It’s tough to be a movie star. You might work at Wal-Mart, but your paycheck is steady and every week. The actors and actresses have to get a role, and hope there will be work for them again. It’s not easy to be a movie star. You don’t want to be known as the one who turned down the leading role in Pretty Woman and Ghost. Molly Ringwald is that one. Remember her?

She was known as a teen star in the 80’s . She is now in her 40’s and plays the Mom in “The Secret Life of the American Teenager.” In her teens, she was the star of the classic teen movies. “Sixteen Candles, Pretty In Pink, The Breakfast Club.” She admits it was an awesome experience that brought her into instant stardom at that time. Now she is a mother and author of a book “Getting the Pretty Back.”

As a young child from about age 6, she was a ham in that she loved to sing and be in front of a microphone. Isn’t the natural ability in a child always somehow shines? Her father was a blind jazz pianist. It wasn’t long before she started with a role on “The Facts of Life.” Her signature movies had a statement. In Sixteen Candles, her family forgets her 16^th Birthday. In The Breakfast Club, she has to go to weekend detention, In Pretty In Pink, poor, she has to make her own prom dress.

Obviously, she did not make the best decisions in transitioning her teen movies into adult movies. In retrospect, how could she turn down the blockbuster movies with a great female part as the lead in Ghost and Pretty Woman. Hence, we haven’t seen much of her in the last 20 years. For all we know, she could have been one of those child stars that went into drug or some addiction and that is why she dropped out of sight. In her teen years, she was everywhere.

She had enough of Hollywood and moved to Paris. Dyed her famous red hair blond and no one recognized her. After awhile, she returned to New York. She had an e-mail relationship with her now husband and went on to have three children. These days she is finding comfort in singing in small jazz clubs once again. She will still be America’s favorite teen even though no longer a teen or a movie star any longer.