Anna Delvey was dressed in a gown covered in sparkles and feathers for her second appearance on the 33rd season of “Dancing with the Stars” (DWTS). She was ready to take on the ballroom, dancing a quick step to “Suddenly I See” by KT Tunstall with her partner Ezra Sosa.
Sounds normal, right? But I forgot to mention one crucial factor about this: since Delvey, born Anna Sorokin, is a con artist and is currently on house arrest, she was wearing an ankle monitor on the show.
Due to her longer dress, Delvey’s ankle monitor was less visible in her second appearance on the show than it was in her first, where it was covered with a bedazzled sleeve to match her outfit. Nevertheless, in the second episode, it had rhinestones and feathers on it to match her costume.
The second episode of the season, which aired on Sept. 24, happened to be Delvey’s last night on DWTS as she was eliminated along with star Tori Spelling due to her low scores from the judges, as well as a low amount of votes from the viewers of the show.
When host Julianne Hough asked Delvey about what she learned from her experience on the show, Delvey responded with “nothing.”
Situations like Delvey’s appearance on DWTS make viewers consider how certain celebrities are portrayed in the media and their impact on viewers of varying ages. It also may lead many to question, including myself, the intentions of broadcast companies, like ABC, when choosing who is put in the public eye.
Starting in 2013, Delvey defrauded multiple banks and socialites by impersonating a German heiress. She made over $275,000 through her scams. In 2019, Delvey was convicted of second-degree larceny, theft of services and first-degree attempted grand larceny. Delvey was released on parole in Feb. 2021. According to Variety, by Oct. 2022, Delvey was released on bail and put on house arrest.
According to School Resource Officer (SRO) Tyler Johnson, in Cook County, house arrest is issued as a sentence depending on the severity of a case. Someone who committed an extremely dangerous crime would not be put under house arrest but would instead serve their time in prison. Additionally, the parameters of each house arrest case may vary. Some individuals are required to stay in their home, while others may be allowed to travel within a county, state or country.
In Delvey’s case, she had to get approval from Immigration and Customs Enforcements to appear on DWTS, according to Rolling Stone.
Johnson highlighted that house arrest can also be called “electronic monitoring,” where the individual checks in with their parole officer frequently, asking for permission to go places or even just letting them know when and how long they will be out of the house.
“[House arrest] is a little more lenient than what some people think,” Johnson said.
What really caught viewers’ attention wasn’t the fact that Delvey was on house arrest; rather, it was the ankle monitor she wore on the show.
Johnson brought up a parallel situation where Chanel decided to make anklet bags, resembling ankle monitors, in 2008. At that time, Lindsay Lohan was a very popular actress, but she kept receiving DUIs, leading to house arrest. She was photographed with the monitor on frequently, and Chanel decided to make it a “cute” fashion trend.
“I just think they capitalized on [Lohan and her monitor] for financial gain,” Johnson said.
To me, it seems as though ABC was doing the same thing with Delvey’s device; not only was it bedazzled, but it was also mentioned by Delvey’s partner Sosa that the ankle monitor was zoomed in on at the beginning of her first performance on the show.
Needless to say it’s pretty apparent that DWTS wanted this aspect of Delvey to really “sparkle.”
Freshman and fan of DWTS Mallory Coil suggested that DWTS could have painted the monitor a neutral color to draw attention away from it instead of putting rhinestones on the entire device.
“You’re looking and it’s like a disco ball and it’s flashing in everyones’ face,” Coil said.
Additionally, highlighting the device only made matters worse for the hate Delvey received across several social media platforms. With such a visual reminder of Delvey’s past life of crime, in my opinion, it was hard for viewers to see a different side of her.
So, if Delvey received so much backlash, why was she even put on the show in the first place?
In my eyes, there is a pretty clear-cut answer to this question: DWTS wanted to gain popularity and viewers’ attention for the upcoming season.
According to Newsweek, the way DWTS stays popular over the years is through choosing celebrities that are culturally significant and will have people talking.
This tactic seemed to work for this season. According to an article from Yahoo.com, the Season 33 premiere had 4.97 million viewers which is four percent more than Season 32’s premier. Additionally, the Season 33 premiere was the show’s most watched episode since Taylor Swift night on November 21, 2023.
Although an increase in viewership may have been beneficial for ABC and Disney Plus, Delvey expressed her frustration.
“I feel that the show so obviously used me to drive up the ratings,” Delvey said in an email to NBC. “That they never had any plans to give me any chance to grow and only cared about exploiting me for attention.”
Honestly, I agree with her resentment; I, too, think that DWTS used Delvey to bring some spice to the show and it ultimately backfired. Delvey never got a chance to show her possibly changed self to America and only left the show with others rejoicing at her elimination.
This wouldn’t be the first time a controversial celebrity was put on the ballroom floor.
In the past seasons, DWTS has put politician Sean Spicer and Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte on the show.
Both Spicer and Lochte’s appearances on the show were not received well.
According to Vox, many Americans saw Spicer’s appearance on DWTS as an attempt to erase his
bad reputation. The show’s willingness to make him a “star” was viewed as giving him an opportunity he hadn’t earned. Lochte’s run on the show seemed to be even more controversial because, after his first performance on DWTS in 2016, two protestors stormed the stage expressing their disapproval and hate for him.
Both of these scenarios make me question whether these were just two more situations where ABC was trying to gain more popularity. Politics are messy, so why bring that mess to what I view as a family-friendly show? And out of all the Olympians, why did they have to choose Lochte? I know Simone Biles made her astronomical debut at the same 2016 Rio Olympics, and she was only 19!
Now, I will admit that when I watched the show as a
kid, I pretty much ignored the stars I didn’t know, so Lochte and Spicer wouldn’t have influenced me too greatly. However, my mom and I loved to comment on the costumes the stars and pros wore. I know that as a kid, I would have noticed Delvey’s monitor, especially since it was zoomed in on, and asked my mom what it was.
That is one of the aspects of this situation that concerns me the most, younger viewers wondering who Delvey is, and why she has that clunky sparkly anklet on. This could lead to younger viewers having the wrong idea of people who are good role models and deserve to be on TV.
Kirsten Anzalone, student activities assistant and a mom who watches the show with her 12 and eight-year-old daughters, remembers informing them on Delvey as soon as DWTS filmed the close up shot of her monitor.
“I immediately told my daughters, ‘This is nothing to be proud of; this woman committed terrible crimes,’” Anzalone said. “‘This is nobody that we want to emulate and nobody that we should be proud of.’”
Now if Delvey is someone people shouldn’t be proud of, why is she on my TV screen? I think Johnson answers this question perfectly.
“I think maybe we’re desensitized to people making big mistakes, or maybe we just don’t care,” Johnson said.
In society, there seems to be a pattern where people either get famous for poor actions or stay famous despite poor actions and although I believe it’s important to forgive people, it’s not OK to just act as if what they are doing is fine. Plus, in a world full of so many people, why not highlight positive role models instead of those who quickly draw viewers in via controversy?
“We should start holding up good people. There’s a lot of people that empower kids … young boys, young girls, there’s good examples of that out there,” Johnson said.
