On the set of The Devil Wears Prada 2, Anne Hathaway thought she was doing a pretty good job of keeping her cool. That, despite a 20-year gap in which the film has become so deeply ingrained in pop culture that a three-word phrase (“Florals, for spring…”) can bring people right back to Runway—and despite the hundreds, if not thousands, of smartphone-armed fans and long-lensed paparazzi who gathered on Sixth Avenue to watch them film scenes.
But then there was the camera test.
“I heard over the radio: ‘Miranda Priestly is walking,’” Hathaway says, speaking to Vogue from the set of her next movie, in Budapest. “Meryl, as Miranda, had started down the hallway ahead of me—I was maybe 50 feet behind her—and seeing her from the back was practically psychedelic. I just felt so many portals open up at that moment. I was 22 again, but it was still now. Thankfully, this time, she didn’t stay in character the entire time, so we had a lot of laughs.”
Filming wrapped last summer on The Devil Wears Prada 2, the highly anticipated sequel to the 2006 movie starring Hathaway as Andy Sachs, an eager young reporter who—hired as the second assistant to Miranda Priestly, the fierce and formidable editor-in-chief of Runway magazine—wrestles with how much she’ll compromise her life, identity, and values for the job.
Once again directed by David Frankel, TDWP2 will follow Andy’s return to Runway as Miranda navigates the perilous new media landscape (and Runway’s precarious position within it). This includes reconnecting with another former assistant, Emily (Emily Blunt)—now the head of a luxury brand and holding the keys to commercial money that could mean Runway’s survival.’
Many members of the original cast and crew have returned—very happily so—including Blunt and Stanley Tucci, as the suave and sage Nigel Kipling. “Everyone who was physically able to come back to be a part of the second film did, so we started with such a deep knowledge and appreciation for the last 20 years, and what the film’s become,” Hathaway says. “Someone new on our cast described it as ‘Gay Christmas.’”
Here, ahead of the movie’s May 1 release, we have the exclusive first look at what’s going on back at Runway. There’s a sharply spectacled Miranda at her desk in a power-shouldered blazer (an afternoon for fittings was spent shopping for and fitting the perfect set of Priestly specs); a wide-eyed, red-bobbed Emily looking poised to say something deeply cutting; a suited-and-booted Nigel and couture-swathed Miranda attending their own version of the Met Ball; and Andy raiding the Runway closet yet again.
“It was like going into the back of your own closet and finding something, thinking, Oh, I wonder if this still fits?” says Meryl Streep.
“It felt a lot like coming home, especially because Stanley Tucci is now… literally my home. It’s incredible what this film has brought us all,” says Blunt. (After meeting on set, Blunt introduced Tucci to her sister, Felicity, whom he married in 2012.) “This character seems to be the glove that fits rather too easily for me. She’s a lunatic. Maybe I should question myself on that: why it seems so easy to step back into her.”
Emily and Andy’s story is “the most unconventional love story” she’s ever played, Blunt goes on. “There’s something so delicious about a character where the guardrails are off, and Annie is an excellent dance partner. I felt a great freedom being Emily again.”
“Nigel must’ve been always hiding away inside me,” adds Tucci. “There was a good deal of Nigel in me, and so I was just able to let it all out again. But, especially in this film, the costumes are so integral to the character.”
Indeed, fashion remains the film’s raison d’être; it’s how power is wielded and agendas are advanced. Costume designer Molly Rogers, who worked on And Just Like That… and the first Devil Wears Prada under the revered Patricia Field, had one initial rule for herself and her team: “No pigeon handbags.” Longevity was on her mind, as was bucking the breakneck speed of trends that could stagnate the movie.
“It’s very natural for myself and my team to throw a little something in, but I wanted it to be seamless, timeless,” Rogers tells Vogue. “We have a really great roadmap—I love the first movie’s clothes because they’re timeless. You don’t see ‘look 14,’ or whatever. I wanted to do that, while making sure the clothing had a broad horizon.”
There was input from the players to consider, too. Streep wanted shoulder pads—and had, at first, hoped to stick to pants (sourcing some fabulous Dior skirts scuppered the plan)—while Hathaway wanted her costumes to reflect Andy’s years as a traveling reporter. “Anything the actors feel informs what I’m doing,” Rogers says.
Streep, she found, was especially generous with fitting time. “We could sleep on things, like, is this Schiaparelli jacket the right moment? Meryl also flipped two outfits in the movie, and it was the right thing to do.”
“As a person holding her position for 20 years, she kept her look but adapted it, as we do with time,” Streep says of her styling. “But I almost had PTSD from wearing high heels for 16 weeks. I feel like I should get a Medal of Freedom!”
Rogers also tried to go for “happier clothes… for the world we’re in right now.” That plays out in a flowing white Phoebe Philo look and a sparkling blue Rabanne date-night dress for Andy, jewel-toned Lanvin for Miranda, and sculptural archival Gaultier couture for newcomer Simone Ashley.
For the Met Gala-esque scenes, Rogers and Streep were thinking about classic, Audrey Hepburn-style silhouettes. In time, they had a custom gown from Balenciaga—newly under the stewardship of Pierpaolo Piccioli—produced in the style of an archival cocktail dress on Rogers’s mood board.
Jonathan Anderson’s Dior was another welcome collaborator: Rogers saw the spring 2026 collection before it hit the runway, and picked up suits, separates, and accessories for Blunt and Streep.
Andy’s looks were more menswear-focused: a tailored Ulla Johnson suit and tie, a pleated khaki Sacai skirt, a Gabriela Hearst waistcoat. “You see her come back to Runway from her reporting job and she’s figuring herself out again, professionally and emotionally,” says Rogers. “We distinguish her from the heel-clackers with menswear and vintage touches, and that New York style of character.” In one of the images, Hathaway wears a vintage three-piece Jean Paul Gaultier pinstripe suit. (“We based a lot of her clothing off of Annie Hall,” Rogers notes.) When she gets access to the Runway closet once again, there’s more Gabriela Hearst, and “the most perfect summer shirt,” via TWP. (“That was on repeat.”) Plus, Rogers kept finding Armani jackets in multiple vintage stores “with the perfect weight and swag for Annie.”
The hair and makeup in the movie was also rethought for the moment. “It wasn’t as styled as in the first movie, which was very model-y and fashion forward,” says Sean Flanigan, the hair department head. “There’s a much more loose and casual feeling.”
Indeed, Streep describes her glam as “more sleek, stylish, and clean.” (Now 82, J. Roy Helland, her longtime hair and makeup artist, was unable to work on the sequel directly, but oversaw the overarching vision.) But Emily, of course, had to have that blunt (pun acknowledged!) bob. “You see a flash of it and people know it’s her,” says Blunt. “But it was a wig—that kind of red is too hard to maintain!”
“My biggest priority was using products that stay truthful to where we are now, using clean products to make glowy skin,” says Nicki Ledermann, makeup head of department and personal makeup artist to Anne Hathaway, who also worked on the first movie. “There’s no Instagram-style of beauty, but it’s not cookie-cutter, either.”
“These are mature women now, and I really wanted to avoid making them look like they’re in their 20s,” Ledermann adds. “There’s nothing more beautiful than having a face that has lines of life. Great skincare came first, and we used a lot of sunblock because we filmed in summer.”
The visuals actively informed Andy’s backstory. “I made it an actual story point in the film that we had to explain how somebody who, working as a writer in these times, could have a fabulous wardrobe,” Hathaway says. “I pitched that Andy went on to do investigative journalism, traveled the world for 15 years… and when you’ve had an education at a place like Runway, you know what to do when you see a consignment shop. So she’s been thrifting for the better part of 20 years. And then the magic closet moment comes back with Nigel.”
Hathaway also made up a backstory for why Andy seems to be wearing a fine set of pearls and a luxurious watch: Forever nifty, Andy had replicas made. The tailed Phoebe Philo T-shirt and barrel jeans were her favourite, though—and that’s to say nothing of the costume that “got the crew to applaud,” she teases.
Each cast member had a different feeling about the heaving crowds each day. “All of this attention and obsession with the quick consumption of this movie before it’s even out… in many ways is emblematic of how our industry and our lives have changed,” says Blunt. “We began wearing our sweatpants to set and only changing out of them at the last minute to try to preserve the magic.”
“It felt jubilant, when I first got out on Sixth Avenue—where we filmed 20 years ago and nobody was interested,” says Streep. “I got changed, got out of my camper, and just heard this roar! When we shot the wannabe Met Ball, it was even crazier. People were dressed up as Miranda! Honestly, it really threw me.”
Fandom and how we consume pop culture has mutated beyond recognition since 2006. Yes, there’s the on-street frenzy and the paparazzi rabid for spoilers, but there are also new opportunities for joy with something like The Devil Wears Prada 2. “I’m hoping everybody dresses up and goes to the movies,” says Hathaway. “I hope people remember how much fun they had wearing hot pink and going to see Barbie. I’m hoping that everybody puts on their favorite Miranda Priestly-approved outfit and just has a blast.”
This article was first published on Vogue.com.
