Entertainment

Robin Wright In 'Sixteen Candles'??

by Alanna Bennett

Remember a little while back, when it was revealed that Alicia Silverstone almost won the part of My So-Called Life's Angela Chase over Claire Danes? Well, that very specific brand of history tidbit is back today, because there are more iconic teen roles that almost went a different way: Robin Wright came pretty close to landing multiple of the roles that went on to establish Molly Ringwald as the teen queen of the '80s.

"It was always down to the wire between me and Molly Ringwald, and Molly always got the part," Wright told Town & Country in an interview for her June/July cover for the magazine. She didn't specify which particular movies she was up for, but any of them — Breakfast Club, Pretty In Pink, Sixteen Candles, to name the most legendary ones — would have surely changed Wright's life forever. It would at the very least have changed some things about who we namedrop when we talk about teen girls in the early to mid '80s.

Tidbits like this are always tricky, because it's often hard to pinpoint exactly what forces of magic combined to make icons iconic in the first place. Silverstone may have been great as Angela Chase, for example — but would we remember the show the same way we do now without Danes' performance? In the '80s, iconicity was most definitely influenced by John Hughes — but would John Hughes have been the same John Hughes without the Brat Pack he helped launch to fame?

As history has it, Wright made it big just a couple years after The Breakfast Club with The Princess Bride, so it's not like the lady's completely lacking. Plus, she stars in the hit House of Cards, while Ringwald is ... where is Ringwald, anyway?

Image: MovieFanCentral