Despite putting her best foot forward, Anna Delvey’s time in the ballroom was cut short.
The socialite con artist, 33 — whose real name is Anna Sorokin — was eliminated during Week 2 of “Dancing With the Stars” on Tuesday night. When asked by co-host Julianne Hough what she was taking away from her experience in the ballroom, she bluntly replied: “Nothing.”
Her pro partner, Ezra Sosa, looked shocked by her brazen reply and raised his eyebrows in surprise. Hough, 36, politely laughed off the reply before wrapping the episode.
As the cast finished saying their goodbyes and dispersed from the stage, dancer Alan Bersten and contestant Dwight Howard were spotted hugging Delvey and Sosa, 23, as they left the stage.
After the elimination, Delvey was seen walking around smiling backstage, per People. For their final dance on the show, Delvey and Sosa performed the quickstep to the “Devil Wears Prada” theme song, KT Tunstall’s “Suddenly I See.”
Sosa choreographed the dance to playfully poke fun at Delvey’s detached demeanor. Still, despite cracking a smile this time, it wasn’t enough to save the fashionista from being voted off.
Delvey first rose to fame for pretending to be a wealthy German heiress and using her social standing to defraud wealthy people, banks and hotels. After being arrested in 2017, she was convicted of grand larceny in the first, second and third degree and theft of services in 2019. Her casting on the show outraged many fans due to these past crimes.
And viewers were less than pleased when Delvey hit the Season 33 premiere last week wearing a blinged-out ankle monitor.
The New York City resident was introduced at the top of the show as a “fashionista and entrepreneur” and took to the dance floor wearing an ankle monitor bedazzled to match her ombre blue, purple, pink and yellow ensemble. The device appeared to be capped off with a bow.
During the segment, Delvey explained why she has to wear the device. “I overstayed my visa because I was in jail so it’s kind of hard to leave,” she said with a slight chuckle.
“I did serve my time,” Delvey noted, saying she hopes to change the critics’ minds.
“I reinvented myself many times, and this time, I’m going to be a ballroom dancer.”
And Judge Carrie Ann Inaba addressed the elephant in the room during her critiques.
“I just wanna say something. When you came out on the dance floor there was a shift in the energy in this room,” Inaba said. “And I would just like to say let’s all just give this a chance, because I can imagine that this is scary for you, and I’m not pro, or for, against anything that you’ve done. But this is about your dancing here.”
Wrapping up her rapid-fire thoughts on Delvey’s “DWTS” debut as time ran out, she added, “Let’s all give her that space, please.”
Delvey revealed that when she was cast on the series, she had received special permission from ICE, who had taken her into custody in 2021, to compete under the condition she would wear the device. Delvey had previously served time in state prison and paid restitution before her February 2021 release.
Delvey’s spokesperson, Juda Engelmayer, confirmed that she could travel within 70 miles of her home base and anywhere in the five boroughs of New York City under previous house arrest conditions, per the Associated Press. However, they could not comment on any changes to those rules.
After last week’s show, Sosa, who was promoted to pro-dancer for Season 33, made a TikTok video on Monday, reacting to the negativity his partner received.
“On my end, I was feeling so much positivity,” he said. “On my partner’s end, she wasn’t receiving the same. I think the hardest part of my day after [the] press line, she was reading the comments and we couldn’t find her. They finally found her in the bathroom. She was crying. I’ve never seen her like that, and it broke my heart.”
In Tuesday’s episode, Delvey’s friend, actress Julia Fox, echoed her partner’s sentiments and shared that Delvey’s tough exterior was a form of self-protection.
“Although Anna does put up this tough exterior, it’s obviously a defense mechanism,” Fox told cameras.
