When you think of the greatest impostors, you picture smooth‑talking swindlers who could sell ice to an Eskimo and still get a thank‑you note. The 20th century gave us a parade of such characters—men and women who slipped into new identities as easily as changing coats. From forged fortunes to fake royalty, these con artists did it all with flair. Below, we count down the ten most audacious impostors who left a trail of bewildered victims and unforgettable stories.

Meet the Greatest Impostors of the 20th Century

10 Cassie Chadwick

Born Elizabeth Bigsley in 1857, Cassie Chadwick turned the art of the con into a lifelong career. Her first brush with the law came at fourteen, when she was caught forging checks in Ontario while claiming they were inherited from a mysterious British uncle. The court declared her insane—a dubious verdict for a teenager.

She married three times, the first marriage in 1882 to a man she introduced as the clairvoyant Madame Lydia DeVere. The wedding drew the attention of past victims, who demanded payment for the money she’d pilfered. The union lasted less than a year.

Chadwick’s most audacious scheme arrived fifteen years later: she posed as the illegitimate daughter of steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. For eight years she secured roughly $20 million in bank loans under Carnegie’s name, banks fearing controversy if they asked the real Carnegie to verify the loans. The ruse collapsed in 1904 when a skeptical bank called her bluff, leading to her arrest. She received a 14‑year sentence but died of heart complications in 1907.

9 Stanley Clifford Weyman

Stanley Clifford Weyman wasn’t in it for cash; he craved the thrill of living multiple lives. He famously quipped, “One man’s life is a boring thing. I lived many lives. I’m never bored.” From posing as navy officers to masquerading as the U.S. Secretary of State, Weyman’s résumé was a kaleidoscope of identities.

His most audacious stunt involved a real Afghan princess, Fatima, who was visiting the United States in 1921. The U.S. government ignored her presence, so Weyman introduced himself as a State Department liaison and promised to arrange a meeting with President Warren Harding—for a $10,000 “gift” to the department. He actually delivered the princess in first‑class style, then hustled his way up the chain of command until he stood beside Harding. The press snapped a photo of the trio, exposing the fraud and landing Weyman in jail—just because he wanted to see if he could.

8 Ferdinand Waldo Demara, Jr.

Ferdinand Demara, dubbed “The Great Impostor,” turned impersonation into a public service. After deserting the Army in 1942 and faking his own death, he resurfaced as Robert French and taught psychology at a Pennsylvania college, hopping between academic posts under a parade of aliases.

When the Korean War erupted, Demara assumed the identity of surgeon Joseph Cyr and boarded the Canadian destroyer HMCS Cayuga. The ship’s crew discovered they had no qualified surgeon—so Demara performed more than sixteen major operations, all after a quick skim of a surgery textbook. Remarkably, every patient survived, cementing his legend as a lifesaving impostor.

7 George Dupre

George Dupre’s con was a tall tale about himself. After World II, he toured Canada as a speaker, claiming he’d been a Special Operations Executive spy who’d infiltrated Nazi‑occupied Paris, survived Gestapo torture, and helped the French Resistance. His dramatic stories sparked a bestseller, The Man Who Wouldn’t Talk, and turned him into a post‑war hero.

In reality, Dupre spent the war in a London office, never once behind enemy lines. When actual veterans came forward to debunk his claims, the truth emerged: he had merely embellished a few anecdotes for fun, and the whole saga spiraled out of control. He donated his earnings to Scouts Canada, and his biography was reclassified as fiction.

6 David Hampton

At just nineteen, David Hampton became one of the youngest high‑profile con artists. He masqueraded as the non‑existent son of actor Sidney Poitier—who, in fact, had six daughters and no sons. After being turned away from a Manhattan nightclub, Hampton claimed to be Poitier’s son, and the bouncers promptly escorted him to the VIP lounge.

Armed with this phantom identity, he infiltrated upscale restaurants, feigning disappointment when his “father” failed to appear while signing checks in Poitier’s name. He swindled celebrities like Calvin Klein and Gary Sinise, and even stole an address book to cold‑call acquaintances of his imagined relatives. After his story inspired the play and film Six Degrees of Separation, he continued to adopt new personas until his death from AIDS in 1993.

5 Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter

German‑born Christian Gerhartsreiter arrived in the United States in 1979 with acting ambitions but no visa or cash. He married a young woman, Amy Duhnke, convincing her that a conscription threat would force him back to Germany. The marriage secured a green card, but he promptly fled to California, abandoning his new wife.

He reinvented himself as “Clark Rockefeller,” a faux Rockefeller heir who fluttered through high‑society circles for two decades. His deception unraveled when his wife, Sandra Boss, grew suspicious. After a 2006 divorce, Gerhartsreiter kidnapped his daughter, leading to his 2008 arrest. Investigations later linked him to a 1998 murder, adding another dark chapter to his elaborate persona.

4 Alan Conway (Stanley Kubrick Impostor)

In the early 1990s, reclusive director Stanley Kubrick was a phantom in public life. Alan Conway, born Eddie Alan Jablowsky, seized the opportunity and began masquerading as the famed filmmaker at London social clubs. Though he sported a clean‑shaven English look and knew virtually nothing about Kubrick’s filmography, his confidence fooled even seasoned critics.

Conway’s ruse even led critic Frank Rich to conclude that Kubrick was gay—an assertion based solely on Conway’s behavior. Tragically, Conway’s impersonations were fueled by alcoholism and delusion. He died in 1998 from heart problems, leaving behind a bizarre footnote in cinema lore.

3 Anoushirvan Fakhran (Jonathan Taylor Spielberg)

Iranian native Anoushirvan Fakhran entered the United States on a student visa in 1992 and promptly reinvented himself as “Jonathan Taylor Spielberg,” the alleged nephew of Hollywood legend Steven Spielberg. He even legally changed his surname to Spielberg in 1997.

In 1998, a mysterious caller claimed to represent Steven Spielberg and arranged for “Jonathan” to research a film at a Fairfax, Virginia high school. The school granted him tuition‑free enrollment, a transfer from a fictitious Beverly Hills acting school, and a coveted parking spot. He lived in a posh Fairfax apartment, drove a BMW, and flaunted the celebrity connection.

The scheme unraveled when he stopped attending classes, prompting school officials to contact Steven Spielberg. Fakhran was arrested and sentenced to eleven months for forging documents.

2 Steven Russell

Steven Russell is as much a master escape artist as he is an impostor. After losing a job in 1990, he faked an accident, sued his employer, and landed his first prison term. While incarcerated, he slipped into a guard’s uniform and walked out—no alarms, no fuss.

Later, charged with embezzling nearly $1 million, Russell’s bail was set at $950,000—unpayable. He called the courthouse, claimed to be a judge, and slashed the bail to $45,000, which he promptly settled. When recaptured, he dyed his prison jumpsuit with green markers to mimic surgical scrubs and walked out again.

His most elaborate ruse involved feigning an AIDS‑related death, then calling the prison as an FBI detective to release himself from guard duty. The film I Love You Phillip Morris dramatizes these escapades. Russell remains incarcerated, with a projected release date far in the future.

1 Christophe Thierry Rocancourt

Before the German “Clark Rockefeller” stole the spotlight, Christophe Rocancourt earned the moniker “French Rockefeller.” He launched his career by forging a Paris property deed and selling it for $1.4 million. Flush with cash, he crossed the Atlantic and began courting Hollywood elites, claiming he was a French relative of the Rockefellers.

Rocancourt’s modus operandi was simple: he would appear at a party, drop a vague reference to a famous mother or producer, and convince the wealthy to fund his phantom projects. He boasted of scamming roughly $40 million over his lifetime. Notably, he persuaded action star Jean‑Claude Van Damme to produce a movie for him.

Arrested for fraud in 1998, Rocancourt continued his cons into the 21st century, even while incarcerated in Vancouver. He once told reporters, “I never steal. Never. I lied, but I never stole.”