In honor of The Devil Wears Prada 2 coming out tomorrow, I gave the original a rewatch (for maybe the millionth time). It made me think about how much of the movie’s portrayal of women, work and ambition still exists...it just looks different in LA.

The overwhelmed assistant didn’t disappear. Here, the “Andys” and “Emilys” became the founder’s ‘right hand,’ working from home but glued to their laptops in the corner of their apartments, spending too much on Uber Eats because they don’t have 10 minutes to run to the Whole Foods on Fairfax and 3rd.

And your boss likely doesn’t bark orders like Miranda Priestly (after all, she swears by every bottle purchased of Poosh “Lemme Chill” and Miracle Meditation at Unplug). Instead, they’re nice but impossible to reach on some days and incessantly “just checking in” every few minutes on others—quietly micromanaging behind a layer of softness.

Even the Creative Director energy has shifted. Less Stanley Tucci in full grind mode at the office, more answering emails between sets from Equinox Culver City at 7pm.

None of the dynamics changed, we just rebranded them into something that’s harder to call out. The first movie still resonates because the cost of ambition for women still exists. It’s just hidden behind nicer language and “cooler” job titles.

It looks like flexibility: WFH culture, wear whatever you want from Alo sets to Starface patches in meetings. It sounds like opportunity: wellness stipends as common company benefits, proximity to something exciting as the “Chief of Staff” or “Personal Brand Manager,” and being in the room where LA’s biggest names are built from celebrity to lifestyle brands. And while New York owns its cutthroat reputation seen in the movie, LA is its equally cutthroat cousin that insists it isn’t—just because we put mushroom elixirs in our coffee.

But everything else is still there. The pressure to prove ourselves. To get it right at all costs, including burnout, identity-shifting, the quiet erosion of our social lives and energy. This hasn’t gone anywhere. Just think about how many popular terms we’ve created to cope with it: ‘quiet quitting’ was added to major dictionaries. ‘Rage applying’ and ‘9-9-6’ are everywhere from social feeds to career podcasts. And ‘work-life-balance’ has become its own content category. All of which came decades after we were first introduced to the turbulent journey of Andy Sachs.

And that’s the part the movie still gets right. It was never really about fashion, it was about the cost of becoming excellent. The long hours just to “stay in the room.” The constant shape-shifting. The quiet understanding that if you want to be taken seriously, you might have to give more than anyone warned you about upfront.

But it’s a lot harder to question something when it’s wrapped in a $10.15 matcha (with tip) from Alfred, a good title and a world you’re supposed to want. We didn’t fix the system. We just gave it your typical LA glow-up. Same story, better lighting.

So where does that leave us today?

Andy’s takeaway at the end of part one was understanding what it takes to succeed, and then decide for herself whether it was worth it. Not based on how anyone else valued it from the outside, but on what actually felt right for her. And this still holds: not rejecting ambition, but choosing it more intentionally. Knowing when you’re building something authentic and sustainable—and when you’re just maintaining the appearance of it while it quietly takes you further from yourself, your passions and the people you care about.

And as evidenced by part two, Andy didn’t give up on her career—she chose her own version of success. Her shift was knowing when to step back, check in with herself and re-prioritize what she actually wanted out of it all.

You should, too.

Because the job might look better now. The lifestyle might sound cooler. But the question is still the same: does it actually feel like the life you want, or just the one you’ve learned how to sustain at the expense of yourself?

- Your Friend