NETFLIX’S Inventing Anna is based on the real-life story of Anna “Delvey” Sorokin, a fake socialite who allegedly conned the elite out of thousands of dollars.
The show has left fans wondering if Anna’s boyfriend, Chase, was real.
What is Inventing Anna based on?
The premise of the show is based on a 2018 article from New York Magazine titled Maybe She Had So Much Money She Just Lost Track Of It by Jessica Pressler, who’s a writer and producer on the show.
The story is based on Anna “Delvey” Sorokin, a real woman who posed as a German heiress to con the elite.
She allegedly stole thousands of dollars from various socialites, hotels, and banks.
In 2019, Delvey was found guilty of one count of attempted grand larceny, three counts of grand larceny, and four counts of theft services.
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She was released from prison on parole in February 2021, but the German citizen was arrested by ICE six weeks later for overstaying her visa.
On October 5, 2022, it was revealed that Delvey is being released from federal jail on a $10,000 bail bond and will be required to remain in 24-hour home confinement with electronic monitoring and no access to social media, according to Bloomberg.
Is Anna Delvey’s boyfriend Chase based on a real person?
In the show, Delvey dates a rich app developer named Chase Sikorski.
The character is seemingly loosely based on Delvey’s real-life boyfriend, according to the details about him in Pressler’s article.
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Pressler never identifies the boyfriend by name, and the name Chase Sikorski seems to have been created for the show, but some of the article’s details about him are used in the show.
In her story, Pressler describes Delvey’s boyfriend as a “futurist on the TED-Talks circuit who’d been profiled in The New Yorker.”
In Inventing Anna, Chase and Anna are living in hotels around the world and rubbing elbows with the elite.
And Chase is getting money from investors for the dream app he’s creating called Wake.
These details from the show are similar to what Pressler wrote in her 2018 story:
“For about two years, they’d been kind of like a team, showing up in places frequented by the itinerant wealthy, living out of fancy hotels and hosting sceney dinners where the Futurist talked up his app and Delvey spoke of the private club she wanted to open once she turned 25 and came into her trust fund.”
The Wake app is seemingly fictional, and it’s unclear what type of app Delvey’s real-life boyfriend had been working on.
In the show, Chase eventually goes to the Emirates without ever actually producing the app.
This detail is also based in reality, according to Pressler, who said Anna’s boyfriend “whose app never materialized” moved to the Emirates in 2016.
In the Netflix series, Chase is painted as a conman, though Pressler never confirms that in her article.
Who plays Chase in Inventing Anna?
The character Chase is played by actor Saamer Usmani.
The actor is known for playing Avery Watkins in the Netflix series What/If.
Viewers may also recognize him from his smaller roles in Succession and Reign.
Usmani attended the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, and graduated in 2014.