Very few women embrace the idea of growing older with positivity or even the slightest bit of excitement. One might imagine that having your youthful image forever preserved on screen for all the world to see might make the process a little easier, but even that didn’t prevent Molly Ringwald from feeling what she was feeling in the weeks leading up to her 40th birthday: “It’s kind of a heavy time for a woman,” she recalls.
Instead of wallowing, Ringwald started writing.
Armed with an idea and what she saw as an opening in the market, she channeled her “almost 40″ angst into a manuscript and delivered it to her publishers ten months later (incidentally, two weeks before another delivery: her twins). “There were no books out there that I really wanted to read,” she explains. “So I wrote something fun and inspirational about what it means to be an ‘It-Woman’ instead of an ‘It-Girl.’”
Getting The Pretty Back (in stores April 27th) is exactly that: a female guide to redefining both attitude and spirit. It includes tips on fitness and fashion, interspersed with anecdotal stories from Ringwald’s past, which she hopes readers will relate to. “I wanted the book to include the full spectrum of what I think is important to women,” she says, “and that’s why it has everything from motherhood to hair! I can’t tell you the amount of conversations I’ve had with my friends about hair!”
Though she is now a mother (to 6-year-old Mathilda and 10-month-old twins, Adele and Roman), a wife (to fellow writer Panio Gianopoulos), an author and a singer (she’s part of a jazz quintet in Los Angeles) Molly Ringwald’s name will forever be synonymous with “The Brat Pack” and the late John Hughes. Her memorable roles in Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Pretty In Pink cemented her status as a bona fide movie star in the mid-’80s. But instead of seeming untouchable, Ringwald was (and still is) surprisingly relatable. She quickly became everyone’s on-screen best friend. So it’s only natural that her first published work would also serve as a tribute to friendship, her advice in this department being nothing less than expert. When asked what she values most in her friends, she barely hesitates: “Loyalty and honesty,” she says, “and just showing up and being there.”
Ringwald credits her friends for making invaluable contributions to Getting The Pretty Back (friend and artist, Ruben Toledo illustrated the tome) — from offering up their support and advice, to sharing their own stories. The most personal inclusion, however, was a poem from her husband, which she used without his knowledge. “He writes me a poem every year, and when he gives one to me, he tells me I can do whatever I want with it,” she says. “I think he was really surprised that I put it in the book, but happy about it too.”
Her husband isn’t the only happy face in the household. Ringwald, who could easily complain about constant references to her past (Samantha! Claire! Andie!), seems pleasantly at peace with where she is and what she has done. “John’s movies have become a rite of passage, much in the same way that J.D. Salinger’s books have. I remember reading Catcher in the Rye when I was a teenager and remember it feeling so relevant even though it was written in the ’40s,” she says. “John’s movies are like that. They’re appreciated generation after generation and I feel very honored to be a part of that.”
When a trip down memory lane is only as far away as a click of the remote control, Molly Ringwald’s life seems all the more remarkable. Fortunately, she never had to deal with the Internet or Perez Hilton, but Ringwald knows about the pratfalls of young celebrity, as she has witnessed the struggles of many of her peers (most recently Corey Haim‘s). Her solution was finding a balance: “It really points out how important it is to have something else,” she says. “My parents always encouraged me to have something outside of my career that mattered to me.” Even though Ringwald tried not to dwell on her fame in the midst of media pressure, she insists that the public’s current thirst for personal details was equally insatiable when she was 16. “It’s so much more ravenous now because everyone gets the information with such immediacy,” she says thoughtfully. “We didn’t have to contend with that. The same desire was certainly there, but I would say it’s just more intense than it was.”
Ringwald still sees members of “The Brat Pack” from time to time, but states that it’s “mostly at tributes.” This should hardly come as a surprise: Whose life (with the exception of Peter Pan) hasn’t changed since they were 16? Nostalgia aside, Molly Ringwald is focusing on the future. Getting The Pretty Back will be on bookshelves, and her television show, The Secret Life of the American Teenager is back on ABC Family June 7. She’s recording an album with her jazz band, which should be out by year’s end, and a second book, the idea for which she’s still “batting around,” is also on the way. At the top of the priority list, however, is getting everyone around the dinner table at the same time. “My husband and I both grew up with that family meal and we want to do that for our kids,” she says, “It’s really important to check in with each other.”
Photos by Fergus Greer.