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8. Before she agreed to take on the role, Meryl Streep pulled a move reminiscent of her character, Miranda Priestly. Although she had already won two Oscars and received 11 nominations, Streep hadn’t yet perfected the skill of negotiating her pay. This time, however, she decided to make her voice heard.
“The initial offer seemed, to me, somewhat disrespectful or at least not representative of my true worth to the project,” she told Variety. “There was a moment where I was ready to walk away, and then they doubled the offer. I was 55 and had just learned, quite late in my career, how to advocate for myself effectively.”
9. Streep had additional stipulations as well. Concerned about the possibility of Miranda becoming a mere caricature, she insisted on including two key scenes: one she dubbed “the business of fashion,” where the fashion icon educates Andy about her cerulean sweater, and another where Miranda is stripped of her defenses, in the poignant hotel room scene.
Streep also conceived the idea for Miranda’s striking white hair. She arrived for a meeting with the studio head, sporting the icy look. As director David Frankel recounted to Entertainment Weekly, “Meryl embodied Miranda in that session, and there was no debate over the hairstyle; they simply gazed into Meryl’s eyes and left it unspoken.”