The Devil Wears Prada 2 Overwhelms its Most Poignant Messages

You’re familiar with Erving Goffman, right? You know, the Canadian social theorist who wrote books like The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life and Stigma, and famously coined terms like “frontstage” and “backstage” to refer to the side of us we reveal to the world and the one we don’t, respectively. It’s probably been a while, but that’s okay. Besides being a fun movie, The Devil Wears Prada 2 contains poignant moments that beautifully exemplify the theory of the twentieth-century thinker.

I think about how difficult it is to get to know people in larger settings like offices and association meetings, where personal agendas and personas abound. We attend these gatherings with a goal in mind, and there is typically something we want from the people in the room. This is very different from a private, more intimate setting, where we have these moments when it’s just the two or three of us. I recall an episode from the television series The West Wing when the First Lady and three other women who work in the White House duck out of an extravagant party to drink wine and hang out for a bit in private. With their guards let down, they shared some unusual honest moments with one another. The First Lady even threw in a profanity! (Oh, my word.) The Devil Wears Prada 2 contains several moments like this.

Starring Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestley, the powerful editor-in-chief at Runway Magazine, The Devil Wears Prada 2 opens with Andy (Anne Hathaway) winning a journalism award and using the acceptance speech to announce that she and her colleagues were just “fired” (though actually laid off) from their jobs at a prominent publication. In her speech, she condemns the decline of journalism and equates it to devaluing journalists. Interestingly, her appearance at the podium conveys how far she has traveled in the twenty years since she worked as Miranda’s newly minted college graduate-turned clerical assistant at the fashion magazine. Back then, Andy leaned into frumpy fitting clothes and frequently complained about the verbally abusive treatment she received from her boss. Today, Andy’s crisp outfit and bold statement signals her maturation over the years and provides the underlying story for Prada 2: that times have changed and media organizations and their mediums are transforming. Runway Magazine, it turns out, is no exception.

Soon after being laid off, Andy gets a call from Irv (Tibor Feldman) the owner of Runway offering her a job to write features to enhance the magazine’s image and control the narrative around any less than favorable news. When she conditions her acceptance on providing work for her colleagues, Irv insists she pay for this herself. Just asking for this, though, speaks volumes about the close-knit relationships nurtured among colleagues who share an identity that is, in this case, centered on getting to the heart of stories and exposing the world to truths. Shifting from this, where the awards were largely intrinsic and recognition of good journalism came from peers to a world chasing views and likes, involved some shape-shifting of her cultivated identity as a journalist. When Andy writes an article that neutralizes some bad press Runway has been receiving, she feels quite proud until Miranda notes that it was largely ineffective since few people read it.

During the print era, newspapers and magazines boasted circulation numbers as a measure of their value. Publishers relied on newspaper headlines, strategically placed articles, and the cover pages of magazines to sell their wares. The digital media landscape has transformed this into article level metrics, a reliance on views and likes as measures of the work’s value. The measures, however, assess popularity but not value or quality. Nonetheless, we see pressure to conform to the new media landscape when Andy’s smile conveying pride in her article fades after Miranda’s blunt reality check. Andy clumsily responds, “I know, I’m working on that.”

Prada 2 subtly injects a change in the cultural landscape as well. One of Miranda’s assistants is Charlie (Caleb Hearon), a man who is of larger weight and displays effeminate mannerisms. Twenty years ago, only slim, seemingly cisgender people were cast in The Devil Wears Prada. Add to this that Miranda’s first assistant is Amari (Simone Ashley), a woman of Indian descent. With appearances by Lucy Liu, Prada 2 seems to be intentional in representing the breadth of people across race, gender, and culture. This is a departure from the original film. Indeed, Prada 2’s inclusive cast signals the film industry’s expansion of its tent and indicates our society’s growing embrace of differences. (At least it did before the recent tectonic shift in our political climate.) 

Despite the signals depicting our social growth since the release of The Devil Wears Prada, the premise of Prada 2 could have been stronger. Andy’s speech about the decline of journalism felt dated, since newspapers and magazines began downsizing and shifting to digital twenty years ago. The most life-relevant and meaningful scenes in Prada 2 were those involving private moments with Miranda and Andy.

One such moment occurs when the two find themselves alone in the kitchen of Miranda’s home during a party. Miranda compliments Andy on her dress and uncharacteristically shares a very personal thought with her—something unlikely to have happened at Runway’s office. There, employees have agendas and aspirations and thus maintain a facade or frontstage appearance to better ensure they achieve what they are striving for. The party at Miranda’s home softens this a bit, but still, there are risks in her sharing with Andy, given the potential for office gossip to damage the iconic image she had cultivated over the years as editor-in-chief of the magazine. Miranda, then, is stepping out on faith that she could trust Andy. For Andy, this serendipitous moment in the kitchen allows her to appreciate Miranda’s humanity and moreover, realize her vulnerability. 

We see another instance of this when Miranda shares her sentiments with Andy about the personal cost of her success and adds private thoughts about her career. Private moments like these present opportunities to take off the frontstage mask and let our backstage persona shine through. Said another way, these instances (while they come with some risks) present opportunities to let our guard down, leaving space for making connections with one another that can lead to closer relationships and more fulfilling lives. See, I told you you’d remember Goffman.

I like this entertaining film, with its fun scenes, aesthetically pleasing visuals, and themes about the fashion industry and women in high-stakes careers. Yes, its cast reflects our society’s diversity, and its story about the publishing industry confronts today’s media landscape. But like Project Hail Mary, I found The Devil Wears Prada 2 instructional with respect to the risks we must take to connect with one another, so we don’t end up alone and feeling isolated.