Miranda Priestly Hangs Up Her Own Coat Now
The Devil Wears Prada took place amid the glorious roar of capitalism. The hit 2006 comedy took place in a world where magazines were still triumphant, with Runway, a fictional, Vogue-esque publication the film was centered on, sitting firmly atop the heap. The only concern was whether Andy Sachs, a plucky aspiring journalist played by Anne Hathaway, could survive working as the assistant to Runway’s imperious editor in chief, Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep), without totally losing her sense of self. But in The Devil Wears Prada 2, Hollywood’s latest nostalgia-baiting follow-up film, the crisis is no longer personal—it’s existential.
Ahead of watching the sequel, I worried about what I thought would be a lazy parade of fan service; I feared that the movie would lob catchphrases and cameos at the audience like dead fish to a herd of clapping seals. (This often seems to be Hollywood’s view of its customer base too.) At first, the story is a bit of a retread: 20 years later, Runway still exists, and Miranda still rules it with a relatively iron fist. But the magazine’s budgets are no longer limitless, the September issue is not quite as thick with glossy ads, and dreaded words such as content and traffic are bandied about during meetings that used to be focused on which passed appetizers would be served at an upcoming gala. The sequel thus finds a good reason to exist: It has plenty of breezy fun probing the dilemmas of modern media, without abandoning the glitz that made the original so enduring.
I’m as surprised as anyone. The director, David Frankel, has mostly specialized in mediocre dramedies since the success of the first Prada, while the screenwriter, Aline Brosh McKenna, has done her best work in television since then. Yet they’ve managed to land on an enticing premise as well as assemble an impressive lineup of on-screen talent. Stanley Tucci returns as Miranda’s right-hand man, Nigel Kipling; so too does Emily Blunt, who plays Andy’s former rival and colleague, Emily Charlton. Additions to the cast include Kenneth Branagh as Miranda’s violinist husband and Lucy Liu and Justin Theroux as a newsmaking tech-industry power couple that are now freshly divorced. Although Frankel is a workmanlike visual storyteller, he understands what to emphasize here—that is, lots of spiky friendships and mild work drama, and very little romantic turmoil.
[Read: The invisible labor of fashion blogging]
In the first movie, Andy is a hard-nosed Northwestern journalism grad who derides Runway’s glossy existence and thinks herself above fashion. She eventually gains some respect for Miranda without submitting to the tractor beam of life at the magazine. (I was thrilled that the sequel contains very little scolding over Andy’s workaholic tendencies, which really weighs down the previous film.) She’s become a celebrated journalist, except Prada 2 kicks off with her career hitting a low point: The publication where she works, The New York Vanguard, is downsizing. (Members of the press watching might find this premise triggering.) In parallel, Runway is weathering a minor scandal, and its publisher hires Andy as a features editor to help stabilize the ship. She remains junior to Miranda, but she’s now confident enough to go toe-to-toe with her former boss more regularly.
Miranda is the queen of a fading empire. She hangs up her own coat in her expansive office, rather than throw it at an underling, and her assistant chastises her when she raises controversial topics (such as being “body negative”) in meetings. Runway is still a home for glamour, but its print edition, as Nigel remarks to Andy, is becoming a relic; the magazine’s editors now worry about posting quick stories online for readers to scroll through. Prada 2 is not completely without flash—one set piece takes place at the Met Gala, while another features da Vinci’s The Last Supper as a backdrop, and everyone’s always dolled up in the finest couture. But its jaded outlook on the industry that Andy once desperately wanted to break into feels appropriate; she got close to the top, only to discover that there’s no stability in working in media, even at the highest echelons.
The lesson here could be for Andy to learn to let go. She meets a nice new fella, a charming Australian contractor named Peter (Patrick Brammall), and has her pal Lily (Tracie Thoms) in her ear promising a cushy copywriting job should Andy ever need a landing pad. But Prada 2 isn’t as afraid of the hustle as its forebear; although Andy has a pretty good head on her shoulders, the big arc of the film involves her, Miranda, and the ever-reliable Nigel remembering that they all want to stay in journalism for the love of the game, even if the events don’t stay as glittery. To do that, they become embroiled in the antics of dueling tech billionaires (and exes), searching for patrons that will allow them to keep the magazine afloat. That trajectory may be depressing to consider, but it’s also as credible as Prada 2 gets—and who am I to bemoan my movie-star fun being zhuzhed up with a little smack of realism?