1. Fictional biography

2. Characterization

3. Comparisons of the character
    Novel  Film 

4. Critical reception

5. Impact and legacy

6. References

7. External links

Miranda Priestly (born Miriam Princhek; October 25, 1949) is a character in Lauren Weisberger's 2003 novel The Devil Wears Prada, portrayed by Meryl Streep in the 2006 film adaptation of the novel.

She is a powerful New York City-based editor-in-chief of the fictional fashion magazine Runway. She is known as much for her icy demeanor and diva attitude as for her outstanding power within the fashion world.

Fictional biography

Miranda Priestly was born Miriam Princhek in the East End of London in October 1949. Her family members were poor but devout orthodox Jews. The family relied on the community for support, because her father worked odd jobs occasionally and her mother died in childbirth. Miriam's grandmother moved in with the family to assist in raising the children. Miriam saved the small bills that her siblings would give her and worked as an assistant to a British designer. She made a name for herself in London's fashion world and studied French at night and was made junior editor of the Chic magazine in Paris. When she was twenty-four Miriam changed her name to Miranda Priestly and replaced her rough accent with a sophisticated one. Miranda spent ten years at French Runway before Elias-Clark transferred her to American Runway. She, her twin daughters, and her husband moved to a penthouse apartment on Fifth Avenue and 76th Street. She is the editor-in-chief of Runway, a very chic and influential fashion magazine published by the Elias-Clark company. She is known for wearing a white Hermès scarf in her everyday outfit and treating her subordinates in a manner that borders on emotional and psychological abuse.

While she reminds employees "a million girls would kill for this job", Priestly's cruel treatment of staff causes a high turnover rate among personal assistants; the focus of her characterization in the book and the film being her newest assistant, recent journalism graduate Andrea Sachs.

Priestly has twin daughters (from her second of three husbands), Caroline and Cassidy, who one review suggested "look like extras from The Omen."^[1]

In the film version, her past is not mentioned at all.

Characterization

Miranda Priestly's personage has been reviewed as a 'Boss Lady' and a 'Diva' referring her as an arrogant, megalomaniac, egomaniac woman.

Comparisons of the character

Novel

Weisberger denies that Miranda Priestly is modeled on Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, saying in the publicity material for the book^[2] that her antics and demands are partially fictional and partially a composite of actual experiences she and her friends had in their first jobs, however in the sequel the writer describes Miranda at a basketball game with Rafael Nadal (a reference to Wintour’s friendship with Roger Federer) and mentions that she’s now the editorial director of the whole of Runway’s parent company (a reference to Wintour's role of Condé Nast artistic director).^[3]

Film

In the film she is a more sympathetic character than portrayed in the book. Whilst she remains just as ruthless and manipulative as she was in the book she is seen in a few moments of vulnerability three quarters of the way into the film in she confides to Andrea her distress about her failing marriage and the effect she is worried it will have on her daughters. The film incarnation of Priestly also speaks with an American accent, which strongly suggests the film character is not a Briton as portrayed in the novel.

Most, if not all reviews and articles of the movie made reference to Wintour. Nicknamed "Nuclear Wintour", Anna has been known to possess most of the same traits as Priestly, although she has shown more redeeming traits. Streep has told multiple reporters that she did not personally base her portrayal on Wintour, but instead on men she has known; Streep actually didn't meet Wintour until a pre-release screening of the movie. Other inspirations for Streep's portrayal include Martha Stewart and the ghost of Joan Crawford from Mommie Dearest.^[1].

Nearly all critics of the film raved about Meryl Streep's performance as the cold, calculating Miranda Priestly. Meryl Streep received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress but lost to Helen Mirren in The Queen. It was Streep's 14th nomination, furthering her impressive record. Streep received a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy for her portrayal of Priestly, that being her sixth Golden Globe.

Critical reception

Streep's performance was praised for making an extremely unsympathetic character far more complex than she had been in the novel. "With her silver hair and pale skin, her whispery diction as perfect as her posture, Ms. Streep's Miranda inspires both terror and a measure of awe," wrote A. O. Scott in The New York Times. "No longer simply the incarnation of evil, she is now a vision of aristocratic, purposeful and surprisingly human grace."^[4]

Impact and legacy

In May 2007, the popular American soap opera General Hospital introduced a new character Kate Howard patterned after the character of Miranda Priestly. Kate is much like Miranda, the only noticeable difference being age.^[6] Later that year, the "Money" episode of the US version of The Office began with Michael Scott (Steve Carell), who had just been watching the film, yelling "Steak!" and "Get me Armani!" to the Dunder-Mifflin receptionist, Pam.

On Episode 18 Season 14 of the Keeping Up With the Kardashians Kris Jenner dressed as Miranda, channeling her 'Boss Lady' persona.^[7][8]

On the film's 10th anniversary, Alyssa Rosenberg wrote in The Washington Post that Miranda anticipated female antiheroines of popular television series of the later 2000s and 2010s such as Scandal's Olivia Pope and Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones. Like them, she observes, Miranda competently assumes a position of authority often held by male characters, despite her moral failings, that she must defend against attempts to use her personal life to remove her from it, to "prov[e], as a creature of sentiment, that she never belonged there in the first place." In doing so, however successfully to herself and others, "she has zipped herself into a life as regimented and limited as a skintight pencil skirt."^[9]

As the film turned 10, Variety's 2016 article stated, "[The characterization] showed Hollywood that it was never wise to underestimate a strong woman’s worth."^[10]

References

External links

• Miranda Priestly role was the 14th nomination of Meryl Streep to the Academy Awards

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