Andie MacDowell's stylish new role

As Andie MacDowell is finding, it doesn't hurt to have been a model in playing a fashion-industry queen.

The co-star of such popular movies as "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and "Groundhog Day" portrays a Type-A businesswoman who's a lot to handle for her new assistant -- a teenager (Erica Dasher) thought to be older, and secretly trying to finish high school while keeping up with the job -- in the ABC Family series "Jane by Design," premiering Tuesday.

MacDowell allows her new character, the impressively named Gray Chandler Murray, isn't a far cry from Meryl Streep's in the movie "The Devil Wears Prada." She reasons: "There are a lot of women in executive positions, and I know many of them myself, who can have this personality. I don't find her that unusual.

"I've worked with many strong women in the fashion industry, and it does take a certain personality. It's a really demanding job. One of the things I like about this character is that she's very much like a man, yet she's a woman. She's very feminine, but many women are as powerful as men have always been. The working world is very tough."

-- Zap2it