There's a lot we can learn from the new film The September Issue, which follows the larger-than-life Vogue editor.
-Carrie Seim, BettyConfidential.com
Anna Wintour, the inspiration behind Meryl Streep's character in The Devil Wears Prada and editor-in-chief of American Vogue, has been called many things in her exquisite existence. But with the release of the splendid and fascinating documentary, The September Issue, we can finally judge Anna for ourselves.
1. Be decisive!
More than any other facet of the enigmatic editor, Anna's decisiveness stands out like a Walmart bathrobe at a Paris couture show. She names it as her biggest strength during the film's credits. (When asked her biggest weakness, she answers, "My children." We're hoping she meant that in a good way??)
Anna never for a moment questions her own judgment as she ruthlessly "edits" racks of clothes, photo shoots and even staffers.
While she may seem harsh or even cruel, she's making an impressive power play. Women all too often hem and haw their way through life, rather than exercising the "courage of their convictions," as Julia Child put it... a bit more eloquently.
I spoke with The September Issue director RJ Cutler during a screening of the film in Manhattan Friday night. I asked RJ the biggest lesson he learned after spending 320 footage hours with Anna.
"There is no reason a meeting should ever last longer than seven minutes," he replied, managing a tone of reverential snark.
It was a surprising response, but brilliant when you consider the hours of your own life you've wasted in meetings. Rather than bloating meetings with personal chitchat and useless filler, Anna insists underlings get organized and get to the point. (Or face her wrath of eye-rolls and impatience.)
3. Sunglasses will get you everywhere in life
(A huge shock of the film is how many of the women at Vogue look real - tired and wrinkly and too busy working even to bother with makeup.)
No need for Botox when you've got a pair of fab, oversize shades.
4. Never be afraid to laugh at yourself.
Anna was shockingly warm and self-deprecating on the Late Show with David Letterman last week. She beat the comedian to the punch with jokes about herself, quipping:
"I'm an ice queen, I'm the Sun King, I'm an alien fleeing from District 9 and I'm a dominatrix. So I reckon that makes me a lukewarm royalty with a whip from outer space. What do you think?"
We think, Anna, that we liked you way more than we expected.
5. Silence speaks louder than words.
As bigger-than-life Vogue editor-at-large André Leon Talley said at the screening I attended: "At Vogue, we work with codes of silences... with just the raise of an eyebrow, you know exactly what you're communicating."
Pity the poor soul Anna is "communicating" with. But you must admire how effectively the woman gets her message across.
6. Clothes should be colorful.
As staffers scurry to anticipate Anna's every whim for the magazine's mega-issue in 2007, black becomes the new kryptonite. Photo spread after photo spread is killed for having too much black.
Anna regally glides through the Vogue offices in shifts of every color - never black. (The woman's really into fur too, but we're not going to touch that with a 10-foot mink.)
Her color palette may have changed since 2007, but the bigger point is to be brave and bold with your wardrobe choices. Let them make a statement instead of cloaking you in darkness.
7. Keep your enemies close; don't worry about your friends.
The two women have a love-hate relationship, and it's delicious to watch Grace's wickedly funny frustration over Anna's callous cutting of her beautiful photo shoots. (Grace makes the crafty move of asking Anna about money on camera so Anna has no choice but to raise the budget.)
Anna is wise enough to surround herself with truly gifted people, even if after working together for twenty years, the two women have nothing to say to each other during a long elevator ride.
Still, at the end of the film, Anna says quite genuinely, "Grace is a genius."
8. Your life should be better than fiction.
Anna Wintour is one savvy sartorialist. Instead of fretting after being demonized (literally) on film, Anna sees it as an opportunity. No matter how badly she's behaved in real life, she can't possibly do worse than her caricature in The Devil Wears Prada.
Certainly, the tart tastemaker has some choice moments in The September Issue:
"The font looks like it's for blind people."
"A little bit of retouching, need to go to the gym," she tells a pudgy cameraman, who makes a surprise appearance in a Vogue photo shoot.
But as Anna told David Letterman last week, "Yes, I am an icon and you think you know me, but guess what, I'm not that bad."
Not that bad, indeed.
Also from BettyConfidential.com: The Devil Meets David Letterman
