Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to. Here's the thing,
Speaker 1: My chance to talk with artists, policymakers, and performers, to
Speaker 1: hear their stories, what inspires their creations, what decisions change
Speaker 1: their careers, what relationships influenced their work. There are many
Speaker 1: who consider The Breakfast Club the greatest high school movie
Speaker 1: of all time. John Hughes directed it, as well as
Speaker 1: Sixteen Candles and Pretty and Pink, all of which star
Speaker 1: my guest today, Molly Ringwald. Molly strikes you as someone
Speaker 1: who had it all figured out early, that she systematically
Speaker 1: set out to be a teen icon, but her idea
Speaker 1: of success was far less defined than that. I think
Speaker 1: the only thing that I planned out was when I
Speaker 1: was seven years old, six or seven years old, I
Speaker 1: think I announced that I was going to be a
Speaker 1: famous movie star. Who to the mirror or two I
Speaker 1: think they full well. I probably announced it to the
Speaker 1: mirror as well, but uh no, there was There was
Speaker 1: a particular time when I announced it out loud to
Speaker 1: I think relatives, cousins or something like that, and my
Speaker 1: grandmother and my mother's mother said, you can't say that,
Speaker 1: you know that that was That was unseemly or immodest
Speaker 1: or something like that. And the reason why I remember
Speaker 1: it was because my mother became so enraged and infuriated
Speaker 1: that she grabbed me and all the kids and we
Speaker 1: left my aunt's house in this she was infuriated by
Speaker 1: someone that her mother. Yeah, well, because I think that's
Speaker 1: that's something that was told to her, and she would
Speaker 1: not can't do that. Don't do it to my kids. Discouragement, don't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you can't do that. So I think that's the reason
Speaker 1: that I had this certainty that I was going to
Speaker 1: be uh an entertainer. I don't even know if I
Speaker 1: said movie star, but I think I definitely said I
Speaker 1: was gonna be a famous entertainer. And you know, and
Speaker 1: I was already sort of like a season pro by then.
Speaker 1: I mean by seven years old, I had already been
Speaker 1: on stage, you know, performed with my dad's jazz and
Speaker 1: it was, you know, it was I had reason to
Speaker 1: believe that this was what I was going to do. Now,
Speaker 1: your dad is he still alive. He's a musician, he is,
Speaker 1: And was that was music and culture and an appreciation
Speaker 1: of things cultural president in your household, Arry, Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it was not only an appreciation in terms of
Speaker 1: art as something that is fun or interesting. It was
Speaker 1: also a job. He made a living as a pianist.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I mean he he supported a family, you know,
Speaker 1: until I started working. He supported a family and a
Speaker 1: musician salary, which is no small feat. Now, your father
Speaker 1: is blind. Was he legally blind from birth? He was
Speaker 1: legally blind from birth. Uh, and and then completely entirely
Speaker 1: blind by the time I think he was about ten.
Speaker 1: Between ten and twelve did he grew up. He grew
Speaker 1: up in Northern California, in Sacramento, and then he went
Speaker 1: away to the Berkeley School for the Blind when he
Speaker 1: was I think around twelve, and learned how to write
Speaker 1: brail and he had a guide dog and all of that. Um,
Speaker 1: I mean people very often asked me, you know, what
Speaker 1: was it like having a blind father, And it's me,
Speaker 1: It's like I never knew anything else. So and and
Speaker 1: to me, he could do anything. I mean, he he
Speaker 1: was so if anything, I felt like my mother was
Speaker 1: was handicapped because she's painfully shy. Um. So my father
Speaker 1: made all the phone calls, you know. He was the
Speaker 1: you know, the social calendar. He could talk to anyone,
Speaker 1: you know, he's he was an entertainer, and so you know,
Speaker 1: he just has always had that facility, and of course
Speaker 1: it wasn't easy, and which is now that he gets
Speaker 1: older and you know, he's more comfortable having people do
Speaker 1: things for him. And I will say, you know, but Dad,
Speaker 1: you could do anything, and he's like, that's ridiculous. Of
Speaker 1: course I didn't. I couldn't do everything. I just wanted
Speaker 1: you to think that I could. And he did. I mean,
Speaker 1: he he was, he was. I think he was an
Speaker 1: amazing father and is an amazing father. When you know,
Speaker 1: you're at the very least you're rehearsing in the mirror
Speaker 1: before you go up and tell everybody in your family
Speaker 1: what your plans are. Um, when is that change? When
Speaker 1: does that really become real for you? I think, well,
Speaker 1: I think when I was when I was little, I
Speaker 1: really wanted to be Um. I think singing was the
Speaker 1: most important thing. I mean, that was the thing that
Speaker 1: made the most sense, and UM I wanted to be Basically,
Speaker 1: I wanted to be Bessie Smith because that's kind of
Speaker 1: because that's who I listened to. My dad was a
Speaker 1: traditional is a traditional jazz musician, and so that was
Speaker 1: my early introduction to jazz music was listening to Bessie Smith,
Speaker 1: and there was something about her. I mean I was
Speaker 1: pretty shy. I still am pretty shy. Um, But when
Speaker 1: I was little, I was very very shy. But the
Speaker 1: only time I didn't feel shy was when I was
Speaker 1: on stage in front of an audience. Um, and it
Speaker 1: had to be a big audience, like if if somebody
Speaker 1: wanted me to know, I can't how many. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: I mean if it was like, you know, a couple
Speaker 1: of people in the living room that was too that
Speaker 1: was too close, if if there were if there was
Speaker 1: literally and I'm still a little bit like that, like
Speaker 1: for since I did um a couple of weeks at
Speaker 1: the Carlisle Hotel singing singing, Yeah, because I've I've recently
Speaker 1: taken up singing again. And I mean, of course you
Speaker 1: know that that room, Well, it's it's really hard because
Speaker 1: you're really close to the people. I mean there's no
Speaker 1: way to have any kind of distance, So you know that.
Speaker 1: I think it worked really well. I mean I got
Speaker 1: and they put the people right. I mean the people
Speaker 1: were practically looking under my skirt. It was it was
Speaker 1: really kind of I don't doubt that but who produced this? Um, Well,
Speaker 1: I decided, Um, okay, we're gonna we're gonna cut ahead
Speaker 1: from you know, from the time that I was little
Speaker 1: because a few things, a few things happened in between
Speaker 1: me announcing that I was going to be a famous
Speaker 1: uh star, and and then you know, so the music
Speaker 1: kind of was the first thing that I wanted to do.
Speaker 1: And then I think by the time I did my
Speaker 1: first movie when I was thirteen years old, I think
Speaker 1: it was with John Cassavetti's and General Rollins and Susan
Speaker 1: Sarandon and Raoul Julie and it was just it was
Speaker 1: called The Tempest, uh, and I think it was that
Speaker 1: how did you get into the movie business? Okay, wait,
Speaker 1: um how did I get in the well? Where were you? Then?
Speaker 1: We had moved from Roseville, California to Los Angeles when
Speaker 1: I auditioned for my first professional job when I was ten, um,
Speaker 1: which was Annie, the first West Coast production of Annie,
Speaker 1: and I got a part in that. And at the
Speaker 1: same time, um, my father got some job or something,
Speaker 1: and so we decided as a family to move from
Speaker 1: Sacramento to Los Angeles. And then once I was in
Speaker 1: l A, you know, I did you know that thing
Speaker 1: that happens where you get an agent, and then I
Speaker 1: went from the play and I went into a television
Speaker 1: series and then just started. You were driven, You had
Speaker 1: the very driven Yeah, very driven, But I mean I
Speaker 1: also had to stay at home mom, who would drive
Speaker 1: me to stuff? You can't do that without having somebody
Speaker 1: that's going to you know, do you take you when
Speaker 1: you have a debt to your mom in a certain way.
Speaker 1: It was definitely a desire that I had that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't have been able to do at that age had
Speaker 1: it not been for them being on board for that.
Speaker 1: Of course, if you talk to my mother now, she says, well,
Speaker 1: there's no way I would let you do that if
Speaker 1: I knew everything I know about show business. Now, there's
Speaker 1: no way. There's no way. But you went to school
Speaker 1: while you were doing You went to Lis frances I
Speaker 1: went to when I was in tenth grade, tenth to twelve.
Speaker 1: Did you go to college? I did not go to college.
Speaker 1: So the tempest, how does this estimable group of people,
Speaker 1: especially back then, you know Cassavetti's and Jenna and those people.
Speaker 1: You know, they're still famous and making a lot of movies.
Speaker 1: How do they find you. I had auditioned and got
Speaker 1: really close to a job in an Alan Parker movie,
Speaker 1: UM with Albert Finney and died Keaton called shoot the
Speaker 1: movie to play their daughter, and um, they had to
Speaker 1: make up their mind by I think, you know, twelve
Speaker 1: twelve noon on a Wednesday, and they got the call.
Speaker 1: My mom got the call. I was at school, you know,
Speaker 1: at that they had decided to go with another actress.
Speaker 1: And I was so heartbroken. I mean I really really
Speaker 1: really really wanted to do it. And then it was
Speaker 1: pretty much like all the rejects from them from that,
Speaker 1: you know, it was being cast. It was Juliet Taylor
Speaker 1: and April Webster and they they took all the kids
Speaker 1: from that and um, and then I auditioned for The
Speaker 1: Tempest and I just had an immediate connection to California.
Speaker 1: In California, Yeah, and I would like to be on
Speaker 1: the set of that movie with all these very highly
Speaker 1: regarded actors. It was incredible. How did they treat you? Amazing?
Speaker 1: I mean they were John was was phenomenal. I mean
Speaker 1: he was he was so generous and so um. I
Speaker 1: mean it was it was a world that I really
Speaker 1: didn't know. I had never even been out of California until,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe to Nevada or something like that. But
Speaker 1: you know, I was playing a New York kid. I
Speaker 1: went to New York for the first time. I went
Speaker 1: to Greece. We filmed a shinnishitav you know, Fellini was
Speaker 1: on the set. I mean, it was like the entire
Speaker 1: world opened up. Yeah, and I thought, this is this
Speaker 1: is what I want to do, this is this is it.
Speaker 1: And I think the singing at that time, like now,
Speaker 1: you're supposed to be able to do everything, you know,
Speaker 1: and in old Hollywood you were supposed to be able
Speaker 1: to do everything. You know, you dance and sing, you know,
Speaker 1: and then and then this little time when I sort
Speaker 1: of came of age, it was very specialized and there
Speaker 1: were there were not that many people that were singing
Speaker 1: and acting and dancing. It was like you had to
Speaker 1: pick or you weren't a serious actor. And I chose acting,
Speaker 1: and that's really where I put on my focus. And
Speaker 1: I still sang, but I just didn't think about it
Speaker 1: as a as a career. After the Tempest, what happened
Speaker 1: after the Tempest? I did a really fantastic movie UM
Speaker 1: called Space Hunter Adventures in the Forbidden Zone in three
Speaker 1: D movie. That's so good. I remember showing you to
Speaker 1: my daughter, you know, when she was like five years
Speaker 1: old or something. You know, I think it was maybe
Speaker 1: the first thing that I'd ever showed to her. You know,
Speaker 1: this is what mommy does. And she watched about twenty
Speaker 1: minutes and then went the edge. Who's making the decisions
Speaker 1: for you back then? You know, it was a combination.
Speaker 1: It was something you know that I read that I liked.
Speaker 1: I think I had pretty good taste. I mean, to
Speaker 1: Stay Center was a good script. Um well maybe except
Speaker 1: for spe but you know, at that point, it was
Speaker 1: either be in high school or be At that time
Speaker 1: it was junior high. Get it. You wanted to be
Speaker 1: on a set. I wanted to work. The only thing
Speaker 1: that I said I did not want to do pretty
Speaker 1: much was I decided I no longer wanted to go
Speaker 1: out for commercials. I was that was not my thing.
Speaker 1: I didn't like what happens um after Space Center. I
Speaker 1: might be forgetting a couple of things. I did a
Speaker 1: movie with Richard Benjamin, I think a television movie V.
Speaker 1: I did like a couple of other little things. And
Speaker 1: then and then I met John Hughes. Where did you
Speaker 1: meet John? I met John in Universal City. It was
Speaker 1: on the weekend. I remember I did not want to
Speaker 1: take this meeting because it was the weekend. And it
Speaker 1: was just like, not really what I wanted to do.
Speaker 1: You want to be in on a set until you
Speaker 1: want to go to the beach exactly exactly, or go
Speaker 1: to the galleria. That's what That's what we did. And
Speaker 1: uh and so. But he was only there for you know,
Speaker 1: a couple of days, and they said I would just
Speaker 1: go go and meet him, and and and I did.
Speaker 1: I think I had read Um sixteen Candles, which I
Speaker 1: thought was really funny. And then I think the first
Speaker 1: thing I saw were his sneakers. You know, he always
Speaker 1: had those those big wild athletics sneakers, and I think
Speaker 1: that's the first thing that I saw. And then I,
Speaker 1: you know, my eyes traveled up and he had that
Speaker 1: like spiky hair and those glasses and the first movie.
Speaker 1: I loved him, loved him that he was writing that
Speaker 1: or had the idea to write it during Breakfast Club.
Speaker 1: He wanted to write a series if she's leaving home, Um,
Speaker 1: she's getting married, she's having a baby. And then I
Speaker 1: think he didn't do the other two but just did
Speaker 1: that one. Um. Yeah, so we we just kind of
Speaker 1: had an immediate connection. I didn't find out until later,
Speaker 1: or he might have actually told me in that meeting
Speaker 1: that he wrote sixteen Candles with my picture above his desk.
Speaker 1: He had already written The Breakfast Club, which was going
Speaker 1: to be cast locally in Chicago, and it was over
Speaker 1: July four weekend, and he had just moved from CIA
Speaker 1: to I c M. And they gave him a stack
Speaker 1: of head shots and he sort of flipped through the
Speaker 1: head shots found my picture, you know, one of those
Speaker 1: really cheesy kind of head shots where your own Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: you're eating pizza playing ukulele that you can't play, uh yeah,
Speaker 1: and so and he put that over his computer and
Speaker 1: he wrote sixteen Candles. You know, like in a day
Speaker 1: and a half or something. Now, this is a guy
Speaker 1: who sees something in you and he changes your life,
Speaker 1: and people to this day just love you in these movies.
Speaker 1: I mean, they just think you represent young femininity. Was
Speaker 1: any of the conversation with John about that. Did you
Speaker 1: talk about the character in that way or he didn't
Speaker 1: bother It's hard to really know what we talked about.
Speaker 1: I mean, how did you do what you did? You know,
Speaker 1: I just I just trusted him. I felt like, and
Speaker 1: I've really never felt this since, you know, it was
Speaker 1: it was you know, I felt a little bit with Paumazerski,
Speaker 1: but it was. But it was different because because John
Speaker 1: was younger, I mean, John actually had less experience than
Speaker 1: I had at that point. I mean, sixteen Candles was
Speaker 1: his directorial debut. He had written Vacation and he had
Speaker 1: written Mr. Mom, but he had never been in that
Speaker 1: position of actually like being on the set um. So
Speaker 1: it was really like we were kids in that way together,
Speaker 1: and he was really like a like a confidante, which
Speaker 1: I mean, to talk about it in retrospect seems you
Speaker 1: could say it kind of seems weird. You know, well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm older than than he was when we met.
Speaker 1: But when I was thirty six years old, like I
Speaker 1: didn't want to talk to people who were fifteen. I didn't.
Speaker 1: Why do you think he did? I don't know. I
Speaker 1: I've often asked myself this, and I don't know exactly why,
Speaker 1: except for we had this like sort of mind connection,
Speaker 1: that that whole thing of like finishing each other sentences
Speaker 1: and he was very close to me, and he was
Speaker 1: also very close to Michael Anthony Michael Hall, and we
Speaker 1: were sort of like, I think, two sides of his personality.
Speaker 1: I kind of feel like in a way that John
Speaker 1: experienced some kind of PTSD when it came to his
Speaker 1: teen years and and and how I mean PTSD is,
Speaker 1: you know, from what I understand, and you know, the
Speaker 1: definition or one of the definitions, is you experience something
Speaker 1: traumatic in your brain is not exactly able to distinguish
Speaker 1: the fact that it's not happening now in the present.
Speaker 1: And for him, he would talk about things that had
Speaker 1: happened to him years ago, or a slight or something
Speaker 1: that somebody said to him, and it was you would think,
Speaker 1: it's so present for him. He's feeling this pain, in
Speaker 1: this anguish and this anger right now. And and so
Speaker 1: he completely connected with me and with with Michael and
Speaker 1: what we were going through, you know, of course, and
Speaker 1: I think it enabled him to write these characters with
Speaker 1: so much honesty and and and it was so raw.
Speaker 1: He was a very sensitive guy. He was the most
Speaker 1: sensitive person that I've ever met in my life. And
Speaker 1: and I and I include myself in that um and
Speaker 1: There's a line in the Breakfast Club that that I
Speaker 1: thought was really sort of interesting when an a. It's
Speaker 1: a line that Alison has where she's as when you
Speaker 1: get old, your heart dies, and um, you know, and
Speaker 1: he he died of a heart attack. Too young, way
Speaker 1: too young. But I feel like he carried around so
Speaker 1: much in in him, so much feeling and so like,
Speaker 1: I mean, this man could hold a grudge like like
Speaker 1: no one else you know. Um, so you know, So
Speaker 1: my feelings about him are you know, like anybody I
Speaker 1: think who's really incredibly important to you in your life.
Speaker 1: It's it's complicated and this seems this is going to
Speaker 1: sound kind of glib, but it's like que the theme
Speaker 1: song from To Serve with Love. When you do sixteen Candles,
Speaker 1: refresh my memory? Does everything erupted based on that? Or
Speaker 1: does it erupted somewhat and erupted even more when you
Speaker 1: do Breakfast Club. Well, when sixteen Candles came out, it
Speaker 1: really was not considered a hit. I think it was
Speaker 1: sort of um in terms of box office it was
Speaker 1: kind of disappointing. Um, but we were already doing Breakfast
Speaker 1: Club when that happened. And and then Breakfast Club came
Speaker 1: out and that was an instantly a hit. And then
Speaker 1: I did another one which he did not direct, Pretty
Speaker 1: in Pink, but he wrote it for me. Uh, And
Speaker 1: then that that was how he directed Pretty in Pink.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right. Uh. Would you work with him on?
Speaker 1: He did this movie My Best Friend's Girl, with Dane Cook,
Speaker 1: and they wanted me to play Dane Cook's father. And
Speaker 1: I was this lascivious pig of a man who was
Speaker 1: divorced from the mother and the son had no hope
Speaker 1: of ever having any success in intimate relationships because I
Speaker 1: was such a horn dog slut pig. But I love Howie.
Speaker 1: He's fun to work. Yeah, yeah, well he he Actually
Speaker 1: I have Howie to thank for that movie because John
Speaker 1: had written it for me. But by the time it
Speaker 1: was time to make this movie, and you know, he
Speaker 1: had moved from Universal to Paramount. John was mad at
Speaker 1: me and didn't want me to do the movie. They
Speaker 1: were going cast Jennifer Beals because she had just had
Speaker 1: a success with Flashdance. In Pretty and Pink, the movie
Speaker 1: that was written for me, they were going to cast
Speaker 1: Jennifer Beals, and Howie was actually the one that said,
Speaker 1: but no, Molly has to be in this, this, this is,
Speaker 1: this is because that's what he did. I mean, maybe
Speaker 1: you didn't work with him enough enough to if you
Speaker 1: if you got close to John, then inevitably you were
Speaker 1: not close to John because he got mad at you.
Speaker 1: And I think when I wanted to do different stuff,
Speaker 1: and um, it's almost as almost like, don't work for
Speaker 1: anyone else. Yeah, you know it's I'm ready. If I
Speaker 1: had to do it over again, I would have worked
Speaker 1: with him more. I do know that he was mad.
Speaker 1: When when you're doing these films Breakfast Club, it's this
Speaker 1: ensemble of young talent. Was everybody on like an equal footing?
Speaker 1: Did he bring people on who were all kind of
Speaker 1: in the same place in their careers or were there
Speaker 1: some of you that were things were a little shinier
Speaker 1: than others. I think we were all sort of I
Speaker 1: mean maybe I think Ali had a lot of uh,
Speaker 1: you know, she had done war games and she did
Speaker 1: a movie with Sean Penn, and you know, written a book,
Speaker 1: and she was she was she was yeah, exactly. Um,
Speaker 1: so I think she had, you know, and then and
Speaker 1: then Emilio was in the Outsiders, and he had that
Speaker 1: and he was of course, the son of Martin Sheen.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think I think we all kind
Speaker 1: of except for Judd. Judd was the only one that
Speaker 1: I think really didn't have any real experience, and in fact,
Speaker 1: he he got fired after like I think one week
Speaker 1: of shooting. John was ready to fire him, and then
Speaker 1: we hired him. And then we hired him because I
Speaker 1: was going to say, the person who comes across the
Speaker 1: hungriest on camera is Nelson. Interesting. Nelson almost seems like
Speaker 1: he's a guy that they plucked off the street and
Speaker 1: threw in there and said, what would you like to
Speaker 1: be in a movie? And he just had this raw
Speaker 1: animal so he was wild eyed. He was wild I mean,
Speaker 1: he was really and he was really doing that whole
Speaker 1: method acting thing where he was I think, you know,
Speaker 1: moonlighting in a school, which I mean, I'm sure would
Speaker 1: not go over today if this, you know, basically a
Speaker 1: somebody in their twenties just shows up at school like, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm just going to hang out, you know. He he
Speaker 1: would tell the kids that his parents had abandoned him
Speaker 1: or whatever, you know, he was. He would like sleep
Speaker 1: in his clothes, you know, I mean, he just was
Speaker 1: completely into this character. And also that character was supposed
Speaker 1: to be different than the rest of us. I mean,
Speaker 1: we all bitch about our parents, but he's really the
Speaker 1: one who's actually being abused for real. He has like
Speaker 1: a cigar burnt into his forearm, you know, so there
Speaker 1: was something different about him when that when that movie
Speaker 1: comes out, because I want to get beyond this period
Speaker 1: when that movie thank you, I do too, that movie
Speaker 1: coming to But but I think what's interesting, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's funny how one day you know you are a
Speaker 1: movie star whose work as a young leading lady in
Speaker 1: these coming of age films were very popular films. Do
Speaker 1: you kind of like you're like, oh, yeah, okay, great,
Speaker 1: you don't really want to well, I mean I sometimes sure,
Speaker 1: But I mean I also have to accept the factor.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess I don't have to accept it,
Speaker 1: but I do accept the fact that these films really
Speaker 1: no longer belong to me. They belong to everyone else,
Speaker 1: and they're very meaningful and I and I have to
Speaker 1: sort of respect that. Um, you know. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: wrapped up in people's memories and I'm part of their
Speaker 1: their slumber parties, and I'm part of their first kiss,
Speaker 1: and I and I mean, I can't tell you how
Speaker 1: many times I hear you got me through high school,
Speaker 1: you got me through this very difficult time in my life,
Speaker 1: you know. And and it's kind of people never say
Speaker 1: that to me. They never say that to me. They
Speaker 1: never say Glen Garry, Glen Ross got me through high school,
Speaker 1: cut me through my twenties. Um, I can respect that.
Speaker 1: At the same time, it's not what is most interesting
Speaker 1: to me in my life. You know. It's definitely one
Speaker 1: of the highlights. But I'm more interested in sort of
Speaker 1: what I'm doing in the moment. Molly Ringwald is singing
Speaker 1: jazz at the moment, or rather next month at Birdland
Speaker 1: in New York City. Take a listen to the Here's
Speaker 1: the Thing Archives, where director Chris Columbus talks about the
Speaker 1: stroke of luck that led to his first movie Spielberg.
Speaker 1: Steven Spielberg was leaving his office on a Friday and
Speaker 1: passed his secretary's desk, and it was sitting there. That's
Speaker 1: why so much of this business is luck. He passed
Speaker 1: the script and saw the title and said that looks interesting.
Speaker 1: Take a listen at Here's the Thing dot Org. This
Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: My guest today is author, singer, and actress Molly Ringwald.
Speaker 1: Molly Ringwald actually has something in common with another one
Speaker 1: of my guests, Mickey Rourke. They both took a long
Speaker 1: time off from filmmaking after the massive success of films
Speaker 1: like The Breakfast Club and Pretty and Pink. Molly knew
Speaker 1: she had an opportunity to reinvent herself, but she was
Speaker 1: unsure how to begin. I guess I was just really young.
Speaker 1: I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do. I
Speaker 1: don't think it was probably the right time for me
Speaker 1: to do that. I mean, I look at people now
Speaker 1: like Lena Denham and and you know, and John was
Speaker 1: always telling me, you have to write, you have to direct,
Speaker 1: this is what you have to do. But it was
Speaker 1: like I just wasn't ready, and I had to I
Speaker 1: had to live a little bit before I was ready
Speaker 1: to sort of. I just I don't feel like I
Speaker 1: was a prodigy in that way. Um and and I
Speaker 1: needed to live life kind of away from everything and
Speaker 1: sort of learn how to be a human being and
Speaker 1: sort of be more well rounded. And that's sort of
Speaker 1: what I ended up doing. When you make these films
Speaker 1: and you're very young and you're surrounded by people, but
Speaker 1: you're savvy. Who were the people you work with? It
Speaker 1: you ended up admiring actors. Director, who who's let's stick
Speaker 1: with actors for the time being. Who was somebody who
Speaker 1: you work with and you thought, wow, they were really
Speaker 1: they were good. John. I think John Cassavetti's um, I
Speaker 1: think about your peers, Raoul Julia in terms of my peers, Um,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to think who did I? Who did I? Really?
Speaker 1: I really loved Sean Penn. I really wanted to work
Speaker 1: with him as an actor, but he was older than me.
Speaker 1: He was, you know, I think he's like a good
Speaker 1: ten ten years older than me. There was really nobody
Speaker 1: at the time that was that was my age, that
Speaker 1: that I could get paired up with, and and it
Speaker 1: was like another moment in time you've already been paired
Speaker 1: up with all of them. It was also a time
Speaker 1: where they weren't casting really young p bowl with older
Speaker 1: people like they are now. Like your leading man was
Speaker 1: not thirty years older. It just wasn't done like right
Speaker 1: then in this like little tiny moment of time. And
Speaker 1: so we came across that that thing all the time.
Speaker 1: We're like, nobody knew who to set me up with
Speaker 1: on film. You weren't cast opposite Sean Connery, No, No,
Speaker 1: I was not. I mean I never really had any
Speaker 1: male co stars that were sort of that that could
Speaker 1: sort of where I was a little bit and that's
Speaker 1: what I did. But like Robert Downey at the time,
Speaker 1: wasn't known. I mean he was, he was really sort
Speaker 1: of he had small parts I think in John's movies,
Speaker 1: but you know, he was a big part for him though.
Speaker 1: That was a huge part of Toback, our mutual friend Toback,
Speaker 1: who was a guest on this show by the way
Speaker 1: to back, I love Toback. He was great with me.
Speaker 1: I think I was probably the only woman that that
Speaker 1: he never made a play for, like in the history
Speaker 1: of the universe, you know, and that was just because
Speaker 1: you know, Warren was producing it and so I sort
Speaker 1: of it was like having like the Mafia. They're like,
Speaker 1: you knew, you know, don't don't go near here. Um. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So it was just kind of like a weird time
Speaker 1: where I think people didn't really know what to do
Speaker 1: with me, and I was not. I mean, I was savvy,
Speaker 1: but I was not savvy enough to really know exactly
Speaker 1: what to do with myself, other than to get out
Speaker 1: to sort of distance myself. I had a famous actress
Speaker 1: once in the late eighties, and she was shooting a
Speaker 1: film and she came to the set to meet me
Speaker 1: to talk about doing a reading of a script with her.
Speaker 1: And this actress, this famous actress who was a child star,
Speaker 1: said to me she was going to take off a
Speaker 1: year or something, and I said, don't you like to work?
Speaker 1: I said, how do you take off all that time?
Speaker 1: I mean, you must have endless opportunities to make films.
Speaker 1: You're very talented and very sought after. And she said
Speaker 1: I hate working because she'd worked so much when she
Speaker 1: was young, and she really affected her. Did you feel
Speaker 1: the same way, UM, I don't know that I ever
Speaker 1: hated working. Um, Did you grow to feel like you've
Speaker 1: done enough of that? It was that I was so
Speaker 1: not turned on by the material, and I didn't know
Speaker 1: how to write myself. Then I was writing, um, and
Speaker 1: I've always written, you know, along with with singing and acting.
Speaker 1: But it was I wasn't good enough and I wasn't
Speaker 1: confident enough in what I was writing to put it
Speaker 1: out there. So what did you do? What did I do?
Speaker 1: I mean, in those years after those films with John?
Speaker 1: What was your kind of compass you said to you
Speaker 1: use if I want to do what? I moved to Paris?
Speaker 1: Talk about that. How long were you there? I was there,
Speaker 1: I mean full time for about five years, and then
Speaker 1: and then pretty much on and off for about ten years. Um.
Speaker 1: I moved from Paris to New York and then I
Speaker 1: kept a residence in both places. But I just I
Speaker 1: didn't know exactly what I wanted to do, other than
Speaker 1: I wanted to be somewhere where I could just be myself.
Speaker 1: So I went to Paris. I got rid of the
Speaker 1: red hair, I you know, dyed my hair dark. I
Speaker 1: learned French. I mean, I went to French class. I
Speaker 1: mean before I went to Paris, I did what I
Speaker 1: was supposed to do and were single. You weren't married then, No,
Speaker 1: I was not married. Um, I was still in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: but I I Um, I applied to a college, you know,
Speaker 1: because I felt like that's what I was supposed to do.
Speaker 1: And I got accepted to usc UM with the agreement
Speaker 1: that I would take special math courses because I'm so
Speaker 1: bad with math uh. And then I went to Paris
Speaker 1: to do a job, one of those you know, stupid
Speaker 1: jobs that you know where it's a terrible script, but
Speaker 1: you know, hey, you're going to be in Paris in May,
Speaker 1: and why not, you know. And then I went there
Speaker 1: and I just thought this. It was like suddenly breathing
Speaker 1: oxygen after you've been just suffocating um, and it was.
Speaker 1: It was the most incredible feeling. And I thought, I
Speaker 1: just have to chase this. I'm not married, I don't
Speaker 1: have any kids. If I ever do this in my life.
Speaker 1: Now is the time. I was about twenty three, and
Speaker 1: what did you do with yourself over there? I just lived.
Speaker 1: I just like drank a lot of wine and ate
Speaker 1: a lot of cheese and walked around and and learned
Speaker 1: French and and become a part of something. Yeah. I mean,
Speaker 1: I just you know, eventually, I knew that my life
Speaker 1: was not going to end up there. I knew that
Speaker 1: I was not going to become, you know, the next
Speaker 1: Jane Berkin. I wasn't going to you know, that's not
Speaker 1: where I was going to end up. But it was.
Speaker 1: It was. It gave me some distance to sort of
Speaker 1: recharge and to figure out you know what what I
Speaker 1: was going to do with my life and who I
Speaker 1: was going to be. And then I kind of had
Speaker 1: to sort of decide again whether or not I wanted
Speaker 1: to act as an adult, you know, because when I
Speaker 1: did it as a young person, it was so completely
Speaker 1: it was just all instinct, you know, and I and I,
Speaker 1: you know, can you really say that you make a
Speaker 1: decision when you're liner? You know, Yeah, I loved it,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't I wouldn't say it was entirely my decision.
Speaker 1: So I kind of had to make that decision again
Speaker 1: as an adult and say, yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: keep doing this, but I'm gonna do other stuff too.
Speaker 1: What did you step up to bad again? So to speak?
Speaker 1: With the acting was actually, you're a little bit instrumental
Speaker 1: in this. No, it's a it's a good thing. I
Speaker 1: think it's a really good thing. I you know, when
Speaker 1: you do something for so long and it comes easy
Speaker 1: to you, it's easy to kind of lose respect for
Speaker 1: what you do, and you sort of realized that not
Speaker 1: everyone can do it. And I remember I was asked
Speaker 1: to do a to read a story for the New
Speaker 1: Yorker Festival, and you were reading a story too, and
Speaker 1: I was really pregnant at the time, I remember, and
Speaker 1: I wasn't crazy about the story that I was reading.
Speaker 1: But you did the most incredible reading I've ever heard.
Speaker 1: It was it was phenomenal. I mean, you had to
Speaker 1: do an Irish accent, you had to do an African acts.
Speaker 1: Do you remember this? Really? It was? It was it
Speaker 1: was an Irish ride her. Um. It was because I thought,
Speaker 1: how is he doing? Like how much did he work
Speaker 1: on this? And it really kind of made me remember
Speaker 1: in a way what what was possible in terms of
Speaker 1: acting and how and how that it really is a skill.
Speaker 1: And I had to sort of look at that and say, like, well,
Speaker 1: how is he like does he just like work on
Speaker 1: accents when he's sitting by himself? And it was sort
Speaker 1: of like a series. I mean that that wasn't the
Speaker 1: only moment, but that was like a moment like that
Speaker 1: sort of I had these moments and doing theater again
Speaker 1: and you're looking at someone and you're like, that's what
Speaker 1: that is? Yeah, And I want to see somebody like
Speaker 1: Cherry Jones. Every time I see Cherry. She's a very
Speaker 1: vivid example of someone who reminds me of why we
Speaker 1: do this. Yeah, And and also Jeffrey tamber and what
Speaker 1: he's doing right now in Transparent. You know, I've always
Speaker 1: known him, I think, as most people as a comedic actor,
Speaker 1: and I you know, I worked with him, um and
Speaker 1: he was, you know, playing one of the buffoon of
Speaker 1: many that he played. And to see him play this
Speaker 1: part and not do the obvious thing. It's moments like
Speaker 1: those that remind me of why I'm doing what I'm
Speaker 1: doing and how and how challenging it can still be.
Speaker 1: But in order to do work like that, you have
Speaker 1: to have great material, and unfortunately there is just a
Speaker 1: dearth of great material for everyone, but particularly for for actresses.
Speaker 1: It's it's even worse. So, you know, so I can't
Speaker 1: only do that. I think if I'm only an actor,
Speaker 1: I'll go out of my mind. And it's it's why
Speaker 1: I write books, and it's why I sing, and you
Speaker 1: know I do It's, Uh, it's the hardest thing that
Speaker 1: I do. For sure. It doesn't come easily, Like I
Speaker 1: didn't come out of the womb writing books. So it's
Speaker 1: something that I always have to work at and I
Speaker 1: I don't I don't think that I've ever had that
Speaker 1: confidence in writing, but it's something that I have that
Speaker 1: I'm more proud of when I've written the hell out
Speaker 1: of something and I and I understand something about a
Speaker 1: care and why somebody does what they do, which I
Speaker 1: think is the same thing that I'm interested in in
Speaker 1: in acting. It's it's the characters and how you can
Speaker 1: take somebody who's so flawed and see them from all
Speaker 1: angles and and that's just an obsession that I have.
Speaker 1: And when I do that and I do it well,
Speaker 1: there's no greater feeling. I feel like I'm flying. I
Speaker 1: love doing plays, and I don't get to do them
Speaker 1: as often as i'd like, especially now that I have
Speaker 1: little kids. Do you do you like performing in the theater?
Speaker 1: I do, yeah, But do you minimize that because of
Speaker 1: your own family situation? Um? No, It's actually one of
Speaker 1: the reasons why I moved back to New York was
Speaker 1: because I really missed doing theater, and my kids all
Speaker 1: love theater. How old are your children now? I have
Speaker 1: a twelve year old and I have two six year olds,
Speaker 1: a girl and a boy. Adel In Roman, you have
Speaker 1: three children. I have three children, and you live outside
Speaker 1: the city. You're not in the city, No, not right?
Speaker 1: Now and that was what you needed to do with
Speaker 1: your kids. Yeah, you want to get out of the the city. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well I wanted to have proximity to the city, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: but but you know, when we were in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: we kept sort of trying out in neighborhoods and I
Speaker 1: just kept getting further and further out. You know, we
Speaker 1: moved back and I said, well, you know, when I
Speaker 1: was in Los Angeles, I was always on the east side.
Speaker 1: So if I have to go back, I'm going to
Speaker 1: be on the west side, and my kids are going
Speaker 1: to grow up in the surf. So we started out
Speaker 1: in Venice, and then we moved to Santa Monica and
Speaker 1: then to Rusta Canyon, and then we you know, ended
Speaker 1: up into Panga until finally I just said, you know,
Speaker 1: in fact, I don't want to be here. I really
Speaker 1: don't want to No, I mean, I want to go
Speaker 1: back to visit my my parents are are in northern California.
Speaker 1: I just I don't like Hollywood. I just, um, you know,
Speaker 1: And I don't care if you're into Panga, if you're
Speaker 1: in the vicinity of Los Angeles. It's just it just
Speaker 1: doesn't feel real to me. And and never really did.
Speaker 1: And maybe it's because I wasn't born in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: I was born in northern California. But I and I
Speaker 1: feel like there's a real distinction between northern and southern California.
Speaker 1: But it just it always felt like artifice to me.
Speaker 1: It never felt real. And so when when I had
Speaker 1: everyone's eyes on me, it felt uncomfortable. When I had
Speaker 1: when I felt like no one's eyes around me, that
Speaker 1: feels uncomfortable. It just the whole the whole thing just
Speaker 1: didn't feel good to me. And I finally, and I
Speaker 1: was really the one that wanted to move back to
Speaker 1: New York because my husband was raised on the East
Speaker 1: Coast and you know, for him California, he's a book
Speaker 1: editor and writer and uh, and then he took a
Speaker 1: little hiatus and got his MBA at Stanford. You're a genius,
Speaker 1: He's a he's a genius. Yeah. So, but he liked
Speaker 1: he liked it out there, you know, and he made
Speaker 1: some good friends and it was very sunny. But I
Speaker 1: just said, if, if, I, if we moved back, we
Speaker 1: have to do it now because Matilda is leaving middle
Speaker 1: school and I don't want her to go to a
Speaker 1: middle school and pull her out of it. So if
Speaker 1: we do it, we have to do it now? Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty much? Um? And I would have I would have
Speaker 1: just sucked it up and just stayed there if if
Speaker 1: it didn't happen. But I said, I really, I will
Speaker 1: wither and die. Not that I'm dramatic or anything, but
Speaker 1: I will wither and die if I have to stay here.
Speaker 1: Please please let's go back, and so um and so yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're back. How driven and how creative and how
Speaker 1: uh stage worthy is Matilda? And how are you going
Speaker 1: to handle that differentely than yours? Percent? She I, I
Speaker 1: have a rule. I don't know if you made the
Speaker 1: same rule for your kids, but my my kids are
Speaker 1: not allowed to be professional as kids. And that's just
Speaker 1: based on my own personal experience. I don't think that
Speaker 1: they just if they have talent, that talent will not
Speaker 1: go away. And if they go through college and get
Speaker 1: to or at least to that college age and say,
Speaker 1: you know what, this is really what I want to do,
Speaker 1: I'll do whatever I can to help them and support them.
Speaker 1: But they know that they can't do that before then.
Speaker 1: But I said, you can do theater, you can take classes,
Speaker 1: you know you can. Um, you know, you can do
Speaker 1: whatever you want as long as it's not professional all.
Speaker 1: And it's been a battle. I think I think Matilda's
Speaker 1: somewhat resigned now, Um, but you know it's been I
Speaker 1: mean for a while it was a daily battle. You know, well,
Speaker 1: why why can't I? Why could you? Why was it
Speaker 1: okay for you and not for me? Um? And I
Speaker 1: just you know, we just it's both of us. It's
Speaker 1: not just me. My husband and I have made that decision.
Speaker 1: And I just want to see what they do. I mean,
Speaker 1: they're extraordinary, you know. And and personally, I think if
Speaker 1: I was gonna, if I was a betting person, I
Speaker 1: would bet that she is is going to be a director,
Speaker 1: and I just hope that she'll put me in her room.
Speaker 1: She I mean, she's a she's she's really incredible director,
Speaker 1: and she makes her own movies, and you know, and
Speaker 1: I think if she was all concentrated on going and
Speaker 1: you know, going to auditions and getting rejected and doing
Speaker 1: all of that stuff, I don't know that she would
Speaker 1: be doing what she's doing right now and and figuring
Speaker 1: that stuff out out of the public eye. And I
Speaker 1: just think that it's the right thing to do. I
Speaker 1: think she's very lucky to have you as a mother
Speaker 1: with your perspective, because as I tell people, I go
Speaker 1: to acting classes sometimes and teach, and I'll say to them,
Speaker 1: but also remember that if you want to be happy,
Speaker 1: this is not a great business. It's not a great business.
Speaker 1: The thing about you that strikes me is there are
Speaker 1: people who become stars and it's only visual. You know,
Speaker 1: you're very striking looking and and it's only visual, and
Speaker 1: then they go away. But you, as an actress then
Speaker 1: had something very unique and something very special. You had
Speaker 1: this tremendous emotional reservoir. You're very emotive in the films,
Speaker 1: and you had a bravery, you know, your character faced things.
Speaker 1: When people remember those films and they see you now,
Speaker 1: they see somebody who was very brave. And I mean
Speaker 1: there's a kind of a brave read you in those
Speaker 1: films that I really really loved. I love that and
Speaker 1: and it's it's something that I hear from people. And also, um,
Speaker 1: I think the fact that I have survived and flourished,
Speaker 1: that that I'm still here, that that I more or
Speaker 1: less look the same, that I fantastic, that I'm then
Speaker 1: I'm okay. I think it's incredibly reassured. You're one of
Speaker 1: the few people in the world. Raise your plastic water
Speaker 1: bottle with me. You're one of the first few people
Speaker 1: in the world I can be in a room with
Speaker 1: and say to John Hughes, if Molly Ringwald got you
Speaker 1: through high school, you may want to read her books.
Speaker 1: Getting the Pretty Back and when it happens to you,
Speaker 1: this is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the
Speaker 1: Thing