Was Judd Nelson in the ‘Brats’ doc after all? Inside that surprise ending
Judd Nelson wants nothing to do with the Brat Pack — or does he?
The “St. Elmo’s Fire” star, 64, turned down former co-star Andrew McCarthy’s offer to appear in the new Hulu documentary, “Brats,” about the ’80s-era group of actors.
But Nelson seemingly makes a cameo — though only over the phone — at the very end of the doc.
Just before the credits roll on “Brats,” McCarthy, who wrote, directed and stars in the project, is standing on a dock and answers a phone call.
“Hello? Judd?” says McCarthy, 61.
There’s been no confirmation that Nelson was on the other end of that phone call.
“Brats,” released June 13 on Hulu, follows McCarthy as he seeks out his former peers that he starred in an ensemble of movies with in the 1980s including “St. Elmos Fire,” “The Breakfast Club,” “Pretty in Pink” and “Sixteen Candles.”
The circle of stars associated with the Brat Pack label, which was dubbed in a 1985 New York magazine article, include Nelson, McCarthy, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Demi Moore, Ally Sheedy, Anthony Michael Hall and Molly Ringwald.
Nelson was one of the few Brat Pack members who refused to do the doc.
“It seems strange to have that subject matter be something for edited entertainment,” Nelson told Us Weekly in March, adding that he “politely declined” McCarthy’s offer to join the project.
“Also, like, he’s a nice guy, but I hadn’t seen him in 35 years,” Nelson added about his fellow Brat Packer. “And it’s like, I’m not going to [be] like, ‘Hey!’ No, dude.”
The “Billionaire Boys Club” actor also denied that the Brat Pack was ever actually a thing.
“It’s like, why kind of rebirth something that wasn’t necessarily fun? … How can we be experts on something that didn’t ever really exist?” he said. “What was so strange is I lived in New York, then I did a movie with people out here [in LA]. So it’s like, then I’m hanging out with them … then when the movie’s over, I go back to New York. I’m not going to hang [and be like], ‘Hey, let’s go to Hard Rock Cafe.’ It’s weird.”
Nelson previously talked about his hatred for the Brat Pack title on “The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast” in 2015.
“These were people I worked with, who I really liked as people — funny, smart, committed to the work. I mean, no one was professionally irresponsible. And after that article, not only are we strongly encouraged not to work with each other again — and for the most part we haven’t — but it was insinuated we might not want to be hanging out with these people. And it was like, I didn’t know that good friends are so easy to come by in this world that they should be tossed asunder.”
“And to think that we’re some kind of gang, or group!” Nelson added. “I lived in New York City. I don’t go three thousand miles to have a beer. … But it just seemed like we were like fruit picked too soon, and then blamed for being picked too soon.”
Ringwald, 56, similarly turned down an offer to be in “Brats.”
“I asked Molly if she liked to speak,” McCarthy noted on-screen. “She said she’d think about it, but she’d like to just keep looking forward.”
While promoting the documentary, McCarthy spoke to Entertainment Tonight about Nelson and Ringwald’s decisions to skip the doc.
“I mean, they both are in the film in a sense that there’s a lot of clips and interviews and things,” McCarthy said.
The “Weekend at Bernie’s” actor added: “The Brat Pack is an ongoing relationship, you know what I mean? And some people are at different places in their lives to want to or not want to talk about it. I think that just informs it even more. I mean, that’s my takeaway from it.”
“Brats” is now streaming on Hulu.
