Ask most people about the greatest monologue in The Devil Wears Prada, and one word will come to mind: “Cerulean.” The speech that Miranda Priestly delivers to her awkward new assistant, Andy, seems to encapsulate the film’s worldview, the faith that the fashion industry matters because regular people are beholden to decisions made by those at the top of field. It’s a tough, cynical moment, one that underscores the movie’s plucky tone.
The better speech occurs just minutes later, when a frustrated Andy complains to fashion director Nigel about the recognition Miranda refuses to give her. What follows is a more complex speech, one that reaffirms the same hierarchies that Miranda praises, but approaches them from a more kind, humane angle. Moreover, Stanley Tucci‘s performance as Nigel serves as the perfect counterpart to Meryl Streep‘s take on the towering mogul, suggesting that people may matter beyond the products they buy.
The scene occurs at the end of the first act, after fully establishing Andy as both our protagonist and audience surrogate. Played to awkward perfection by Anne Hathaway, Andy is both a try-hard and hopelessly outmatched by the job, attempting to play her ignorance about fashion as a type of reserved cool and convincing no one.
The first act has also established Nigel as something like Miranda’s majordomo, someone who enforces her orders and echoes many of her sentiments. He makes a point of mocking Andy’s weight, suggesting that a size six is overweight, and dismissing her clothing choices. Yet, because Nigel’s the chief point of contact for Andy (certainly more so than Emily, Miranda’s sneering first assistant, played by Emily Blunt), she has to rant to him.
Unsurprisingly, he also offers little sympathy for Andy’s desire to be recognized for her hard work. However, his speech frames even Miranda herself as insignificant in the grand scheme of the fashion industry. “She’s just doing her job,” Nigel explains, depersonalizing his boss’s behavior to draw attention to the institution that is the magazine Runway. “Don’t you know that you are working at the place that published some of the greatest artists of the century? Halston, Lagerfeld, de la Renta. And what they did, what they created was greater than art because you live your life in it.”
However, then, Nigel shifts attention away from genuflecting individuals for their genius and instead turns to the average person. Where Miranda’s speech framed the little people as unwitting and ungrateful pieces whose choices are determined by their betters, Nigel’s speech extends hope to even those who aren’t icons.
“You think this is just a magazine, hmm? This is not just a magazine,” he declares. “This is a shining beacon of hope for—oh, I don’t know. Let’s say a young boy growing up in Rhode Island with six brothers, pretending to go to soccer practice when he was really going to sewing class and reading Runway under the covers at night with a flashlight.”
When put this way, the work done by Nigel, Miranda, and everyone else at Runway seems less like reinforcing an aristocracy and almost republican, if not democratic. Runway, in Nigel’s imagination, offers a place for those who don’t have one otherwise, especially for those who do not believe they belong anywhere else. With Runway‘s goal reframed, Andy’s aloofness seems cruel and selfish, which Nigel further points out.
Effective as the speech is, written by Aline Brosh McKenna and adapted from the novel by Lauren Weisberger, the key moment comes right at the end. That’s when director David Frankel pulls the camera close-up to Nigel as he lightly pushes the soft end of his pen onto Andy’s forehead, to replicate the childish star he believes she wants for her work.
The gesture could be condescending, and perhaps if any other actor had done it, it would be condescending. But Tucci plays the moment as playful, affirming, perhaps even kind. It’s just one of many such moments in Tucci’s performance as Nigel. He delivers withering lines about Andy’s fashion choices, and backs up his critiques with his own natty apparel, but there’s a softness in his eyes, a warmth in his voice that makes the observations something other than cruel cuts.
In the hands of a lesser actor, Nigel would be too cruel, and he would not be able to become the mentor that Andy needs. Andy’s transformation and ultimate victory at the end of the story would feel like a perverse loss of self, a surrender to the same emotional beating that Miranda gives everyone. But because Tucci found the actual person within the character, he lends pathos to Andy’s transformation.
Combined with Hathaway’s unashamed take on Andy, Tucci’s performance as Nigel allows us to enjoy The Devil Wears Prada. Through their perspectives, what could be a cynical look at a cruel industry turns into something fun, human, and enjoyable… even for those of us with cerulean in our closets.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 arrives in theaters on Friday, May 1.
