Aline Brosh McKenna

And they always encouraged both my brother and I to be very outspoken.

And so I'm fascinated anthropologically with the...

sort of apologies and the abnegation of self that women are taught in America.

It's really interesting because I think people think of American women as being sort of brassy, but we're actually taught a lot of dissembling.

So, often when I work with younger female writers and I'll hear them saying, well, this is probably terrible and we don't want to do this.

Not this, but this is not what we want to do, but maybe.

And I had a crazy idea and a bad idea and their legs are cinched together, much like ours are, to sort of occupy the least amount of space on a chair.

And then boys are really...

encouraged to splay in every way imaginable.

And I wasn't taught to sort of smallify myself by my mother.

And that's maybe one of her greatest gifts.

Well, I mean, no one gives you more permission to speak your mind than Miranda Priestly.

So that was, I always loved that about that character.

If it becomes necessary to apologize to the furniture a little bit to get what you want, I think it's okay as long as you're aware that you're doing it.

As a tactic or a strategy, I think it's completely fine, the exclamation points and the... Listen, I also think, you know, being kind and stopping to praise someone, which are, again, let's say typically female...

attributes are great in the workplace.

But yeah, anytime I, the two care, Miranda Priestley, and then I wrote a movie called Morning Glory with Harrison Ford playing a aging news anchor who was really outspoken.

And that was a ton of fun.

And I could just make him say anything.

And I think there's a tremendous amount of wish fulfillment in writing those characters because we all want to be able to do that.