Throughout the 1980s, John Hughes made one classic high school comedy after another. In 1985, he achieved the gold standard: The Breakfast Club. Hughes took five archetypes of teen movies – a jock, a nerd, a popular girl, an outcast, and a goth – and put them all in Saturday detention together.
Over the course of the day, the five kids discover that they’re not so different after all. The Breakfast Club has been ripped off a bunch of times, but none of its imitators have come close to matching its greatness. So, here are 10 behind-the-scenes facts about The Breakfast Club.
10 John Hughes wrote the script in two days
With a background in writing ad copy, John Hughes was a famously quick writer. He would apparently write in 20-hour binges and finish entire screenplays in less than a week. His usual turnaround was four days (as was the case with Ferris Bueller’s Day Off), but he reportedly wrote the script for The Breakfast Club over the course of just two days: July 4 and 5, 1982.
Most screenwriters could be given six months and not come up with anything as inspired or unique or funny as The Breakfast Club, so it’s a testament to Hughes’ talent that he could do it in two days.
9 The Breakfast Club was shot in sequence
Movies tend to be shot out of order. Based on the scheduling of actors, the availability of locations, and general convenience, scenes are usually filmed all over the place and then pieced together in the cutting room.
However, since The Breakfast Club is set across the course of one day, mostly taking place in the same location, it was possible for the crew to shoot the movie in sequence, therefore making it easier for the actors to chart their characters’ arcs on-screen. In fact, shooting in sequence is easier for everyone, because it makes it easier to keep track of which pages have and haven’t been shot.
8 The actors did a lot of ad-libbing
The cast of The Breakfast Club rehearsed the movie like a play, running through the entire script a few times before shooting. But even with this preparation, the actors still did a lot of improvisation on the set. For example, Brian’s line about getting a fake I.D. “so I can vote” was ad-libbed by Anthony Michael Hall.
Surprisingly, the whole scene in which the characters talk about why they’re in detention in the first place was improvised by the cast. There was no script for the scene; John Hughes just told them all to make up their reasons on the spot.
7 Brian’s mother and sister are played by Anthony Michael Hall’s mother and sister
Brian Johnson’s mother and sister appear briefly in The Breakfast Club, and they’re played by actor Anthony Michael Hall’s actual mother (Mercedes Hall) and younger sister (Mary Christian). At the very least, these cameos added a degree of authenticity.
Hall had a major growth spurt during filming, which sort of screwed up the continuity. The crew was able to shoot around it, so it wasn’t as obvious and distracting as it could’ve been, but according to Judd Nelson (who played John Bender), Hall was shorter than him at the beginning of shooting and taller than him by the end of it.
6 The weed used in the film was actually oregano
In one of the most memorable scenes from the movie, the characters smoke some pot. Since it’s illegal and it would cause the actors to mess up their lines anyway, the production didn’t use real marijuana. Instead, they used oregano. Smoking oregano apparently produces no high, and gives users the same effect as smoking tobacco, so the actors’ heads were clear for the filming of the scene.
John Hughes has said that his biggest regret from the making of The Breakfast Club appears in this scene: his use of the glass-breaking effect when Emilio Estevez lets out a loud screech.
5 John Hughes and Judd Nelson didn’t get along
There was a lot of animosity between director John Hughes and actor Judd Nelson on the set of The Breakfast Club. Nelson decided to stay in character on the set, even when the cameras weren’t rolling, and so he was constantly bulling Molly Ringwald. While Paul Gleason felt that this was a sign that Nelson was a good actor, Hughes almost saw it as a reason to fire Nelson.
There was originally a plan to make a sequel to The Breakfast Club every 10 years, with the plot being that the characters would get together once a decade to catch up. However, since Hughes vowed never to work with Nelson again, there was never a sequel.
4 Nicolas Cage was up for the part of Bender
Emilio Estevez was originally cast to play John Bender, but when John Hughes had a tough time casting the role of Andrew Clark, he asked Estevez to take that part instead. With the role of Bender now vacant, Nicolas Cage was up for the part. However, the budget wasn’t big enough to accommodate the salary that Cage could command at the time.
John Cusack really wanted the part, and even flew out to read for it a few times. However, Hughes wanted to go in another direction with the character, eventually casting Judd Nelson in the role before production on the film began.
3 Simple Minds weren’t the first choice for the theme song
The theme song from The Breakfast Club, “Don’t You (Forget About Me),” was written for the movie by Keith Forsey. It ended up being a chart-topping hit for Simple Minds, but initially, they weren’t the producers’ first choice to perform the song.
In fact, the producers had a tough time getting an artist to sign on for the movie. They were turned down by Bryan Ferry and Billy Idol (who ended up recording a cover of the song in 2001). The Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde also rejected the producers’ offer, but she encouraged them to offer it to Simple Minds, who were fronted by her husband at the time, and they accepted.
2 John Kapelos joked about Martin Sheen without realizing he was Emilio Estevez’s dad
At the beginning of filming, John Kapelos, who played the janitor, cracked a joke with the young actors, telling them not to overdo the intensity of their performances, because that gave Martin Sheen a heart attack while filming Apocalypse Now. Emilio Estevez was offended by the remark, because Martin Sheen is his dad.
When he made the joke, Kapelos didn’t realize Estevez was Sheen’s son. Estevez accepted his apology, but Kapelos always felt bad about it. He recounted the story to Sheen himself when he guest-starred on The West Wing and Sheen found it funny, which made Kapelos feel a little better.
1 Judd Nelson improvised the fist pump at the end of the movie
The final scene in The Breakfast Club sees John Bender walking across the football field before doing a fist pump as a sign of rebellion against the whole gosh-darn system. The original script simply called for Bender to walk into the sunset, with no fist pump.
On the day of shooting the scene, John Hughes told Judd Nelson to play around with some actions in a couple of extra takes, at which point he came up with the fist pump. Everyone on the crew agreed that it was great, so it made it into the final cut. It went on to become one of the defining images of the ‘80s.
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