Dance with the Devil

INTERVIEW: The September Issue director R.J. Cutler

by Molly Eichel

When filmmaker R.J. Cutler read an article about the Met Costume Gala, he became fascinated with the event's head honcho, Vogue editor in chief Anna Wintour, who was made infamous by her fictionalization in The Devil Wears Prada, a novel written by a former (pissed-off) assistant. Cutler contacted Wintour's people and she suggested Cutler and his crew be flies on the wall during the eight months it takes to put together the mag's September issue, which, during 2007's filming, was the largest in Vogue history.

Cutler, who previously worked on D.A. Pannebaker's '92 campaign film The War Room ("Here are the similarities: They're both driven by passion, vision, dedication, hard work, strong leadership. James Carville doesn't really dress as well as Anna," he says), went behind the scenes at the style bible. What he found was the yin-yang relationship between the precise Wintour and artistically inclined creative director Grace Coddington; their relationship is at the heart of his film. Cutler talked with City Paper about Vogue, Coddington and coming face to face with the devil herself, only to find she's not that scary after all.

City Paper: Anna Wintour has this intense reputation because of The Devil Wears Prada and I've heard so many intern horror stories. It's hard not to come in with preconceived notions.

R.J. Cutler: I really, truly didn't. Meeting her, you may have heard horror stories from interns and you may take The Devil Wears Prada as some sort of valid chronicle of who she is, but there are also a lot people out there who you meet, who I've met — I'm one of them! — who will say, "When you meet Anna Wintour, she's lovely, she's impressive, she's ... formidable, she's direct." It's also my discipline not to enter with preconceived notions, it's my job not to. Because if I enter with a preconceived notion that's going to take up room where my curiosity should be living. My question shouldn't be, "Is Anna this thing that I've heard about?" My question should be, "Who is Anna?" The simplest question in the world. Who is she? What does she do? Who does she do it with? Who are they? What are their relationships? Just dumb questions. But dumb questions get you really, really far. They allow you discovery. Discovery is surprise and surprise is magic.

CP: I was surprised because she wasn't this awful witch. But she certainly doesn't have that warmth that Grace Coddington has. At what point did you identify the dichotomy between the two?

RJC: Very early on. It was very clear to from the beginning, but I will tell you that it wasn't cold and warm that was clear to me from the beginning. Grace was the devil in red hair. She did not want me filming. She was mean. She did not want me around. The first two words out of her mouth were, "Go away." If she had a stick, she would have chased me away with it. It took me four months. Now, I will tell you that's the beginning of 2007, this is the middle of 2009. This is someone who is a dear friend of mine, someone I have great admiration for. But when we first met, she was not kind. But it was the creative relationship; it was the sparks between them that I responded to. Also, it was the different approaches. Anna [is] so efficient and decisive and Grace is so thoughtful and artistic. The warmth is what I learned about once she warmed up a little [laughs].

CP: So why did she warm up?

RJC: I went to her and said, "I can't do it without you."

CP: You said it was early on that you identified your film's thesis — their relationship. Was there a light bulb moment?

RJC: There was a light bulb moment. It was one night when I had been banging my head against a wall for several months trying to figure out what the movie was going to be about if it weren't about Grace and Anna. Another filmmaker in that same situation may not even be interested in Grace and Anna. But this story spoke to me and I wanted to make this film. And I was home one night, and there's a beautiful book of Grace's, of photographs called Grace: 30 years at Vogue. It's huge, probably a thousand dollars on eBay. It's out of print. It's just every photograph she ever does is beautiful. It's arranged by photographers. I was looking through the book and I'm really admiring the book and I think, "Photographers, of course!" We're all photographers. [Cinematographer] Bob [Richman]'s a photographer. [Grace's] whole life has been about photographers. She loves photography, she loves photographers, they're her artistic soul mates. She's going to love working with us. And I went to her and I said, "I can't do it without you. Just give me one hour." ... She came in the next day and she gave us one hour. And we spent an hour with her and we barely shot, we just got to know each other a little bit. And that led to another hour and another hour, and that's the movie you see.

CP: One of the things that makes Grace so endearing is that she's not afraid of Anna. When I was watching Anna onscreen, I wasn't afraid of her, either.

RJC: Good for you. You'd do well there. There are people who watch this movie and are like, I could never work there.

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CP: But I thought the main example of how fearful she is wasn't through her actions but through the way people reacted around her. You saw the designer's reactions, or you saw an editor getting upset. What was the atmosphere like in the Vogue offices? Is there a culture of fear?

RJC: It's more complicated. I used to direct plays; that was my first career. Until I was 30, that's what I did. And we used to say when we were doing a Shakespeare play, "How do you know when the king has walked in the room? Is it because he's wearing a robe and a crown?" Well no, he's the king whether he's just wearing a jock strap. How do you know the guy's the king? Because when he walks in the room, everybody bows. And that's how you know.

The lesson is, you know people by the way other people react to them. You know a celebrity is walking down the street not because the sun is shining out of his eyes. You know he's a celebrity because the paparazzi are running around and people are asking for his autograph and women are throwing themselves at him. ... Otherwise it's just a guy, you'd have no idea. All of these reactions, all of these ways people respond to Anna, is who Anna is.

CP: Do you think the myth has somewhat magnified itself?

RJC: Well, the myth is caricature, it's not myth. And also, look, she's a theatrical figure, there's no question about it. She goes, she shows up at the shows, she sits alone with her glasses on, she's there early. If the show starts late, sometimes she leaves. She's demanding. She has her supporters and her detractors. Her former assistant wrote this shitty book about her. She's in fashion, it's a bitchy industry, it's a gossipy industry. It's a high-stakes industry, there's a lot of bloggers. So you add all that up, you're going to have caricature, you're going to have myth. Is it exaggerated? I don't know. Some people say all rumors are true.

CP: Your movie is based on such a specific time in the magazine industry [2007]. How do you think the movie would have changed if you shot it now?

RJC: I don't know. I don't think the dynamic between Anna and Grace has changed. So, to the extent that this movie is about their relationship, which I believe it's about, their relationship would be the same, the setting would be different — because 2009 is different than 2007 — but that's why there was Spider-Man I and Spider-Man II. Not that I'm making two different movies but the environment changes, but the core dynamic stays the same. Well, not really Spider-Man, it's more like — what's that movie with Mel Gibson and Danny Glover?

CP: Lethal Weapon.

RJC: So that's what Vanity Fair said of the film. That they were like Danny Glover and Mel Gibson except better dressed. I think the story would be a little different because the world be different, but it wouldn't have impacted the story at its core.

CP: So it's the superficial things.

RJC: Yeah, you know, Tom and his team wouldn't be celebrating the biggest issue ever. But Anna and Grace would be still be going at it.

CP: I kept thinking that if Anna were a man working in a masculine industry, instead of a traditionally feminine industry, do you think she would have this reputation?

RJC: No. I think it's more complicated because she is a woman. You can't really go there. But I do think that a guy who had her leadership approach and her management approach? No way! Do you think Morley Safer would interview a guy on 60 Minutes with a guy who dominated a $300 billion global industry and would ask him if he was a bitch? Morley Safer would be like, [affecting a funny voice] "Hey buddy, you're the greatest, let's go play golf. Look everybody, tough guy loves me!" But because he's with a woman, he's like, "You're a bitch." It's cowardly to me. And it's sexist. Absolutely, there's no way with a guy with Anna's approach to running her business would be the subject of that kind of inquiry. No way. Tell me an instance where anybody gives a shit that fill-in-the-blank is an asshole to the people who work for him. It doesn't happen. Not that I'm saying Anna's an asshole to the people who work for her, don't get me in trouble. I'm not saying it at all. But she's tough. We know she's tough, I made a movie about her. She is tough! She is demanding. No tough, demanding guy gets asked by Morley Safer, "Are you a bitch?" Or even "Are you too tough?" What a silly question. You a run a publication that makes tens of millions of dollars. She should have said, "Fuck you, you asshole. You pussy. That's the question you're going to ask me?" She should have said that.

CP: Do you think that's affected her at all?

RJC: I don't know. What she said to me on that subject was, "You learn to let that stuff roll off you. You get used to letting it roll off you." She's got a thick skin.

CP: Most of the time, Anna seems to ignore you, but were you and your crew ever the target of her ire?

RJC: You mean the time she chased us out with a frying pan? When we showed up at her house and she was cooking and we were like, "Anna we're filming!" And she was like, "Get out of my house!"

CP: Shotgun and all.

RJC: Can't you see her? Boosh! "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!" Naw ... we didn't have the camera rolling.

CP: Aw, damn.

(molly.eichel@citypaper.net)