From first kisses to first periods to almost-perms, inside the making of the VHS classic, 'The Baby-Sitters Club.' jessicagolds reports
“Everybody was thinking, It’s a kids movie,” director Melanie Mayron tells Vulture. “But I wanted it to have a great cast.” Photo: Sam Emerson/Courtesy of Bre Blair In 1986, The Oprah Winfrey Show began beaming out of American screens, “How Will I Know” poured out of everybody’s radios, and the first pastel-covered Baby-Sitters Club book by Ann M. Martin started filling the shelves of young readers the nation over. Kristy’s Great Idea came first.
From left to right: Stacy Linn Ramsower as Mallory, Rachael Leigh Cook as Mary Anne, Bre Blair as Stacey, Schuyler Fisk as Kristy, Larisa Oleynik as Dawn, Tricia Joe as Claudia, and Zelda Harris as Jessi. Photo: Sam Emerson/Courtesy of Bre Blair Melanie Mayron, director: Everybody was thinking, It’s a kids movie, but I wanted it to have a great cast. Ellen Burstyn is a dear friend. She was in my very first movie I ever acted in, Harry and Tonto.
Melanie Mayron in 1995. Photo: Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images Blair: They said, “You’re going to have to perm your hair,” and my mom and I both said no to that. I would put my hair in rollers every single day. So all the old pictures of me on set are of my hair in rollers.
‘We’ve Got Kristy’ Finding the right actresses for two of the three remaining baby-sitter roles was easy: Stacey Linn Ramsower’s “beautiful, earnest quality” struck Mayron as perfect for Mallory, and the production found its Claudia in Tricia Joe, who at 18 was the oldest girl in the group. Kristy, however, remained harder to cast.
Mayron: Sissy Spacek is one of my oldest friends. We had the same manager when we were 20, 21 in New York. We’d both been in the movie Missing together. Her nephew, Steven Spacek, was my assistant at the time, and he said, “You know, [Sissy’s daughter] Schuyler is in the seventh grade, doing musicals back in Virginia.
Pre-Shoot Bonding: ‘Melanie, I’m Crying!’ About a week before filming began, the cast flew out to California and checked into their very swanky shoot accommodations. An Embassy Suites? A Residence Inn? Reports differ, but it was some place with a macaroni bar in the greater Los Angeles area. Mayron needed their relationships to feel real and lived-in, so she set the girls up to bond as much as possible in that seven-day period.
Oleynik: We just hung out. It never ended. We would swim together, and eat dinner together, and I don’t really remember any separation at all. We were just constantly together. Mayron: When we got done, I said to them, “You know, I think you guys now know more about each other than you probably know about some of your best friends at home.” It was the day before we started shooting.
Blair: I just remember on set, Melanie, she was wearing this skirt — she had awesome style, she’s just so cool — and she lifted [it] up in front of us and had fluffy bloomers on. Just flashing us to make us laugh. Mayron: The first kiss Bre ever had was in the film, and needless to say, it was a huge deal and had to be handled very delicately.Blair: It was terrifying! I didn’t want to do it. And I think part of the reason I was nervous was he was quite a bit older than me. I was 14 and he was 22. He was this really cute guy from Germany. I mean, I was dying.
Oliver: [Blair’s] mom was there. And of course all the girls gave her a lot of crap. They were all giggling. They had to kind of restrain everybody from being on set. Blair: There’s another scene where I have to kiss [Oliver] at the end of the film, and I was told we were going to potentially have to reshoot that first kiss, and I started crying. “I don’t want to do it again!”
I remember that being a really uncomfortable scene to do … It just was this odd feeling for me, because I was at a point in my life where I really wanted kids. I really wanted to be the good dad. So to play this dad who had a kid who he really wasn’t attentive to, and in this scene, to sort of live that reality, was difficult for me. I remember Melanie being very kind and patient with me, to try to make this performance nuanced.
Oleynik: The scene when we’re all at the cabin for Kristy’s birthday, and someone says to Kristy, “You’re important to us.” That level of deep affection that you see with us — the way that we’re all touching each other and holding each other and literally cradling each other in support — that’s still sort of rare, I think, to see that level of friendship onscreen. Really unabashedly affectionate.
Mayron: It was so touching. The parents kept coming up asking, “What’s going on?” And I said, “Just leave them.” Blair: We went all over: Atlanta, New York, Minnesota. We were at malls, we were at waterparks, amusement parks. We went to hospitals. It was really fun. And really wild to see all the fans, because they’re all my age.
25 Years Later, a Sleepover Classic Returns What was once a theatrical disappointment slowly became a VHS success and beloved pop culture relic. The cast of The Baby-Sitters Club eventually reunited for a 20th anniversary screening of the movie at Alamo Drafthouse in 2015, which attracted a sold-out audience of 20- and 30-something women who grew up wearing out their BSC cassettes and to this day approach the cast and Mayron to thank them for bringing Martin’s books to life first.
Cook: After round two of complimentary margaritas, Larisa decided to just start catcalling the screen. She would go, “Oh, yeah! Kirsty’s Dad!” Cook: Just the idea of kids being able to make their own money — have their own business — that’s powerful stuff. It grabbed me as a kid and I think it grabs people now.
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