Meryl Streep Almost Didn’t Get Devil Wears Prada Role Because Someone Working on Film Thought She Wasn’t ‘Funny,’ Says Producer

Imagine an alternate universe where Meryl Streep was not cast as the legendary Miranda Priestly in the The devil wears Prada.

As shocking as the thought was, it was almost a reality, according to one of the producers of the classic 2006 film.

Producer Wendy Finerman said Wednesday Hollywood gold podcast host Daniela Taplin Lundberg said Streep almost passed on the role because someone involved in the production thought she had “never been funny in her life.”

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According to Finerman, the producers “knew” they wanted Anne Hathaway because she was a “good, all-American girl,” but when it came to Streep, they weren’t necessarily sold.

“And Meryl, people thought we were crazy. I mean, people called me and said, ‘Are you crazy? She wasn’t funny a day in her life,’ Finerman recalled, adding that the skeptics were wrong.

The Devil Wears Prada cast.

Sylvain Gaboury/FilmMagic

“But this was obviously a different world for her, and I think that was part of the fun of the unexpected,” the producer added.

Lundberg cited Streep’s comic relief in past films like Devil and Death becomes herbut he said many could associate the 74-year-old with more dramatic roles.

Elsewhere in the interview, Finerman shared a golden nugget about how art imitates life.

During one part of the shoot, Streep’s body double didn’t have the clothes needed to film a scene in Paris, so Finerman instructed her New York assistant to run home to get her passport because she had been sent to make the delivery. She even had to fly business class on a free trip abroad to make sure the wardrobe wasn’t stopped and searched.

Full Miranda Priestly move.

Meryl Streep felt ‘miserable’ playing ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ character, Emily Blunt says: It was ‘terrifying’

However Dear mother! star previously said Entertainment Weekly that she was “miserable” getting into character to play a tough-as-nails fashion magazine editor, a role that earned her an Oscar nomination.

Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep and Emily Blunt in the movie ‘The Devil Wears Prada’.

Barry Wetcher/20th Century Fox/Kobal/Shutterstock

“That’s the last time I tried the method!” said the actress in an interview in June 2021.

Earlier this month, Hathaway, 41, and she The devil wears Prada co-star Emily Blunt recalled their first meeting on the set of Diversity“Actors on actors” series.

The Princess Diaries The alum said Blunt, 40, had not been officially selected as Priestly’s assistant at the time. “In my head — the immediate thought — I was like, ‘What a movie star!’ You poured stardust.”

“I was so green when I got into that situation,” he said Oppenheimer said the star. “And you were like the warmest hug. Even though you were a colossal movie star at the time, you treated me as a complete equal. You’re one of the people I’ve known the longest. We’ve known each other for 18 years.”

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Source: HIS Education