The forthcoming release of The Devil Wears Prada has yielded a substantive media bounty over the last week, from Ginia Bellafante’s lovely expert testimony in The Times to Logan Hill’s sort-of-arousing Anne Hathaway profile in last week’s New York Magazine to Jeffrey Wells outlandish quasi-crit at Hollywood Elsewhere: “Without Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci’s performances, this very carefully measured girl movie set in the never-jangled world of a big-time fashion … would be okay but only that. But with them — because of them — it’s savory as hell at times.” (Excellent observation: Two of the three leads make the film work. It’s like, “Without Faye Dunaway and William Holden, Network would just be Peter Finch shouting.”)
But I digress. You really must check out the Prada parade’s sprawling incursion into the New York Post–the corporate sibling of Fox 2000 and, apparently, the unofficial Devil Wears Prada marketing arm in the days leading up to the film’s June 30 unveiling. Choose your pleasure, or collect the whole set:
–Post fashion editor Serena French has the details on the supposed $1 million wardrobe, including a $12,000 handbag and $445 shoes;
–French again, outlining the rules that govern fashion-magazine assistantship. As I noted at the top, Bellafante’s more intimate Times reflection is the “I Survived” gold standard here, but this is the Post, after all, and you could certainly do worse for your 50 cents;
–Danica Lo tallies up the factual liberties revealing Prada‘s exotic yet “flabbergasting” inattention to detail. For example:

“Assistant Andrea is better dressed than most full-blown editors I know,” says Diane Salvatore, editor-in-chief of Ladies’ Home Journal. “If I had an assistant who was dressed that well, I would assume she was involved in an online identity-theft scam.” …

For the rare formal function, the luckiest (and slimmest) may in fact be allowed to select a gown. Andy borrows a black Galliano for an industry gala – an oddly conservative choice, says More magazine beauty and fashion director Lois Joy Johnson, who coached actor Stephanie Szostak for her role as editor Jacqueline Follet, (Runway magazine editor Miranda) Priestly’s Euro-chic arch-rival. “The assistants look like they are on their way to a prom.”

Fuck. That. I am soooooooo waiting for the DVD.
–A twin bill of features touting Prada fashion stylist Patricia Field (above, with Streep), including Linda Stasi’s afterthought linking Field to the resurgence of “That Girl!” couture and Serena French yet again profiling Field, who has all kinds of praise for the Prada gang while throwing fistfuls of shit at Warner Independent’s The Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing;
–And finally, who can forget perhaps the year’s most brilliant Page Six item (even better than Richard Johnson copping to drunken driving)?

Anne Hathaway says Stanley Tucci was a real hands-on guy when they made The Devil Wears Prada. “He would just smack me in my boob and elbow me,” Hathaway told journos at the New York premiere. “If you’re a girl, you know that hurts, so, after about the fourth time, I finally said: ‘Stanley, can you please stay away from my t – – s?’ He got really flustered and said: ‘What do you expect? You’re flinging those melons around like it’s harvest season.’ “

Expect Cindy Adams to leap in with a frothy-mouthed succession of sentence fragments and ellipses any day now, while Roger Friedman prepares to attribute the film’s genius to its “fearless send-up of Vogue editor Anne Winter [sic]” and Lou Lumenick’s blinding grand finale reportedly promises the long-rumored six-star rating system that was not quite ready for X-Men: The Last Stand. Come on, Rupert–give the gang a raise.

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