In the words of Runway’s Editor-in-Chief
One of my all time favorite fashion films is “The Devil Wears Prada” (2006) co-starring Anne Hathaway and Meryl Streep. Streep plays Miranda Priestly, a no-nonsense, well-styled magazine editor, who had a penchant for pursed lips and snarky one-liners. In the film, she ruled Runway Magazine with a golden fist, while sporting sky-high stilettos and carrying coveted handbags. Just as fabulous as her designer wardrobe, including Chanel, Alexander McQueen, and of course Prada, were her witty words and sarcastic attitude. She made being a mean boss, look super cool. Here are a few of her best Miranda-isms.
1. “You have no style or fashion sense.”
2. “Oh God. Get away from her, she’s useless. And unattractive.”
Details of your incompetence do not interest me.
4. “Please bore someone else with your questions.”
5. “Florals? For spring? Ground breaking.”
6. “Do you know why I hired you? I always hire the same girl–stylish, slender, of course, worships the magazine. But so often, they turn out to be–I don’t know–disappointing and, um, stupid.”
By all means, move at a glacial pace, you know how that thrills me.
8. “‘This stuff’? Oh. Okay. I see. You think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select, I don’t know that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you are trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don’t know is that that sweater is not just blue, its not turquoise. It’s not lapis. Its actually cerulean. And you’re also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then i think it was Yves Saint Laurent–wasn’t it who showed cerulean military jackets? And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. And then it, uh, filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic Casual Corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and its sort of comical how you think that you’ve made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact you’re wearing a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room, from a pile of stuff.”
Did you fall down and smack your little head on the pavement?
10. “I said to myself, ‘Go ahead. Take a chance. Hire the smart, fat girl’ … you ended up disappointing me more than any of the other silly girls.”
11. “And this layout for the Winter Wonderland spread. Not wonderful yet.”
12. “Find me that piece of paper I had in my hand yesterday morning.”
Is there some reason that my coffee isn’t here? Has she died or something?
14. “Oh, don’t be absurd. Everyone wants this. Everybody wants to be us.”
15. “Truth is, no one can do what I do.”
