by Jake Bourgeois, Contributing Writer
One of the biggest names in television is back with a brand new miniseries for Netflix.
Inventing Anna is a new production from Shonda Rimes, the followup to the smash hit Bridgerton. Admittedly, the only trip I’ve taken to Shondaland prior to this is the premiere season of How to Get Away with Murder. However, as I stated just last month, I’m a huge fan of Julia Garner’s work in Ozark, and the plot has a “truth is stranger than fiction” feel to it. Based on an article by New York Magazine (here, Manhattan Magazine), it follows a reporter in need of redemption (Anna Chlumsky, My Girl) who unravels the enigma of Anna Sorokin (a.k.a. Anna Delvey), who swindled her way into the exclusive club that is New York City high society. (The show does move past the article for its final two episodes.)
Despite my relative unfamiliarity with Rimes productions, it all seemed to point to a formula that seemed too good to fail.
Then the narration started.
We’ve got a bad accent hall-of-famer on our hands, folks. I don’t know who developed the confounding mix of German and Russian that brought us this accent, but I knew almost immediately I’d made a terrible mistake. I’m one of those people where once something that gets under my skin presents itself, it poisons the entire well. This is a level up from that. As I tried to slog my way through the premiere, I couldn’t listen to more than a few moments when Garner was on screen for fear that I would start bleeding out of my ears. Perhaps this is what it’s like for those who try to watch Mary Poppins without the nostalgia allowing them to forgive Dick Van Dyke’s attempt at a cockney accent, but it truly ruined my ability to have any chance at enjoying this show.
Eventually, the caustic nature of the accent dulled enough to where I could at least work my way through the nine-episode series. Perhaps I developed some form of auditory Stockholm Syndrome knowing that I had 10 hours of this to consume. The problem with the accent didn’t end with the damage it did to me in an audible sense, however. It undercut the entire drive of the show. It’s built upon the fact that Anna was so charming, so charismatic that she conned the elite of the elite into believing she was one of them. I couldn’t take that seriously with the distracting accent. It’s a shame, too, because I do think there were points — particularly when sat in the visitor’s room at Rikers Island prison — where I think Garner might be doing some good work. But it’s just all ruined by the choice of accent. There are points when I can’t tell if I have an issue with the performance, or if the accent itself is just infecting my entire view.
While Delvey’s name remained the same for the show, reporter Jessica Pressley’s name is changed to Vivan Kent. While I don’t know for certain whether the name change was intentional to make us consider her some sort of “superwoman,” the show’s certainly not getting the benefit of the doubt from me. Just an eye roll. Regardless, watching Chlumsky doggedly on the trail of the story is the best part of the show. There’s a complexity to our protagonist, with a career misstep alluded to that’s put her career in the dumps. Chlumsky has her moments in her performance, but it’s an uneven one. My favorite portions of the show were when she was interacting with her fellow office mates of “Scriberia.” (See, it’s clever because they were banished to the far dark corner of the office.) There’s a great camaraderie to that group. Unfortunately, none of the other performances really made much of a mark on me. They try, as each episode essentially focuses on a character or two caught up in her schemes. Admittedly, it’s made harder by the fact there’s really no one to root for. Meaning, as things got further along, I was less interested in what would happen next, and more interested in when my nightmare would be over.
Even the stuff that went past what I could read in the article, I just didn’t find it interesting. One character even correctly points out it’s just trafficking in rumors when a character goes abroad for a possible follow up. The intrigue was all in the rise and fall. I didn’t much care for anything after that — trial included.
With a Rimes production and the fact that the tale is all about living the high life, the show at the very least looks decent. When going for style, however, the show overuses pop music in scenes that distracted more than it helps. The melodramatic tone feels unnecessary, too, as there’s plenty of drama without adding extra. No, I’m not naïve enough to think no dramatic license was going to be taken with this story, but the codas to the article feel unnecessary. It makes me think seven episodes with a “where are they now” montage, maybe eight, would have been more than enough. I would have even preferred just a straight up documentary. It’s shorter that way at the very least. I just don’t know that this was the best partnership for this story.
Considering the place where the show started from, having such an intriguing tale to chronicle, the result was an unequivocal disappointment. It’s ironic that the roughly 10-hour run time feels like its own long con. You’d save yourself a mountain of time (most of it wondering how you let yourself be duped) by just reading the feature.
Grade: D+
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