Mikey Madison legitimizes sex work as ‘Anora’

Anora movie poster

In actuality, the anchor and guiding force of this movie is Mikey Madison.

For the first time in watching a Mikey Madison movie, albeit the first out of three films I’ve seen of her’s, I was pleasantly surprised to not watch the 25-year-old actress set ablaze in Sean Baker’s “Anora.”

In Quentin Tarentino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Madison played a murderous Mansen follower who, in her limited screen time, was subject to a projectile dog-food can to the head, a vengeful pitbull attack and, most dramatically, the kiss of a flamethrower. (During the 2025 Screen Actors Guild awards, Madison joked that she “finally felt” like she had “made it in Hollywood” because of this character).

Later Madison would go on to play Ghostface in the fifth “Scream” iteration, joining a long line of actors playing the iconic villain including Mathew Lilliard and Laurie Metcalf. Madison’s character, after dramatically revealing her identity as the masked killer, was promptly shot before eventually falling on a stove, where she was set on fire and killed. 

Watching Sean Baker’s “Anora,” I couldn’t help but ruminate on the possibility of seeing Madison alight with fire, yet again. Luckily, although I have enjoyed this blazing continuity in Madison’s career, her character, the titular Anora, is never once set on fire. The lack of flame makes sense given the confines of the plot: Madison’s Anora is a 25-year-old stripper working and living in Brighton Beach, New York, who spends her nights stripping and days sleeping. 

It’s her good luck and hard work that she meets Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), the son of a wealthy Russian oligarch who pays Anora to have a week of sex, parties and “fun.” A week of fun that ends with Anora and Ivan married, happily eloped in the great city of Las Vegas, Nevada. 

Such a whirlwind romance it should be for Anora, who both the audience and Sean Baker have crowned Cinderella: the poor, kind-hearted woman who eventually marries her prince charming. Prince charming Ivan is not, however, as, just in the beginning of their marriage, we find out he did not alert his family to his nuptials. 

We find this out not from Ivan himself, but instead from the three men who break into Ivan’s family’s New York home, their berating of Ivan leading to the 19-year-old running off into the streets of New York City, leaving his new wife alone with a gaggle of men. Madison may never be on fire in this movie, but we do get to see a ten minute home invasion scene: Anora tries to run away and fight off these men, leading to a broken nose and smashed artwork, but to no avail.

These men offer a tied up Anora an ultimatum: help them find a runaway Ivan to get their marriage annulled or get arrested for a slew of crimes they can accuse her of. While brash, Anora chooses the former option, and almost the rest of the movie is a comedic chase scene of these three men and Anora searching for the wayward playboy.

It’s rather odd that “Anora” was crowned the Best Picture winner at this year’s Academy Awards. “Anora” is not necessarily a drama, a dramedy sure, and its lens is more comedic than anything else. Only in the last five minutes is there any sort of searing, “Oscar-worthy” drama. 

Director Sean Baker came away from Oscar’s night with four Academy Awards (for directing, editing, writing and producing), becoming the first person to win four Oscars in a single night for a single film. However, no matter how well Baker’s craft is on display in “Anora,” this is not his movie. 

In actuality, the anchor and guiding force of this movie is Mikey Madison. Almost in every shot of this movie, Madison portrays a woman constantly under the guise of customer service, whether it be working the floor at her strip club or chatting with her husband. She is a saleswoman, and her product is herself. 

The audience only gets to see the authentic Anora in limited quantities: when she’s chatting with fellow strippers, wiping tears away in an unknown man’s car or sleeping in the house shared with her sister. While some could argue that this makes her one-dimensional, I argue that it’s the work of an impeccable actress. No character in the last five years has had the same depth and understanding Madison imbues Anora with, whether it be as person, woman or sex-worker.

Madison, in the long press release of this movie, has become a vocal advocate for sex-workers. Like Baker, Madison walked away from Oscar’s night with an Academy Award of her own, winning against favorites like Demi Moore and Fernanda Torres. But it’s not her win, though much deserved, that is remarkable.

16 actresses have won an Academy Award for portraying a sex worker, from Jane Fonda to Emma Stone, but Madison became the first to publicly acknowledge the community in her speech; Madison wanted to “recognize and honor the sex worker community… I will continue to support and be an ally.”