The Devil Wears Prada 2: Miranda Priestly Is Back — and the Fashion World Will Never Be the Same

Gird your loins. Miranda Priestly is back.

Nearly two decades after Meryl Streep made cinema history with a performance so controlled, so coldly exquisite, so wholly original that it redefined what it meant to be a movie villain, the fashion world’s most feared editor-in-chief is returning to the screen. The Devil Wears Prada 2 opens in theaters on May 1, 2026 — and if the record-shattering trailer response is any indication, the cultural hunger for Miranda’s return has not dimmed one single thread count.

The original Devil Wears Prada was a phenomenon. Released in June 2006, it grossed over $326 million worldwide against a modest budget of $35 to $40 million, earned Streep an Academy Award nomination and a Golden Globe win for Best Actress, and launched a thousand thinkpieces, runway trends, and Halloween costumes. It made “Cerulean” a cultural shorthand. It gave us “Gird your loins.” It gave us Streep’s whisper. Almost twenty years on, it remains one of the most quoted, re-watched, and passionately argued-about comedies of its era.

Now, the whole company is back — director, writer, and all four principal stars — for a sequel that finds the fashion world changed almost beyond recognition and Miranda Priestly still, impossibly, the most powerful person in every room she enters.

THE ORIGINAL DEVIL WEARS PRADA: A PHENOMENON REVISITED

To understand why The Devil Wears Prada 2 matters so much — why its first full trailer became the most-watched trailer in 20th Century Studios’ history, viewed over 220 million times in its first 24 hours — you have to go back to 2006 and remember what the original film actually did.

The Devil Wears Prada was adapted from Lauren Weisberger’s 2003 novel, a roman-à-clef drawn from her own brief, bruising stint as assistant to Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. Fox bought the film rights before the book was even finished — the studio’s executive vice president Carla Hacken had read only the first hundred pages and an outline, but that was enough. “I thought Miranda Priestly was one of the greatest villains ever,” she recalled.

The film tells the story of Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway), a Northwestern journalism graduate who lands a job as second assistant to Miranda Priestly (Streep), the imperious, ice-blooded editor-in-chief of Runway, a thinly veiled version of Vogue. What follows is a story about ambition, identity, complicity, and the corrosive glamour of a world that demands everything and offers very little in return. Andy’s journey from frumpy outsider to fashion insider to someone who has to decide what she’s actually willing to sacrifice is the film’s emotional spine.

But the film’s soul is Streep. Her Miranda Priestly is one of cinema’s great performances: never raising her voice above a murmur, never expressing a feeling she hasn’t deliberately chosen to weaponize, never wasting a single gesture. It was, Streep later revealed, the only film of her career where she took a Method approach, staying in character between takes. At the original table read, instead of the “strident, bossy, barking voice” the cast expected, Streep spoke her first line as Miranda in a near whisper — and silenced the room. “It was so unexpected and brilliant,” Hathaway recalled.

The film was not only a commercial success but a cultural one. It earned Streep an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe. It launched Emily Blunt — who auditioned in sweatpants, rushing to catch a flight, and got the call while in a dive bar in London — into the stratosphere. It made Stanley Tucci’s Nigel and his immortal “Gird your loins” one of the most quoted supporting performances of the decade. And it gave the fashion industry a mirror that, after some initial reluctance, it ultimately came to cherish. Even Anna Wintour — who inspired Miranda, and whose editors and designers largely avoided the film for fear of displeasing her — eventually said she liked it.

“It was the only film of Streep’s career where she took a Method approach. She silenced the room by speaking her first line as Miranda in a near whisper.”

HOW THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 CAME TO BE: THE LONG ROAD TO A SEQUEL

For years, a sequel seemed impossible. Streep was on record saying she wasn’t interested. Hathaway said she would only return if the story was “something totally different.” And the source material was complicated: Lauren Weisberger did write a sequel novel, Revenge Wears Prada: The Devil Returns, in 2013, but it was set a decade after the first book and followed a somewhat different trajectory than any film sequel would likely take. Weisberger also wrote a third book, When Life Gives You Lululemons (2018), centered on Emily rather than Andy.

The idea of a sequel resurfaced seriously in July 2024, when Walt Disney Studios — the parent company of 20th Century Studios — announced it was developing one. Crucially, it would reunite the original creative team: director David Frankel and screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna would both return, ensuring the sequel would feel like a genuine continuation rather than a cash-in reboot. Negotiations moved quickly. By the time the announcement was made, all four principal stars had signed on.

The timing of the announcement carried its own eerie poetry. It came just days after news broke that Anna Wintour — the legendary, long-serving editor-in-chief of Vogue and the real-world inspiration for Miranda Priestly — was stepping down from her role. Life imitating art, or perhaps art finally catching up with life.

Principal photography began on June 30, 2025, with 20th Century Studios confirming the news via Instagram with a clip of two devilish red heels and a soundtrack of iconic quotes from the original. The internet, predictably, lost its mind.

DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 PRODUCTION: ON SET IN NEW YORK AND MILAN

Filming took place across two continents over the course of nearly four months, with production wrapping on October 20, 2025. The shoot was paparazzi gold from the first day, with professional and amateur photographers tracking the cast’s every Prada-clad step through the streets of New York City.

The core New York shoot began in late June 2025. Streep, Hathaway, and Tucci were spotted filming together during the week of July 21 — the first confirmed sighting of the iconic trio back in character. Blunt joined them a week later. By early August, the cameras had captured scenes involving new cast member Patrick Brammall alongside Hathaway, and Sydney Sweeney — one of the film’s reported cameo appearances — was spotted on set with Blunt on August 7.

A significant airport sequence was shot at Newark on September 10, 2025 — drawing the kind of crowd and social media coverage usually reserved for actual celebrity arrivals. Production then moved to Europe, with Tucci and Streep filming at Dolce & Gabbana’s Milan Fashion Week show on September 27. Full Milan production ran from October 6 to 18, with fashion royalty making appearances both in front of and behind the cameras: Donatella Versace was spotted on set filming a cameo in October, and Lady Gaga — the Grammy and Oscar-winning artist currently on her Mayhem Ball Tour — was confirmed as a cast member and reportedly spotted in Milan.

The production used the working title “Cerulean” during casting — a nod to the original film’s most famous monologue, in which Miranda explains to a dismissive Andy exactly how a shade of blue in her discount sweater connects, through a chain of influence and imitation, back to a decision made years earlier at a couture show. It is one of the great speeches in comedy film history, and using its name as the sequel’s code suggests the creative team understood from the beginning what this story needed to honor.

“The production used the working title ‘Cerulean’ — a nod to the original film’s most famous monologue. The creative team understood from the beginning what this story needed to honor.”

THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 PLOT: WHAT WE KNOW

The Devil Wears Prada 2 is set approximately twenty years after the events of the first film — meaning the world it inhabits is a recognizable but dramatically changed version of the one audiences fell in love with in 2006. Print media is in crisis. The fashion industry has been transformed by digital platforms, social media, and the rise of influencer culture. And Miranda Priestly — the woman who once seemed as permanent and immovable as haute couture itself — is nearing retirement, facing the most threatening challenge of her career.

At the center of the story is a power struggle that feels both deeply personal and perfectly timed for 2026. Miranda’s former assistant Emily Charlton (Blunt), who was so devoted to Runway in the first film that she collapsed from starvation rather than miss a single day of work, has rebuilt herself into a formidable executive. She now runs a luxury wellness and lifestyle brand — and it is Emily’s company, with its advertising revenue and financial clout, that could determine whether Runway survives the print media apocalypse. The woman Miranda once dismissed and humiliated now holds the keys to her kingdom.

Andy Sachs (Hathaway), meanwhile, has returned to Runway — this time as its Features Editor, rather than the harried junior assistant she once was. The trailer makes clear that Miranda, in true Miranda fashion, has absolutely no recollection of Andy’s previous time working for her. Andy must navigate not only her complicated history with Miranda but also the collision between her former mentor and her former colleague, as the three women’s lives become entangled in the fight for Runway’s future.

According to reporting by Puck’s Lauren Sherman, Emily’s character has been significantly elevated for the sequel: she will be dressed in Dior fashion throughout the film, reflecting her new stature, and her billionaire boyfriend — described as partly inspired by tech moguls in the Jeff Bezos mold — is positioned as a potential buyer for Runway. The dynamic this creates, with Emily and Miranda both wanting different things from the same transaction, promises exactly the kind of high-stakes, razor-sharp comedy the original film delivered.

Notably, The Devil Wears Prada 2 is not a direct adaptation of Weisberger’s sequel novel Revenge Wears Prada: The Devil Returns, nor of her third book. It appears to be a wholly original story, written by Aline Brosh McKenna specifically for the screen. That creative freedom may be exactly what the sequel needed: not to be constrained by a narrative written in 2013 for a media world that has already changed beyond recognition, but to engage directly with where these characters — and the fashion industry itself — actually are in 2026.

THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 FULL CAST: OLD FACES AND NEW

The core quartet returns intact. Meryl Streep reprises Miranda Priestly. Anne Hathaway is back as Andy Sachs. Emily Blunt returns as Emily Charlton, now transformed from put-upon assistant to luxury brand CEO. And Stanley Tucci is once again Nigel, Miranda’s long-suffering, impeccably dressed creative director. Tracie Thoms and Tibor Feldman also reprise their supporting roles as Andy’s friend Lily and Runway’s corporate overseer Irv Ravitz, respectively.

The new additions are extraordinary. Kenneth Branagh joins as Miranda’s latest husband — a role that, given Miranda’s track record with marriages in the first film, promises rich comic possibilities. Justin Theroux plays a character described as “forward-leaning, rich and stupid” — four words that suggest a villain the fashion world will find very familiar. Lucy Liu, Simone Ashley, B.J. Novak, Pauline Chalamet, Rachel Bloom, Patrick Brammall, Caleb Hearon, Helen J. Shen, and Conrad Ricamora round out the new ensemble.

And then there are the cameos. Sydney Sweeney was spotted on set. Donatella Versace filmed an appearance. Lady Gaga — one of the most fashion-forward artists alive, and a figure whose relationship to the world of Runway’s aesthetic is more than superficial — has been confirmed in a role. The cameo-heavy approach reflects the film’s ambition: not just to revisit the world of high fashion, but to populate it with figures who genuinely belong there.

Notably absent: Adrian Grenier, who played Andy’s boyfriend Nate in the original film, will not be returning. Given that the sequel is set twenty years later and focused squarely on the professional arena rather than Andy’s romantic life, his absence is unlikely to leave a gap.

THE TRAILER HEARD AROUND THE FASHION WORLD

The marketing campaign for The Devil Wears Prada 2 has been a masterclass in building anticipation. A forty-second teaser dropped in December 2025, offering just enough — a glimpse of Streep and Hathaway, the unmistakable visual grammar of Runway’s world — to send the internet into a frenzy. The teaser was reported to be the most-viewed comedy trailer in fifteen years, with 181.5 million views in its first 24 hours.

Then, during the 2026 Grammy Awards in late January, the full trailer arrived — set to Madonna’s “Vogue,” a choice so perfect it felt inevitable. The trailer showed the reunion between Miranda and Andy, the transformed Emily, and Nigel navigating a fashion world that has moved on without them. It was viewed over 220 million times in the first 24 hours, making it the most-watched trailer in 20th Century Studios’ history.

The timing of the release — May 1, 2026, just days before the Met Gala on May 4 — is, of course, entirely deliberate. There is no better moment to release a film about the soul and spectacle of high fashion than the week the entire fashion world gathers in New York for its annual ceremony of excess and artistry. The marketing and the calendar are working together with the precision Miranda Priestly herself would approve of.

WHY THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 COULD DEFINE 2026

There are sequels that exist because a studio wants more money, and there are sequels that exist because the story genuinely has more to say. The Devil Wears Prada 2, from everything available, looks like the second kind — and that is a rarer thing than it sounds.

The premise is genuinely resonant. The decline of print media is not a comic abstraction; it is the lived reality of an entire industry that once shaped how the world thought about beauty, culture, and identity. Miranda Priestly navigating a world in which her power is no longer absolute — in which the young woman she once dismissed has become her equal, and the assistant she once humiliated may hold her fate — is not just funny. It is the kind of story that can be funny and devastating at the same time, which is exactly what the original film was at its best.

The creative team understands this. David Frankel and Aline Brosh McKenna made the original film work not by playing it purely for laughs or purely for drama, but by holding both registers simultaneously. The sequel has every indication of doing the same. The trailer alone — with Miranda’s imperious blankness in the face of Andy’s evident anxiety, and Emily’s barely concealed triumph — lands every note it attempts.

And then there is Streep. At 76, returning to one of the most technically demanding comic performances of her career, she is — by all accounts from the set and the footage released — precisely as formidable as she was in 2006. Perhaps more so, because now there is something new to play: a woman who has survived everything the world has thrown at her, who has never bent, and who is facing, for the first time, the possibility that the world might simply move on without her.

That is a genuinely interesting story. Gird your loins indeed.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 opens exclusively in theaters on May 1, 2026, from 20th Century Studios. The original The Devil Wears Prada (2006) is available to stream now.

All production details and cast information current as of March 21, 2026. Subject to change.

Estimated reading time: 13 minutes