Meryl Streep has finally cleared up one of the biggest myths around ‘The Devil Wears Prada’, and no, Miranda Priestly was not just Anna Wintour with sharper one-liners.
While fans have spent years assuming the icy editor was modeled directly on the former Vogue boss, Streep now says she was pulling from two very different power players instead. During a recent appearance on ‘The Late Show with Stephen Colbert’, the Oscar winner revealed that Miranda was really built from a mix of director Mike Nichols and filmmaker Clint Eastwood.
That twist may surprise plenty of viewers, especially with ‘The Devil Wears Prada 2’ now on the horizon.
Meryl Streep Says Miranda Priestly Was Not Just Anna Wintour
Streep, who first played Miranda in the 2006 hit and is returning for the sequel, said her performance owed more to the men she had worked with in Hollywood than to a fashion editor.
“I was basically imitating Mike Nichols that whole time,” she told Colbert. Then she took it one step further. “If Mike Nichols and Clint Eastwood had a baby… it would be Miranda Priestly.” That is a pretty wild image, but it also explains a lot.
For years, many fans connected Miranda to Anna Wintour because the film was adapted from Lauren Weisberger’s novel, itself inspired by her time working as an assistant to the Vogue powerhouse. But Streep says the DNA of the character came from somewhere else.
Why Mike Nichols and Clint Eastwood Made Sense
According to Streep, Nichols gave Miranda her sharp tone and sly sense of control. “The command on the set. And Mike would do it sort of with a sly humor,” she said. “And Miranda, she knows that what she’s saying is sort of snide, but she knows it’s kind of funny too.”
That balance, biting but amused, became central to the character. “That little way of doing things, people take as mean, but it’s funny. I think it’s funny,” Streep added.
Eastwood, meanwhile, shaped Miranda’s quieter authority. “Clint would never raise his voice,” she said. “He would direct and people had to lean forward to hear what he was saying.”
She also recalled how quickly he worked. “He’d often shoot the rehearsal and then move on. So his crew was like on the balls of their feet.”
When Colbert asked whether Eastwood knew he had helped inspire Miranda, Streep admitted he did not. “I told Mike, and he was thrilled,” she said.
Anna Wintour Ended Up Enjoying It Anyway
Even if Wintour was not the direct blueprint, the comparisons clearly followed the film everywhere. Last year, Wintour admitted that people in fashion were nervous about how she would react when the movie first came out.
“I went to the premiere wearing Prada, completely having no idea what the film was going to be about,” she said on ‘The New Yorker Radio Hour’.
In the end, though, she was more amused than offended. “First of all it was Meryl Streep, which, fantastic,” Wintour said. “And then I went to see the film, and I found it highly enjoyable. It was very funny.” She even called it “a fair shot.”
Now, with ‘The Devil Wears Prada 2’ set to hit theaters, Streep’s confession gives fans a new way to look at one of her most famous performances. Miranda Priestly may have ruled fashion, but apparently, her real roots were pure Hollywood power.
