Andrew McCarthy finally confronts writer who coined ‘The Brat Pack’ label he despised — here’s what happened
The brats are striking back.
In the new Brat Pack documentary on Hulu, Andrew McCarthy, 61, confronted writer David Blum, 68, about how he coined the now-iconic group title in a notorious New York Magazine cover story from 1985.
At the time, Blum was doing a piece on Emilio Estevez and joined him on a night out in LA with other actors including Rob Lowe and Judd Nelson. Blum ran the Brat Pack profile that changed the lives of McCarthy, Estevez, Lowe, Nelson, Demi Moore, Anthony Michael Hall, Molly Ringwald and Ally Sheedy forever.
During “Brats,” McCarthy, who wrote, directed, and stars in the project, went to see Blum at his hotel room to hash things out decades later.
“If you had told me 10, 20, 30 years ago I’d be walking out to see David Blum’s apartment, the writer of the Brat Pack article, I’d say you’re f–king crazy,’ ” McCarthy said just before the sit-down.
Blum told the “Pretty in Pink” actor how he never meant for the Brat Pack article to come off negative.
“I didn’t dislike any of them — I thought they were all quite nice,” Blum said. “It’s hard to explain, but I didn’t think at the time, ‘Ugh, these brats.’ At all.”
He also revealed how he came up with the Brat Pack title: the night before the dinner, he was out with other journalists, and one of them referred to the group as the “fat pack.” That joke “reemerged” in Blum’s head before he went out with Estevez and company.
“It didn’t cross my mind really that it was all that big a deal,” Blum told McCarthy.
McCarthy, still bothered about the situation, asked Blum if he thought the Brat Pack title was “scathing.”
“I guess in retrospect, yes. At the time, no,” said Blum. “I was proud of my creation of the phrase. Look, I was 29. I definitely knew it was gonna have a reaction.”
McCarthy explained: “My recollection was that it was instantaneous and burned deep. i just remember seeing that cover and going, ‘What just happened.’ I felt instantly that I had lost control of the narrative of my career.”
The “Weekend at Bernie’s” star continued: “What really upset me about the article was that it felt like they’re not that interested in doing the craft of it. They want to be famous and party. I took offense at that. It felt like to me, and I know to the other people at the time, that we have to reposition this or deflect this or get away from this. Because it certainly wasn’t perceived in the industry as a compliment.”
Blum said that in hindsight he feels “more redeemed than ever by the fact that I was not wrong.”
But McCarthy called out Blum for not writing the article “with any affection” towards the group.
“You were all adults,” Blum pointed out. “I would not have written that story about minors.”
“There were a couple things in the article that were plain old not nice, and I should’ve been scolded by somebody,” Blum added. “And I was. I was just trying to be funny. I hope I won’t sound too arrogant by thinking that I might have succeeded.”
Blum said that while his life didn’t change as much as he thought it would after the Brat Pack article came out, he’s still “proud” of the piece and doesn’t regret publishing it.
“You’re 29. That’s when you make mistakes,” he said. “Even if it was a mistake, I still don’t think it was, you’ve gotta take chances and just swing and do crazy things.”
As they said goodbye, McCarthy asked Blum if he could have been nicer in the article.
“It’s collateral damage in my view to making the point,” Blum answered. “Here was a bunch of people that had become very famous and popular.”
“Sticks and stones,” Blum added.
McCarthy addressed his sit-down conversation with Blum in an interview with Decider.
“We all tell ourselves what we have to tell ourselves so we can live with ourselves. I think his perspective as writing this magazine piece as a young man was to make a splash and get the next job,” said McCarthy. “This was a heyday of snark journalism, and New York magazine was at the forefront of it. He wasn’t thinking about his subjects. I think he ultimately came down on ‘I know this wasn’t cool, but I stand by it.'”
McCarthy also mentioned that he had to “actively restrain” himself from talking back to Blum.
“But I didn’t want to do to him what he did to us. Really, I just wanted to get his take. At the end, when I asked if he could have been nicer, he simply said ‘sticks and stones.’ A callous remark, but I let him speak for himself,” he said.
“Brats” is now streaming on Hulu.
