Molly Ringwald Talks SIXTEEN CANDLES, the Brat Pack & Singing Jazz with Harper Simon

Guest Bio

Molly began acting at the age of three when she toddled on stage in the role of one of Baby-love’s illegitimate children in a stage production of Truman Capote’s The Grass Harp. She continued to act in other community theater productions in her hometown of Sacramento, inhabiting such glamorous roles as the Dormouse in Alice Through the Looking Glass and the only girl in the boy’s chorus of Oliver (where every night she trumpeted “Food, glorious food! Hot sausage and mustard!”). At the age of ten, she was cast in her first professional role in the children’s chorus of Annie at the Curran Theater in San Francisco and the Schubert Theater in Los Angeles. True to the chorus of “It’s a Hard Knock Life,” she had to leave the production after fifteen months when she had grown too tall.

After a brief stint in The Facts of Life, her first television role, Molly was cast at the age of thirteen in Paul Mazursky’s film Tempest. Her performance as Miranda, the daughter of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands, earned her a Golden Globe nomination. She went on to star in numerous films, including The Pick-Up Artist, For Keeps, Fresh Horses, Betsy’s Wedding, Cindy Sherman’s directorial debut Office Killer, Billy Bob Thornton’s short film Some Folks Call It a Sling Blade, Jean-Luc Godard’s King Lear, and the now-iconic John Hughes’ movies Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, and Pretty in Pink.