interesting than "I wrote a small article about a kid who turned out to be lying and got in trouble for it" this might have worked. Like if there was something there about her coming from a humble or embarrassing background and cracking the elite publishing circles in New York, but she always had this sense of being an imposter or fraud, then maybe those parallel stories would have worked. But that's really not what was going on.

And using the pregnancy to create dramatic tension makes no sense at all. It's a story about a scam artist! The dramatic tension comes from the very obvious threat of her being found out by literally everyone in her life. Why would you overlook this in order to make the entire story backward-looking, and then use the journalist's impending due date as the driving force of the entire show. What on earth?

Seriously, just awful storytelling. It actually makes me mad. I resent I watched this show and that the people involved got paid so much to make it.

[Anonymous]

Ha - I totally agree, PP! The whole time , I kept thinking that I wished they would just show Anna's escapades, from the very beginning of her time in NYC. How did it all start? How did she have enough money to begin with to buy all those clothes, go out to the best places, etc.? I wanted a little escapism, to go along with Anna as she was scamming her way through NYC. Instead, I got a journalist's tale, complete with overacting pregnancy aches and pains.

Give me the luxe life of the scam artist! Not interested in Vivian's newsroom high jinks back in Scriberia.

[Anonymous]

This story would make so much more sense if Anna was actually attractive. She doesn't have good style either and her accent is annoying AF. It blows my mind that she got away with so much.

I can see this kind of thing happening with a very beautiful, mysterious and charismatic woman. But Anna just looks like a plain girl from the Midwest with a meth problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ha - I totally agree, PP! The whole time , I kept thinking that I wished they would just show Anna's escapades, from the very beginning of her time in NYC. How did it all start? How did she have enough money to begin with to buy all those clothes, go out to the best places, etc.? I wanted a little escapism, to go along with Anna as she was scamming her way through NYC. Instead, I got a journalist's tale, complete with overacting pregnancy aches and pains.

Give me the luxe life of the scam artist! Not interested in Vivian's newsroom high jinks back in Scriberia.

I think part of it is that no one knows exactly how it all started. It all had to be pieced together bit by bit through lots of stories, little anecdotes, financial documents, etc. Only she knows the full story and she’s not going to tell.

[Anonymous]

Agree that the whole journalist storyline was distracting and detracted from the interesting story arc. I couldn’t stand her and her husband was a waste of space on the screen. I liked the Scriberia friends but had no idea why they were so kind. Also…with a zillion journalist jobs being eliminated I can’t imagine that any magazine keeps on writers like that anymore. They’d just fire them, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:After watching the first episode of the Drop Out (the Elizabeth Holmes show with Amanda Siefried) I'm more annoyed than ever with how they chose to frame this show. I simply do not understand WHY you would take a fairly interesting story about a scam artist and frame it entirely through the lens of the journalist who wrote the exposé about her. Like the Drop Out isn't the best show on TV or anything, but it's decent and interesting. And it would be significantly less so if it was the story of a podcaster researching Elizabeth Holmes for a podcast, instead of just the story of Elizabeth Holmes.

I am a writer and one of the first rules of writing is Cut. To. The. Point. Sure, stories need textures and layers and setting to draw the audience in and help them identify with the story. But you do that by focusing on the most interesting and relevant elements of the story and expanding on them. You don't do that by fixating on peripheral issues that aren't particularly interesting or unique to the story. Like, for instance, the marriage of the journalist who is writing about your main character.

I think they had this idea that the journalist's story would be relevant by creating a parallel with Anna's story -- they are both trying to prove themselves, and both trying to overcome unpleasant things in their pasts by inventing a new, better version of themselves. I think if the journalist's (sorry, refuse to learn her name because I care so little about her) story was more interesting than "I wrote a small article about a kid who turned out to be lying and got in trouble for it" this might have worked. Like if there was something there about her coming from a humble or embarrassing background and cracking the elite publishing circles in New York, but she always had this sense of being an imposter or fraud, then maybe those parallel stories would have worked. But that's really not what was going on.

And using the pregnancy to create dramatic tension makes no sense at all. It's a story about a scam artist! The dramatic tension comes from the very obvious threat of her being found out by literally everyone in her life. Why would you overlook this in order to make the entire story backward-looking, and then use the journalist's impending due date as the driving force of the entire show. What on earth?

Seriously, just awful storytelling. It actually makes me mad. I resent I watched this show and that the people involved got paid so much to make it.

To the extend your first paragraph is understandable, I disagree. I'm enjoying Dropout well enough for some of the side stories, but the several, much shorter Elizabeth Holmes documentaries and Bad Blood podcast on the subject were MUCH more intriguing. For me, the Dropout drags the story out, getting some interesting details along the way, but fails to "Cut. To. The. Point" (is that a term of art in journalism?), in the exact same way that Inventing Anna fails to "Cut. To. The. Point." So using your criteria, the shows are stylistically more similar than they are different.

[Anonymous]

I really liked it. Was the scene with Anna's father and the wine and coke all imagined by Vivian? When she was letting her imagination run wild? The bag of money, too!

[Anonymous]

I love that she scammed all the bankers! What a bunch of Putzes.

Rachel’s a wanna b striver.

I hope she’s making it.

[Anonymous]

I think the reason the charges were ultimately written off was several reasons. One having traveled extensively in the developing world, credit card debt is much to be preferred than jail in a foreign country. Two in her book she paid it down. Three it was a crime that went to court. Four vanity fair as a client.
As dumb as it seems paying the bill to get out of the country was a smart move. Going in the first place was dumb and entitled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I couldn't stand the Rachel character. Such a blubbery mess when she should have stood her ground and had Anna arrested in the first place.

However, even though I couldn't stand her, I found myself mad during the last episode when Kacy confronts her at the courthouse, after learning that Rachel helped get Anna arrested. After hearing about ALL the lies and grifting Anna had done, Kacy has the nerve to call out Rachel for helping with the sting?? I wish Rachel had said, "Girl - back off. Anna didn't owe YOU $62,000. She should have been arrested long ago." And then she should have flounced off instead of slinking away like a moron. What was Kacy thinking, defending Anna like that? Barf.

Except the cops said there was no crime when she went to them. She willingly gave her credit card to the hotel. There was no theft except by Rachel to her company. This wasn’t like the woman whose card racked up all Anna’s clothing charges.

Also… didn’t the credit card company “write off” the $62K? If so, in the end Rachel actually benefited from Anna’s scheme?

Totally!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This story would make so much more sense if Anna was actually attractive. She doesn't have good style either and her accent is annoying AF. It blows my mind that she got away with so much.

I can see this kind of thing happening with a very beautiful, mysterious and charismatic woman. But Anna just looks like a plain girl from the Midwest with a meth problem.

But that's the whole point. What makes scam artists successful is not the looks. I knew one in real life; she worked on a much smaller scale but still. She looked OK, not super stunning or anything. But she had some sort of psychological super powers, she instantly knew people's weak spots and how to exploit them.

[Anonymous]

I thought the visit to Germany was interesting. There was a point where Russians could make money a lot of money during a certain time period exiting Russia. Still happening today. So Anna’s family had money for part of her young life this her upper class mannerisms but then it dried up. Most people benefiting from this emigration who made money were criminals so like father like daughter. But Anna didn’t quite have what it took. That’s partly why the family didn’t want to be involved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I thought the visit to Germany was interesting. There was a point where Russians could make money a lot of money during a certain time period exiting Russia. Still happening today. So Anna’s family had money for part of her young life this her upper class mannerisms but then it dried up. Most people benefiting from this emigration who made money were criminals so like father like daughter. But Anna didn’t quite have what it took. That’s partly why the family didn’t want to be involved.

It's not clear to me that they ever had a lot of money. Somehow she had to afford private school. The money bag was not real, was it?