A sequel? For a beloved movie from almost 20 years ago that already closed the book quite neatly? Groundbreaking. Yes, a Devil Wears Prada sequel is in the works with nearly all of the original leading actors in talks to reprise their roles from the 2006 movie.
The cast is coming back.
Puck first reported that Meryl Streep and Emily Blunt had been brought back into the fold. However, per an update from Entertainment Weekly, both actresses plus Anne Hathaway, Stanley Tucci, director David Frankel, and producer Wendy Finerman are reportedly all in talks to return for the follow-up film.
The sequel already has a plot.
The film’s screenwriter, Aline Brosh McKenna, has reportedly come aboard, and we already have some details about the story. Streep’s Anna Wintour–inspired Miranda Priestly is at the end of her career as the editor-in-chief of Runway, dealing with the slow death of print media. Blunt’s character, Emily (whose last name is apparently Charlton?), has worked her way up from top assistant to “high-powered executive at a Kering- or LVMH-style luxury group” that holds all the advertising dollars. You see where this is going. Now, Miranda needs Emily.
That is a pretty good idea for a sequel, to be honest. It changes up the power dynamics, it brings the story to the present day, and it tackles an issue that the average movie-goer deeply cares about: how to create a profitable media brand in the 2020s.
What will the other characters be up to?
Last we saw her, Hathaway’s Andy was getting hired at the New York Mirror based on the strength of her college reporting on janitors’ unions and Priestly’s recommendation. What would Sachs be doing 18 years later? Did the gloomy future of media inspire a pivot to tech? Was The Intern just a sequel to The Devil Wears Prada this whole time? Or maybe Andy just has a modestly successful Substack and a husband who makes a lot of money.
As for Tucci’s Nigel, I hope that he has gotten out of the Runway universe. Perhaps he became a name-brand stylist like Law Roach or Karla Welch. I could also see him in a sort of Edward Enninful position, heading up the French edition of Runway and being more well liked than Priestly.
Did Meryl confirm the reports?
No! Do not fall for @merylstreep on Instagram. The unverified fan account shared a photo of Miranda Priestly and captioned it “Miranda will return ❤️.” The post has almost 85,000 likes and thousands of comments from people who think that Streep would write a caption like that. We will all get to hear from the actress when she starts her Only Murders in the Building press tour later this summer.
That’s all we know now, but we’ll keep updating as details come in.
