Looks like Fisher Stevens, the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind The Cove, may have found the subject of his next major documentary project: Anna Wintour. Or rather, Anna Wintour appears to have found him.
According to Page Six, the world’s most iconic editor was so impressed with Steven’s work on 2023’s Beckham docuseries that she decided he was just the person to tell her own story.
Of course, this won’t be the first time Wintour has appeared in a documentary. She’s taken part in many fashion documentaries — ‘Victoria Beckham,’ ‘The First Monday in May,’ ‘In Vogue: The 90s,’ and, most famously of all, 2009’s ‘The September Issue.’
Wintour was also the subject of ‘Bloomberg Game Changers: Anna Wintour,’ a video profile about her career and influence. But that was just a single 24 minute episode (which you can watch in it’s entirety below). A filmmaker can only go so deep in that amount of time, and she wasn’t a producer on that project, so access was limited.
Her project with Stevens will likely be much more exhaustive and illuminating, especially if she is willing to give up some control and really let the filmmaker (and the audience) in.
“They have started filming,” an insider reportedly told Page Six, “following [Wintour], and also looking at the world behind-the-scenes as she takes on this new global role and hands over Vogue US. I believe they were filming her at the recent fashion weeks.”
That same source claimed that lots of streamers — including Netflix — are already vying for the rights to the project. But another source claimed that the doc is actually about Vogue globally, not Wintour personally, and is being made for Condé Nast “internal purposes only.” Whatever that means.
Honestly, Wintour seems much more likely to participate in a documentary about Vogue than to commission one about herself, but the latter does sound a lot more interesting. After all, Wintour is the only Vogue editor — the only editor period — to actually transcend the magazine she led. She is a legtimate celebrity, as her appearance at this year’s Oscars proves. What other magazine editor has ever presented an award at that event? None. Because Anna Wintour is not just an editor. She’s an icon and global fascination in her own right.
Anna Wintour and Anne Hathaway present the Oscar for Makeup and Hairstyling to Mike Hill during the 98th Oscars (Trae Patton / The Academy)
Here’s hoping we all get the Anna Wintour deep dive we deserve. If not, of course, there’s always Anna: The Biography by Amy Odell. Odell was never allowed to interview Wintour for that book, but Wintour’s team did facilitate the author’s reporting by connect her with many of her closest friends and colleagues. Still, a full blown docuseries would be nice. And Stevens seems like a great fit, though according to IMDB, he’s currently in pre-production on a Kate Spade documentary, so who knows? Maybe Wintour is just helping him with that. Time will tell!
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