Lacey vs. Aleah Woodmansee in Real Life: How Accurate Is ‘The Act’?

In Hulu’s The Act, Gypsy Rose Blanchard is shown in scenes with a neighbor friend named Lacey and Lacey’s mom, Mel. But the two characters don’t actually exist in real life. Mel isn’t based on anyone in real life. Lacey, meanwhile, is loosely based on a neighbor that Gypsy Blanchard knew in real life named Aleah Woodmansee.

In the final episode of The Act, Mel visits Gypsy in prison, seeking to know if Gypsy was complicit in the lies her mother, Dee Dee, told about her. Those lies led to Dee Dee creating all sort of fictional illnesses for Gypsy that resulted in Gypsy being on a feeding tube, having her teeth taken out, and enduring other horrors. In real life, Gypsy was not complicit and was trying to escape that life. In the final scene, Mel begins to see Gypsy as a victim and not a villain. But she also tells Gypsy: “I can’t be your mom… You’re on your own now.” That scene didn’t happen, since Mel doesn’t exist.

As for Aleah (the inspiration for Lacey), she told In Touch Weekly that she’s not thrilled with how she’s heard that she was portrayed. She told In Touch: “I have not watched the show. I’m always hesitant to watch anything that comes out, even interviews I did. To be quite honest, I don’t like what I hear about how I am being portrayed. I understand that it’s supposed to be dramatized but [there] are a few things I have had issues with.”

One thing she disagrees with is Lacey’s accent, because Aleah said she’s “not a fan of the whole hillbilly tone (for) the character.” She also said that she never smoked with Gypsy like the show portrays. “Alcohol and smoking were things we never discussed,” she told In Touch. “Literally the most risque topics we even touched on were boys…and … that remained pretty tame.”

The tattoo scene in episode 2 was fake, she added. All her tattoos have been done professionally and Aleah keeps them covered up most of the time. “I really don’t understand why [that scene] was necessary.”

Aleah said it was important to her to maintain a respectable image before and after the case, which she doesn’t feel the show portrayed.

People who know Aleah have posted their agreement on Facebook in public notes. One woman wrote: “Watching this with my best bud and I can’t believe the misrepresentation. If they only knew the real Aleah… At least we’re having a good laugh.” 

People who know Aleah only have kind and positive things to say about her. “Aleah is the sweetest lady ever! It’s sad how Hollywood will change who someone truly is just to make it more ‘dramatic.'”

Another wrote: “I’m lucky to know Aleah and the freaking awesome lady she is!”

Another said, “Tell Aleah to keep her head up and to continue to be strong willed! Read the article and couldn’t agree more with what she said! That girl is bright AF! Proud of her!”

Very little interaction still remains on Facebook that you can see between Aleah and Gypsy, but you can still see one comment from back in 2010. This could have been written by Gypsy or by Dee Dee, since the account that replied to Aleah was shared between both of them.

Aleah told 20/20 that Dee Dee disapproved of the conversations she and Gypsy had, much like the series portrayed, Oxygen noted. And Dee Dee really did destroy Gypsy’s laptop because Gypsy and Aleah had been exchanging messages about boys, Aleah told In Touch Weekly. Dee Dee destroyed the laptop with a hammer and later told Aleah that she had found all the messages and Aleah couldn’t talk to Gypsy about boys again.

Aleah also spoke to In Touch Weekly about the day that Dee Dee was murdered.

She said a group of neighbors was talking to the sheriff’s department about the message left on Dee Dee’s Facebook, and they were trying to track them down. Every lead ended up as a dead end, and Aleah remembered that Gypsy had told her about Nick Godejohn and a Wisconsin marriage license. So Aleah was the one who first gave the sheriff’s department Nick’s name.

If you are interested in debunking more details about The Act, there’s a Facebook page call By Proxy that is preparing an official story about Blanchard’s case. The page is run by Kristy Blanchard (Gypsy’s stepmother) and the writers of By Proxy.

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