Anne Hathaway: Streep U.S.' Best, Ever

Worked With Her in 'Prada'; Is Amazed At Her Ability To Focus

(CBS)  Pretty much all of us has worked at one time or another for someone who'd qualify for the title, "The boss from Hell."

In "The Devil Wears Prada," which hits theaters Friday, Anne Hathaway plays a young journalist whose first job is working for the queen of all such bosses, who's played by Meryl Streep.

On The Early Show Friday, Hathaway told co-anchor Harry Smith Streep's character, Miranda Priestly, was "obsessed" with having her character succeed. "With her, failure is not an option," Hathaway said.

She plays Andy Sachs, a very earnest, energetic journalist who comes into the office determined not to be bullied or intimidated by Streep's character and, Hathaway told Smith, in the beginning, she succeeded but, "Then I get served up a big piece of humble pie."

When Smith compared Hathaway to a young Audrey Hepburn, Hathaway almost blushed, saying, "Oh, God, well -- I'm so undeserving!

"I have so much love and respect and admiration for her, to be compared to her, to me, it sounds wrong. But thank you very much for thinking that. And thank you, ("Prada director) David Frankel for fooling everyone."

Hathaway continued on the great actors theme, saying, "I've now worked with so many amazing, amazing actors, and the two best ones are Julie Walters and Meryl Streep. They're just absolutely amazing. Meryl's arguably the best actress in the world, and she's certainly the best American actress, I think, of all time. She so exists within the moment, the word."

And working with Street, Hathaway says, taught her "how important focus is and just how to be connected to your character. She's always at the very center of it. And I'm still very, very much at a stage that I can get distracted with certain things. I can get pushed off focus. And she absolutely never is."

Is Hathaway ready for the leap her career could get from "Prada"?

"Oh," she responded, "it could be, or it could not be. I'm just ready for anything for life and whatever that means. I'm really lucky. Before this movie started, I just took a lot of time off. I went back to school. I spent a lot of time kind of, you know, investing myself in a life that -- I'd always been a gypsy. I'd always been traveling and living out of a suitcase. And so now, regardless of what happens, if it (her career) takes off, as I hope it does, or if it doesn't, which is always a possibility, sadly, I've got a really great -- I've got really great roots right now, a really great foundation. So come what may, it's just life. It's good."