Emilio Estevez explains why he missed every “Breakfast Club” reunion: 'I skipped all of my high school reunions'

Emilio Estevez loves his The Breakfast Club costars. He just doesn't like reunions.

Forty years after making the generation-defining teen drama that saw his jock Andrew Clark thrown together in a Saturday detention with popular princess Molly Ringwald, nerd Anthony Michael Hall, bad boy Judd Nelson, and introvert Ally Sheedy, Estevez finally deigned to attend a cast reunion.

"I skipped all of my high school reunions," Estevez joked when asked what took him so long at the "Don't You Forget About Me: The Breakfast Club 40th Anniversary Reunion" at the C2E2 pop culture convention in Chicago on Saturday.

He went on to explain that "this was just something that finally I felt I needed to do, just for myself. But this one felt special. We're here in Chicago, where we made the film. It's obviously the 40th anniversary, and it just felt like it was time."

Ringwald confessed she felt "really very emotional and moved to have us all together. This is the first time Emilio has joined us," adding with a wink, "We don't have to use the cardboard cutout anymore."

Estevez confessed that it was a comment of Ringwald's that, after getting back to him, played a decisive role in finally motivating him to accept a reunion invitation.

"Somebody told me that Molly said, 'Well, does Emilio just not like us?' And that broke my heart," he shared. "I thought, 'No, of course, I love all of them.' And this just made sense, so here I am."

The former Brat Pack member and son of Hollywood legend Martin Sheen has appeared in at least half a dozen films enduringly popular enough to merit continual reunions, from St. Elmo's Fire and The Mighty Ducks to The Outsiders, and the star has been loath to attend those reunions, too.

Estevez's history also suggests that he isn't categorically opposed to cast reunions — at least not when they come in the form of reboots and sequels. Estevez reprised his role as coach Gordon Bombay in the first season of Disney+'s sequel series, The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers. One poignant episode saw Bombay reunite with several key characters and players in the youth hockey team he originally coached in the 1992 film, including Fulton Reed (Elden Henson), Averman (Matt Doherty), Adam Banks (Vinny La Russo), Connie (Marguerite Moreau), Guy (Garret Henson), and Kenny Wu (Justin Wong).

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The Breakfast Club is perhaps the most beloved of all writer-director John Hughes' films, which include Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles. The film had an enormous impact on the careers of its five principal stars, but Estevez revealed at Saturday's reunion that he was barely present for their first meeting.

The night before the first script read-through, Estevez said he'd "had all four wisdom teeth pulled" and was "on pain pills" when Hughes queued up a first cut of Sixteen Candles. "He puts the film on, we're sitting there, I don't think I made it through the opening credits. I passed out from the pain pills, and just from the ordeal of having my teeth extracted."

You can watch the full reunion of The Breakfast Club cast above.

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