Matthew Vaughn debunks yet another Taylor Swift conspiracy theory

In the Taylor Swift fandom, to buy into yet another far-fetched conspiracy theory is called “clowning.” “I’m putting on my clown makeup,” a stan will say, before launching into a complicated numerology-based hypothesis to explain why the next Taylor’s Version will come out on a certain date. Swifties can be capable detectives, yes, but they also share similarities with the Q-Anon community in the way they dream up and discard theories to fit their preferred reality. Such is the case with Argylle, the mysterious novel that’s been adapted into a blockbuster by Matthew Vaughn.

The crux of this latest Swiftie theory is that there is something suspicious about Argylle. The book is by an anonymous author who goes by the pseudonym “Elly Conway.” According to a biography from her publisher, Penguin, Conway “was born and raised in upstate New York. She wrote her first novel about Agent Argylle while working as a waitress in a late-night diner.” Vaughn acquired the rights to adapt her book long before it was actually published; the novel only just came out on January 9, and Vaughn’s film debuts in February. Vaughn’s Argylle is also an interesting meta-adaptation of the material, wherein Elly Conway the author is actually a character in the film being played by Bryce Dallas Howard.

Swifties latched on to the mystery of the real Elly Conway’s identity for a number of reasons. For one, Conway’s meager social media presence started with a post on Swift’s birthday. For another, the fictional Conway in the Argylle film carries around her Scottish Fold cat in a backpack carrier—the same kind of cat and carrier Swift has. There’s the New York connection; “Elly” now resides in the city, and has posted photos in locations near Swift’s home and studio. Then there’s the fact that the movie character is a redheaded author, just like Swift portrayed in All Too Well: The Short Film, which launched a bevvy of “Taylor is writing a book” theories. Finally, she has been known, on at least one occasion, to use a pseudonym to hide her collaboration with another artist (“Nils Sjoberg” penned the Rihanna/Calvin Harris track “This Is What You Came For”). There are more connections, if not very convincing ones, but when you train your fanbase to look for “Easter eggs,” as Swift has, the investigations will be dogged and thorough.

Unfortunately for these enterprising Swifties, however, this is a bad case of clownery. Conway’s Twitter/X account denied Swift’s involvement, and now so has Vaughn. “I’m not a big internet guy, and it was actually my daughter who came up to me—this is the power of celebrity and the internet—and said, ‘You never told me Taylor wrote the book!’” Vaughn told Rolling Stone in a new interview. “And I’m looking at her going, ‘What are you talking about Taylor Swift wrote the book? She didn’t write the book!’ And I was laughing because I was like, ‘It’s not true! She didn’t write the book!’ But my daughter was convinced of it.”

Swift did, in fact, inspire the film’s cat (in that the movie cat is Vaughn’s family pet, and his daughters wanted a Scottish Fold after seeing Swift’s documentary Miss Americana). However, that’s where her connection to Argylle ends. “There is a real book … and it’s a really good book. And there is an Elly Conway who wrote the book, but it’s not Taylor Swift,” Vaughn explained. “And I say that because I imagine Taylor Swift has a load of people trying to jump on her bandwagon left, right, and center, and I don’t want to be a part of that club. I did read the conspiracies and I was like, wow, they don’t leave a stone unturned! But it’s not Taylor Swift. She definitely didn’t write the book.”

This is not the first time Swifties have jumped to an incorrect conclusion about an unpublished book’s mystery author. But in this case, the writer’s identity remains unknown. It seems likely that this person is connected personally to Vaughn, as the manuscript is copyrighted by Marv Quinn Holdings Limited (Vaughn’s production company is “Marv Studios”). He remains coy about Conway’s identity, but the fact that she’s a character in the film—a film upon which Vaughn hopes to launch a franchise—suggests that the whole mystery author narrative is part of a grand marketing scheme to benefit both the book and the movie. Swift, meanwhile, has her own debut feature film on the horizon, so where would working with Vaughn fit into the equation? Sorry, Swifties. Queue up “Send In The Clowns.”