Well, December 10th marked the 49th birthday of the elusive Michael Schoeffling. And though his acting career was rather short, his legend continues to grow.
Schoeffling is best remembered as Jake Ryan from the incredibly hilarious John Hughes classic "Sixteen Candles", but it was roles like Kuch from "Vision Quest" and Joe from "Mermaids" that gives you a glimpse into his true acting abilities.
I often wonder what might have been with Michael Schoeffling, but his mysterious decision to give up acting and move to Pennsylvania to supposedly make furniture still baffles me. Maybe not the decision, but the fact he went into recluse and hasn't been interviewed in years. Thus my posting of his head on Bigfoot a few years ago.
Here's a couple of things I did not know about him:
1. He was a GQ model in the 80's
2. He won a Gold medal for the US National Junior Free-style wrestling team in 1978. Must have been hard for him to allow Matt Modine to pin him in "Vision Quest"..
I still remember reading the article "Real Men Can't Hold a Match To Jake Ryan of Sixteen Candles" and realizing that maybe his recluse might be part of the incredible legacy of Jake Ryan. In fact, GQ attempted to do an interview with him a few years back and they couldn't even find him!
So if you're a fan take a moment to reflect and wish Michael Schoeffling a Happy 49th.
One final rumor - It has been out there that Michael Schoeffling's daughter played a model on a recent episode of "Ugly Betty" .. If true, how cool would that be?
[ 13. December 2009, 16:45: Message edited by: Valley ]
Posted by Kash (Member # 297) on :
Happy birthday Michael, great post Valdude: I can barely remember my own birthday so good on you for remembering Jake Ryans!
That GQ cover looks exactly like the kind of pictures they used to put up in the barbers...
YOU: Short back and sides please.
BARBER: Like that? (points to picture)
YOU: Yeah, OK.
Some more, lesser known facts, about Michael Schoeffling.
Michael Schoeffling...
1)... stole my sweater vest.
2)...made this
3)...is Keyser Soze.
Recent picture: Michael Schoeffling going to the shops.
From the early 90s: Pictured with English cricketer Ian Botham.
John Hughes was apparently going to cast him in Pretty In Pink but chose Andrew McCarthy after talking to Molly Ringwald; who said McCarthy was more her type than Schoeffling.
In a way I'm glad he made a clean break from showbiz and does his own thing. Jake Ryan is a legendary character and MS was, if only for awhile, a cool actor and semi-iconic 80s figure.
Posted by aTomiK (Member # 6575) on :
Here´s to the mystery man!
Sixteen Candles and Vision Quest are classics indeed.
He also had a role in the ´86 flick Let´s Get Harry aka The Rescue. I just got the VHS tape and maybe will watch it later today.
Posted by logan5 (Member # 1467) on :
That's not Ian Botham!
quote:"Real Men Can't Hold a Match To Jake Ryan of Sixteen Candles"
Two things:
1) Never understood people that try to compare 'real' people to people in a movie. Yes, when an attractive person in a movie says all the right things and you can go back and revisit it over and over again whenever you feel like it is enjoyable. But the fact that anyone would 'project' that as an ideal into the real world, would project that prison-cell idea of how finite someone should be, says a lot more about the person doing the 'wishing' than the people they don't feel 'live up'.
2) The whole Jake Ryan thing has grown since the late 90's. If you approached 99% of teenage girls in the US just one year after '16 Candles' had come out and asked them for a 'top ten hottest guys' list, I'll bet you that Michael wouldn't be on any of them. He has come to be seen as an 'ideal', and that's not a bad thing, but the inflation of his importance has kind of re-coloured the past. C. Thomas Howell and Charlie Sheen probably graced 100 times more bedroom walls in the 80's. I think that when looking at the film (or looking back) it's important to keep things in context. At the time 16 Candles was a minor hit from a then unknown new director amidst a whole raft of teen-oriented movies (some good, some bad, some hits, some misses), and Michael was just one of a whole raft of pretty boys during what was arguably a golden age of pretty boys.
