Naomi Campbell Shades “Other Lady” Anna Wintour in Award Speech

After serving arsenic 1 of Anna Wintour's 2 assistants from 1999 until 2000, Lauren Weisberger would usage her clip moving for the Vogue editor-in-chief arsenic the inspiration for her 2003 bestselling publication The Devil Wears Prada, aboriginal adapted into a deed movie starring Meryl Streep as Wintour stand-in Miranda Priestly and Anne Hathaway arsenic her overworked 2nd assistant.

In Anna, author Amy Odell reports that the manner icon had a astonishing absorption erstwhile she discovered Weisberger was penning a novel: "'I cannot retrieve who that miss is,'" erstwhile Vogue managing editor Laurie Jones recalled her saying.

After the book's release, Aimee Cho, who was Wintour's adjunct astatine the time, said, "Everything felt precise existent to life, but done a antagonistic lens. I ever understood that [Anna] would woody with it, and she would woody with it well."

While Wintour work the book, Jones told Odell that "she was benignant of bemused" and "wasn't bothered by it astatine all." Her different person William Norwich added that Wintour "really didn't care" astir the publication adjacent after it became a sensation. "I don't deliberation Anna is arsenic funny successful the taste improvement that she is arsenic the remainder of america are," Norwich explained.

Still, that doesn't mean immoderate of the details that were included successful the publication and movie weren't based connected real-life details...

During astir of her tenure arsenic editor-in-chief of Vogue, Wintour has had 2 oregon 3 assistants astatine a time. Odell broke down what their varied responsibilities looked similar successful the 2010s done inheritance sources.

"The archetypal adjunct managed the different two, handled her schedule, and was the superior adjunct Anna communicated with," Odell wrote. "The 2nd adjunct liaised with the caretakers and cook astatine her homes successful Manhattan and Long Island coordinated her movie screenings, and took attraction of her dogs."

She continued, "The 3rd adjunct ran errands, picked up theatre tickets, helped with manner week, and ordered Anna's apparel straight from designers, usually a customized runway look."

While the archetypal adjunct could bask the weekend, the 2nd and 3rd would alternate being connected call, with Anna perpetually sending assorted requests, often with nary taxable line. 

When a caller adjunct began moving for Anna, they were fixed a 21-page overview of however to grip astir tasks, though it noted that the elaborate usher was not comprehensive. Their enactment days began astatine 7 a.m. and could often crook into 12-hour shifts. Former adjunct Meredith Asplundh revealed her starting wage was $25,000, while Laurie Schechter, 1 of Anna's first-ever assistants, shared that she mislaid 8 pounds successful her archetypal 2 weeks. 

Asplundh, who started arsenic an intern astatine Condé Nast successful 1993 and was hired to beryllium Wintour's 2nd adjunct 1 period later, revealed that Wintour addressed her utilizing the archetypal assistant's sanction erstwhile she archetypal began moving astatine Vogue. 

And Asplundh said she was told not to permission her desk, adjacent to spell to the bathroom, if the different adjunct was not  around—just similar Andie, Anne Hathaway's character, successful The Devil Wears Prada. But, Asplundh clarified, this was not a directive from the brag herself. 

Asplundh explained, "It was benignant of similar lore, passed connected from procreation to generation."

Yes, 1 of Wintour's 2nd assistants astir important regular tasks was to present the Book—a mock-up of the magazine—to her home, according to Odell's interviews with respective erstwhile assistants. That aforesaid worker would past greet Anna astatine her car erstwhile she arrived astatine the bureau the pursuing greeting to retrieve her notes, on with the different contents of her "AW bag," which was "a monogrammed L.L.Bean canvas tote with navy handles containing the Book, papers she had brought location to look astatine the nighttime before, and her burgundy crocodile decorator planner, which her assistants custom-ordered whenever she filled it up and needed a caller one," per Odell. 

As for the notes process, if Wintour approved a communicative for print, she would constitute her initials positive OK, which became known arsenic an "AWOK" in the office."'Is it AWOK'd? Is it AWOK'd yet?' editors would parrot successful frustration," Odell explained.

But erstwhile Wintour decided to termination something, whether it was a feature, a photoshoot oregon a trend, that was it. A juicy interrogation with Uma Thurman pursuing her divorcement from Gary Oldman successful 1992 ne'er ran due to the fact that the archetypal sprout and the reshoot were not up to Wintour's standards, portion Gwyneth Paltrow was photographed 4 times successful 3 years earlier yet landing a screen successful 1996. 

Ain't nary remainder for the fashionable.

After speaking with respective sources, Odell was capable to interruption down Wintour's regular daily successful the book, revealing the EIC usually wakes up astatine 5 a.m. to exercise—either a tennis acquisition oregon a league with her idiosyncratic trainer—before sitting down to get her hairsbreadth and constitution done. She past is driven by a chauffeur to the Vogue bureau by 7 a.m., kicking disconnected a time of meetings, run-throughs—"I deliberation conscionable the sheer information that they had to instrumentality apparel into her bureau earlier immoderate shoots was wildly antithetic and unheard of," said erstwhile staffer Gabé Doppelt—and more. It wasn't antithetic for Wintour to inactive beryllium astatine the bureau astatine 11 p.m. during her aboriginal tenure arsenic editor-in-chief. 

Every morning, it was the work of 1 of Wintour's assistants to marque definite her daily breakfast—a whole-milk latte and a blueberry muffin from Starbucks—was waiting for her connected her desk. 

Like Miranda Priestly successful the movie, Wintour would devour the aforesaid repast for luncheon each time if she did not person a gathering retired of the office: A uncommon steak and mashed potatoes, served connected a sheet alternatively of a takeout container, from the Royalton. "She'd instrumentality a fewer bites and past say, 'Take my plate, I'm done,'" Odell wrote.

And, according to her person Miranda Brooks, Wintour aboriginal went connected the "the fare of cream," which fundamentally consisted of cocoa milkshakes, truthful she wouldn't get excessively thin.

In 1 of the movie's astir memorable moments, Miranda cries successful beforehand of Andie implicit her divorce, a uncommon amusement of emotion from the crystal queen. It turns out, the country was remarkably akin to an acquisition then-Vogue lawsuit planner Stephanie Winston Wolkoff had with Wintour successful London portion she was successful the midst of her precocious '90s divided from husband David Schaffer. 

"Was she sad? Of people she was sad," Winston Wolkoff told Odell. "Did she amusement it successful the bureau a lot? No. She conscionable kept going."

And though Winston Wolkoff had a existent transportation with Wintour, "as soon arsenic I was successful the office, it was similar determination was nary idiosyncratic relationship."

While Wintour ne'er specifically told her unit what to wear, it was wide that she had definite sartorial expectations.

Asplundh told Odell that determination were times erstwhile "she would glare astatine immoderate I was wearing. It wasn't a glare similar approval. It was benignant of, What the hellhole is that? You could decidedly archer erstwhile she was like, 'Why would you enactment those pants with that top?'"

In fact, immoderate employees referred to this arsenic The Look, Wintour's non-verbal mode of assessing an ensemble. 

"She would bash that automatically. You would locomotion into her office, and she would commencement astatine your shoes and enactment the mode up," erstwhile staffer Maggie Buckley said, admitting she started wearing Manolo Blahnik heels, Wintour's favorite, each day.

Odell reported that Wintour would surface each idiosyncratic who interviewed for a occupation astatine Vogue, checking retired their outfits earlier hiring them. 

Though Odell acknowledged Wintour developed a estimation for being "icy and scary and fabulous" and was fixed nicknames specified arsenic Nuclear Wintour and Wintour of Our Discontent, she spoke to respective sources who changeable down that characterization. 

"People misinterpret her absorption for coldness. But she's not cold, she's generous to a fault," Anna's idiosyncratic person Emma Soames said. "If it did not impact editing Vogue, she didn't code it. So she had nary tiny talk."

And during her archetypal stint astatine Vogue successful 1983, serving arsenic the manner mag's first-ever originative director, Wintour was "cool arsenic a cucumber," according to then-junior copywriter Lesley Jane Seymour. "A batch of those women astatine Vogue were terrifying. I don't retrieve her being terrifying. She got the enactment done and she was pleasant."