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How Meryl Streep Forced Disney to Pay Up for ‘Prada 2’ Cast

Streep previously revealed that she “doubled” her ask, but a new report says she did much more than that.

Meryl Streep leveraged her star power to get herself and her co-stars paid the big bucks for The Devil Wears Prada 2, according to a new report from Variety.

Streep’s eye-watering salary, which the site revealed was $12.5 million, wasn’t the only demand she made to reprise her role as Miranda Priestly. While the star told Today that she initially turned down the offer until producers upped it (“I doubled my ask,” she said), she also got the 20th Century Studios production, which is owned by Disney, to pay each of her co-stars—Anne Hathaway and Emily Blunt—the same amount, in what’s called a “favored nations” deal.

Not only did the three stars rake in the millions for their roles, but they will also receive the standard box-office bonuses for movie stars. Sources told Variety that those bonuses are already making the stars bank, as the film has made $300 million worldwide in just one week. Each star could earn an additional $20 million, the site’s sources said, if the number continues to climb.

According to projections, the film should make another $42 million in its second weekend.

Streep, who has been nominated for an acting Oscar a record-breaking 21 times, said on Today, “It took me this long to understand that I could do that!” She added that when it came to The Devil Wears Prada sequel, after the original made $325 million at the box office in 2006 and got Streep a Best Actress nod, “They needed me, I felt.” The film’s director, David Frankel, previously told The New York Times that “most” of the film’s $100 million budget went to its cast.

Variety reports that Streep’s jaw-dropping Prada 2 salary is not her highest film haul to date. Streep reportedly made more on Netflix’s 2021 disaster film Don’t Look Up, but her salary for that film has not been reported.

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Eboni Boykin-PattersonEntertainment Reporter

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