The advent of the digital age has blessed us with a few things: the iPhone, TikTok and the promise of a sequel to a film I’ve watched nearly every year if I can help it.
Call me cliché, but it’s hard to recall a time when I didn’t treat The Devil Wears Prada like gospel. For most of us who grew up obsessed with the idea of working their first big girl job at a magazine, it was the ultimate playbook. There was a naivete to Andy Sachs and her lumpy blue sweater, whose sorely mistaken notions of being a ‘real’ journalist slowly came undone at Runway. As Emily Charlton might have postured, it probably began from the moment she put on her first pair of Jimmy Choos (or those Chanel boots). Anyone who’s seen the film will remember the iconic makeover montage that comes on to the tune of Madonna’s ‘Vogue’. With the help of Nigel—and that colossal wardrobe of sample size designer pulls—Andy is reborn. Her attitude too, notably shifts. A million girls would kill for the job, and she’s finally realising that two can play at the game—for all her grievances with her boss. She gets good, like first assistant good. She pulls off the impossible, gets a sweet swig of a fashion insider’s life, and flies a little too close to the sun flirting with industry folk.
When she is finally met with the real filth of the industry—and Miranda casts Nigel aside—she realises she has to leave before it’s too late. She turns the other way, and makes the bold decision to turn away, leaving both Miranda and Runway. It begs the question then: what would it take for Andrea Sachs to return to a life she thought she had left behind forever?
“I was really curious about what it would mean for her to confront that and go back to a place that she had once decided wasn’t right for her,” Anne Hathaway tells Vogue Singapore, ahead of the exciting release of the sequel. It’s certainly not to be taken for granted that the original main cast of Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci and Emily Blunt were all glad to return to the glossy world of this beloved magazine, one which we left in its prime back then, and are meeting anew now.
Only Runway is 20 years into the digital age now. Like real life, the print medium—that sometimes feels senseless in the advent of social media—is put into question. The very essence of journalism is put through the wringer. “To put things in perspective, the first iPhone didn’t come out until a year after the first movie debuted, and I think that was sort of the beginning of the end. As we saw the world of print journalism continue its decline year after year, it made sense to explore this change and develop a story where these characters ended up interacting again,” explains director David Frankel, when asked why now—two decades on—felt like the good time to return to Runway for a sequel.
In truth, the original will always have a special place in our hearts. The cast and crew themselves will attest to this too. But there’s still a story to be told with the second film, which invited its A-list crew all back for another silver screen run. Whilst Streep and Hathaway were traipsing through Asia for their press stops and fan events, we caught up with the two leads, and they shared with us what felt most integral to their characters’ narratives and their most adored on-screen relationships in The Devil Wears Prada 2.
It’s a new reality at Runway with the advent of the digital age. 20 years later, what was the most important part of the sequel’s narrative that drew you back to it?
Meryl Streep: That was the most important part for me. It was the acknowledgement—tacit and overt—in our script of that new reality. That really pulled me in, because I’m trying to figure it out myself. Trying to figure out how to be in a world of digital. I don’t have Instagram or Tiktok, and I feel like I sit outside the lingua franca of the time, I don’t really speak now. I wondered how someone my age, who was confronting that change, would deal with it as a businesswoman. That’s very much about what our story is about.
Anne Hathaway: Everything that Meryl just said I was very interested in. I also was interested in how the girl who threw her phone in the fountain grew up. I think she’s done a really admirable job of living a life full of adventure and integrity, and the circumstances kind of arranged themselves that somehow, it’s the best career move for her to go back to Runway. I was really curious about what it would mean for her to confront that and go back to a place that she had once decided wasn’t right for her. And to meet it again 20 years later, when she’s more sure of herself, more confident, and what would it mean to walk through that door with a little more power.
Why do you think the first film became such a cultural touchstone?
MS: I have no idea! I really don’t. I thought a lot about it. I think maybe part of it has to do with the idea that “girlbosses” were still emergent and exciting 20 years ago. This was a film about a woman who was the head of a major company, and the major characters were women, and ambitious women at that. So it was all new and fun. Now, of course, that phrase has come under siege, but I think it’s still relevant to explore how women lead and in what ways. It’s also just really fun. The world is turbulent and fairly dark. The news is upsetting, and it’s great to have reminders of what’s wonderful, free, beautiful and silly in the world.
AH: I think we had a few things going for us: Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci, Emily Blunt in one of her first-ever roles. You had these incredible performers, who all had so much chemistry. Then David Frankel, who’s not just a brilliant man, but has unbelievable taste, as the person in charge. We had this hilarious script by Aline Brosh McKenna. It was produced by Wendy Finerman and Karen Rosenfelt. Just everyone contributed to it. There was so much love on set while we were making it, and I do genuinely think audiences loved it in return. And it’s been this 20-year love affair between the people that made it and the people that made it a part of their lives.
How much of the creative process were you a part of—in bringing Miranda and Andy back to screen?
MS: Well, bringing back Miranda…When we leave her in the car at the end of the first film, she’s sort of sailing into a world that she feels in control of. Completely. Her plan has worked, she’s saved her business, she’s still on top. Has it been moved off the pedestal?
And we begin this film in a very different space. Confronting all the changes that the digital landscape has brought to publishing, to magazines, to journalism. Trying to find her way with all the ways you can be cancelled and virally challenged. So that was interesting to me, because it wasn’t the same old person, it was a deepening of this woman. And an acknowledgement of the time in her life when she had to make big decisions. And I loved it, I loved putting her in jeopardy that way.
AH: I felt like Aline did such a fabulous job with the script, I found that I didn’t really have a lot of notes on the character. So I focused on the back story; what has she been up to for 20 years?
And from where Aline originally saw the character, we had a conversation about whether or not that was the most interesting way to bring her to life. So she listened to me on that one and we pivoted. And then when I got the final version of the script, I said: “This is wonderful. How are we going to explain the clothes?” So we actually came up with a specific back story of how Andy’s built up a closet over the last 20 years. Travelling the world, making the salary that you make as a journalist. But I was like how do you look fabulous in a fashion film? How do you have great style on a journalist’s budget? So we were like if she’s travelled the world, that means she had access to great consignment shops. So we said that she’s been spending the last 20 years shopping consignment, and because she worked at Runway, she’s got an eye and she knows the label and she knows what a great score is.
VS: But she still gave away Chanel!
AH: She did, but it was to someone who really, really deserves it!
There are some gorgeous scenes that take place in Milan. Do you have a favourite?
AH: It was a scene I wasn’t in, actually. There was a smaller portion of the crew that was going to go film Meryl in the Galleria. And I asked, “Do you think it would be appropriate or welcome if I just came just to watch?” And they said it’d be great. So, I was there. I got to see that scene being filmed, and it’s one of the most beautiful shots I’ve ever seen. I ran up to Meryl after the first take and I told her, “You’ve never been more beautiful than this moment.” So, I’d say that, for me, that moment of finishing the film in the Galleria with everybody getting to see Meryl Streep be Miranda Priestly at the top of her craft in the most beautiful place, was definitely the top for me in Italy.
What were some of your favourite on-screen relationships in this new sequel?
AH: It sounds like such a line but I love them all. When I saw the whole film put together, the way the chemistry just pops, it’s unbelievable. People that you wouldn’t necessarily think would have such great and dynamic chemistry, and such a strong relationship, become some of the heartbeat of the film. It sounds like such a diplomatic answer but I really love all of them.
MS: I particularly love the relationship that Emily’s character has with a new member of the cast. It’s so delicious, it’s insane. I won’t say anymore about that.
VS: Your lips are sealed.
Watch The Devil Wears Prada 2 in cinemas from 30 April.
