I was 14 when St. Elmo’s Fire and Sixteen Candles released. I was a teen in the John Hughes era. I crushed on the boys of the Brat Pack (I was all about Judd and Andrew) and wanted to be Molly or at least friends with her. I was a little sad to learn I was 2 years shy of having been in Washington Square Park at the same time as @andrewtmccarthy
So when this book was released a couple of weeks ago I knew I had to have it.
For me this was a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ read. But if you’re not familiar with the time and hold no nostalgia for it or if you have a taste for memoirs filled with lots of very intimate and private details about the writer and/or those they come in contact with this may be 3-4 stars for you.
It’s a thin one, 217 pages. It’s not gossipy and there’s nothing scandalous or salacious in the pages.
But I loved it. I was surprised to learn that The Brat Pack weren’t for the most part a group outside of the movie sets, in my teenage brain and heart they were the group of friends I wanted to be with and join. I felt like Andrew on these pages was as laid bare as he could be as sparse as it was given what he shares about his nature and insecurity defense mechanism of withdrawing. I imagine even sharing this much wasn’t easy and that makes it all the more revealing.
I almost thought that I wished he had shared more about his life now, how he is doing, but then I realized that is part of the problem we have with celebrity, the feeling of wanting to know all the slimy and private details. If a friend was telling me about their life before we met and these were the details they shared I wouldn’t be angry to feel cheated, I’d feel thankful they shared anything with me as we grew our knowledge of each other. And that’s what this is, a small glimpse given by someone who owes nothing to anyone.
I’m so glad I read it and spent some time remembering that time and my love of the movies he wrote about.
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