One thing is sure about The Devil Wears Prada 2: An ambitious promise to make a sequel to a cult film after 20 years has paid off, at least so far box office statistics are involved. The numbers speak for themselves, with $77 million taken in US theaters and another $157 million worldwide since its April 29 release.
In front of such a box office smashthis version has provoked heated debates for several days about its quality and comparison with the original. In Italy, the controversy extends to the writing of the film.
The controversy stems from the choice of voice actors in the Italian version of The Devil Wears Prada 2which are themselves a nod to continuity; it’s the same cast as before. Connie Bismuto is back to voice Anne Hathaway as Andy, Francesca Manicone voicing Emily Blunt as Emily, Gabriele Lavia is once again Stanley Tucci’s Nigel, and above all, Maria Pia Di Meo, the actress who has been the familiar and expressive voice of Meryl Streep in almost all the Italian adaptations of recent years—very scary—even Projects.
Although many fans were happy to see these familiar voices again, some viewers noticed a certain awkwardness, especially due to the age of the voice actors themselves, especially Di Meo and Lavia.
Di Meo, born in 1939, is undoubtedly a legend of Italian singing, and his performances, associated with great Hollywood actresses such as Jane Fonda, Julie Andrews, Mia Farrow, Barbra Streisand, and Streep, have made him one of the most recognizable and expressive voices in the country’s cinema.
Still others say her performance now shows the passage of time too much and that there is a disconnect between her 87-year-old voice and that of an energetic and intense character like Miranda (played, originally, by the 76-year-old Streep). Could this nine-year gap be too big to bridge? The same has been said of Lavia, who calls out Stanley Tucci with results that often sound forced.
But beyond the issue of age, there is probably a broader debate to be had about text writing in general and its effectiveness in an age where first downloads and then streaming platforms have accustomed us to seeing more and more content in the original language.
Even just listen to the trailer released online for The Devil Wears Prada 2, a native Italian speaker will notice not only that the sounds have aged to varying degrees of dissonance but also that the speed of the lines makes them difficult to follow. And what about dialogue editing? “I’m a features editor at Runway,” Anne Hathaway’s Andy says proudly, but how many of those outside of newsrooms know what a features editor is? And again, when Miranda’s second assistant says, “I have to pee, I’ve had a venti,” how many people outside the US quickly understand that she’s referring to a Starbucks drink?
Perhaps, then, what has not aged so well is not the voices of individual transcribers but rather a system of citations that no longer keeps pace—in many cases—with the speed and specificity with which the content itself is produced. In the face of this consideration, however, one cannot ignore that, at least in a market like Italy, especially in the cinema, people go in large numbers to watch dubbed versions of the film.
So these same online forums probably serve to keep the focus on how many countries outside of the US watch these movies. And one that deserves the greatest respect but also a quality that is not fully guaranteed by the modern pace of excitement.
This story has appeared before WIRED Italy and translated from Italian.
