June 8, 2005

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  It's Official: The Eighties Are Back Department

  
  

  

  
  

  Put 37 Candles on the Birthday Cake

  
  

  Associated Press
  June 6, 2005, 11:22AM 

  
  

  LOS ANGELES —

  
  

  Molly Ringwald said she's in discussions to make a sequel to Sixteen Candles, the 1984 movie about the obstacles and embarrassments a teen girl faces on her birthday.

  
  

  The John Hughes film shot Ringwald to teen stardom but she has not appeared in a major movie role in many years. After making a string of bad films in France, and treading the boards on Broadway, most notably in 2001 as Sally Bowles in "Cabaret", she has been raising a daughter, now 1 1/2 .

  
  

  Ringwald, 37, said she had been approached repeatedly about doing a sequel but it was only recently that she read a script that she liked and wanted to star in the movie.

  
  

  "I've turned it down for years. I couldn't see how it would work," she said Saturday. "Now, it seems right." The Eighties revival that's been hinted at for at least 10 years is finally here.

  
  

  Ringwald was reunited last Saturday at the MTV Movie Awards with three fellow The Breakfast Club cast members.

  
  

  Appearing on stage with her were Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy and Paul Gleason, who played the principal in the 1985 Hughes movie about high school detention.

  
  

  

  
  

  I had a Molly Ringwald fixation in the eighties, along with all the other teen boys, except that I was in my early 30s. I had the Time Magazine Cover displayed proudly on my bedroom dresser. I first saw the soon to be queen of eighties teen movies  in 1982 when she was merely 14 in the Paul Mazursky movie "The Tempest". Soon thereafter she starred alongside Peter Strauss in "Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone." I was hooked. She was a miniature Melanie Griffith. Her crooked smile had the ability to melt my heart. She captured the hearts of everybody else in 1984 as Samantha Baker in John Hughes seminal "Sixteen Candles", the first of the eighties teen movies. Although Hughes' current career is as a has been writing 5 Beethoven movies, in the mid eighties he directed four of the most popular teen movies of the decade. Besides "Candles", there was "The Breakfast Club" (also with Ringwald), "Weird Science" and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."

  
  

  

  
  

  Molly also starred in the teen flick "Pretty in Pink" In 1987, at the ripe old age of 19, and too old to be a teen, Molly started tackling "adult" roles and her career took a nosedive. "The Pick-Up Artist", "For Keeps" and "Fresh Horses" all bombed. I saw them dutifully in a theater when they arrived on the scene, and saw them dutifully die. It wasn't that Molly had soured as an actress or had grown up gawky. On the contrary, she grew more beautiful. Her choices for material sucked, however, and the movies were simply dreadful. After making a loser called "Strike it Rich" in England in 1990 (which I think went straight to video.) Molly finally found a fitting persona in Stephen King's heroine Frannie Goldsmith in the 1994 TV miniseries "The Stand".

  
  

  

  
  

  My redhaired girlfriend disappeared again, this time to France, where she made a series of movies in French, no less, after marrying a French guy named Thierry Somethingorother. I didn't catch up with her again until 1996. Now a stunning 28, Molly was in the cast of the short lived TV comedy series "Townies" which also introduced Jenna Elfman, later of "Dharma and Greg". "Townies" skipped town after one season. Then came TV movies for a couple of years, until  the tide was turned, and Molly shows up as a teacher (8th billed) in the dreadful "comedy" "Teaching Miss Tingle". The movies' only claim to fame is that it was originally to have been titled "Killing Miss Tingle" but was changed because of pressure groups.

  
  

  

  
  

  Molly returned to the stage, from whence she originally came. Michael Anger in the New York Metro.com writes: " The stage was Ringwald’s first home, and her childhood sounds like something from the vaudeville era. Born in Sacramento, California, she was the youngest daughter of Bob Ringwald, a blind jazz pianist. Ringwald would belt out classic torch songs, accompanied by her father, and, at age 6, she even released an album called I Wanna Be Loved by You, Molly Sings. Her spin in the Broadway revival of Cabaret was the fulfillment of a long-nurtured ambition." Her role as Sally Bowles was during the 2002 season of "Cabaret". She also filmed a TV movie pilot  for TNT called "The Big Time" in 2002.

  
  

  I believe she's doing voice work for some future cartoon. Here's an interesting blog entry from 2002 where one guy voices his opinion why her film career went "downhill". I think a sequel to "Sixteen Candles" is a perfect comeback vehicle. Molly is still gorgeous. I would only hope John Hughes will come out of retirement to direct the film. "37 Candles" is a perfect title. (But so far the only news on the net is the "blurb" from AP from above) I'm ready for another look back at the eighties, and this is the perfect launching pad.

  
  

  I don't think the eighties ever went away actually. They're all over the internet. I think I'm going to add "Sixteen Candles" and "The Breakfast Club" to my Netflix queue and get back together with Molly Ringwald, one of  the many lost loves of my past. Then I will hope that there really will be a sequel to "Sixteen Candles".

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