TBD on Ning
John Hughes 1950 - 2009
John Hughes, the director of The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Planes, Trains & Automobiles, has died. He was 59 years old. The Michigan-born writer, director and producer died suddenly of a heart attack while taking a morning walk during a trip to Manhattan to visit family. He is survived by Nancy, his wife of 39 years, sons John and James, and four grandchildren.
John Hughes was 34 years old when he released his first feature, Sixteen Candles, but no director before or since was ever more in touch with his inner teenager. The next four films he would make -- writing and directing The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and writing and producing Pretty in Pink -- defined what it was to be adolescent in the age of Reagan. The kids in his films weren’t merely mindless horn dogs peeking through peep holes into the girl’s locker-room shower; they were funny, smart, and troubled — fully formed characters in a genre that usually presented teens as little more than bundles of hormones.
Hughes began his film career as a screenwriter, penning many of the early National Lampoon franchise comedies, some based on autobiographical stories he originally wrote while a staffer on the National Lampoon magazine (1983’s National Lampoon’s Vacation was based on a story called “Vacation 58”). Later in his career, after the success of his high school films, he tried directing more grown up comedies, like 1987’s Trains, Plains, and Automobiles, and 1988’s She’s Having a Baby, but they never matched the success of his “brat pack” pictures, the ones that made household names out of young actors including Molly Ringwald, Ally Sheedy, and Anthony Michael Hall.
As it happens, Hollywood was originally skeptical of Hughes’ more nuanced view of on-screen teenagers. When he first screened The Breakfast Club for Universal executives, the studio brass hated it. But they were missing the one really key element of teendom, and that is that it feels as good to feel bad as it does to feel good.
But even as Hughes’ directing career waned in the 1990s, his writing successes continued. In 1990, he tapped out a story about a little boy who gets accidentally left behind by his family and ended up with the billion-dollar Home Alone franchise. In 1994, he officially retired to northern Illinois, with his wife Nancy but continued to write (sometimes under the pseudonym Edmond Dantes) for movies like 2002’s Maid in Manhattan and 2008’s Drillbit Taylor. Eventally, though, Hughes finally got in touch with his inner grown-up. “If you’re a father of a teenager, you’re a dork, no matter what you do,” he said in 1999. “But it’s OK. It’s natural. Going through these phases, that’s what makes life wonderful. I ain’t going to dye my hair. I’m just fine being the old gray guy.”
Rest in Peace.
John Hughes was 34 years old when he released his first feature, Sixteen Candles, but no director before or since was ever more in touch with his inner teenager. The next four films he would make -- writing and directing The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and writing and producing Pretty in Pink -- defined what it was to be adolescent in the age of Reagan. The kids in his films weren’t merely mindless horn dogs peeking through peep holes into the girl’s locker-room shower; they were funny, smart, and troubled — fully formed characters in a genre that usually presented teens as little more than bundles of hormones.
Hughes began his film career as a screenwriter, penning many of the early National Lampoon franchise comedies, some based on autobiographical stories he originally wrote while a staffer on the National Lampoon magazine (1983’s National Lampoon’s Vacation was based on a story called “Vacation 58”). Later in his career, after the success of his high school films, he tried directing more grown up comedies, like 1987’s Trains, Plains, and Automobiles, and 1988’s She’s Having a Baby, but they never matched the success of his “brat pack” pictures, the ones that made household names out of young actors including Molly Ringwald, Ally Sheedy, and Anthony Michael Hall.
As it happens, Hollywood was originally skeptical of Hughes’ more nuanced view of on-screen teenagers. When he first screened The Breakfast Club for Universal executives, the studio brass hated it. But they were missing the one really key element of teendom, and that is that it feels as good to feel bad as it does to feel good.
But even as Hughes’ directing career waned in the 1990s, his writing successes continued. In 1990, he tapped out a story about a little boy who gets accidentally left behind by his family and ended up with the billion-dollar Home Alone franchise. In 1994, he officially retired to northern Illinois, with his wife Nancy but continued to write (sometimes under the pseudonym Edmond Dantes) for movies like 2002’s Maid in Manhattan and 2008’s Drillbit Taylor. Eventally, though, Hughes finally got in touch with his inner grown-up. “If you’re a father of a teenager, you’re a dork, no matter what you do,” he said in 1999. “But it’s OK. It’s natural. Going through these phases, that’s what makes life wonderful. I ain’t going to dye my hair. I’m just fine being the old gray guy.”
Rest in Peace.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Zen Elipsys on
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My ultimate JH movie was Ferris Bueller's Day Off. He really emphasized 'skip day' for me.
Show of hands, how many went to see the Breakfast Club? LOL!!!
Man, that brought back some serious memories. I really am glad I enjoyed my teenage years. -
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Permalink Reply by Eva on
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Pretty in Pink (giggling).
I luuuuuuuuuuuvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv'd Ferris Bueller! Who didn't! I think that one put him on the map for me! -
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Permalink Reply by Jose Chan on
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For me, it was Trains, Plains, and Automobiles. Second has to be Mr. Mom. I can still sit down and watch these movies as if they were viewed for the first time.
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Permalink Reply by Earende on
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There are soooooooooooooo many--
And Jose, I do understand that 'feel' you get from watching his movies, whether he wrote or directed it. Made in Manhattan still tugs at the heart strings for me (I know---softie!) and Ferris Bueller always makes me envious... -
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Permalink Reply by Maxim Oleksyn on
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His seeming disappearance inspired a 2009 documentary, “Don’t You Forget About Me,” by four young filmmakers who went in search of a man who was by then being compared to J. D. Salinger because of his reclusiveness. It became a tribute to Mr. Hughes’s influence on youth culture.
He defined mine. I first came here to America when I was a 'tween'. I struggled to learn the language here. But found comfort through some of the films. Sixteen Candles and Ferris Bueller were the first movies I remembered seeing on Cable. It was fun learning phrases and 'terminology' and testing it out in school. I used to have my classmates roaring with laughter as I chewed up the language. But it broke the barrier. Helped me make friends.
I would like to be remembered in a positive way like that. Someone who made a difference in the lives of others.
There is no better tribute. -
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Permalink Reply by Assassin on
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Planes/Trains was the bomb. Still is. I couldn't get into TBC and the like, but Bueller was decent. Home Alone P1&2 are in the movie collection.
Hughes died at a pretty young age (59?). Wow. Reading his bio lets me know that he had a pretty good life. Good childhood and great family.
It's all good... -
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