The Breakfast Club is one of the most beloved and favorite movies of the 80s. With 5 extremely diverse characters, there is at least one that we all can relate to on some level. With Halloween around the corner, I wanted to make it easy to turn these characters into creative Halloween costumes. The characters have iconic styles easily recognized and perfect for an 80’s theme party! In this post I will give you 5 easy costume ideas. Especially if you’re looking for a couples costume or group costumes!
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“…and these children that you spit on as they try to change their worlds are immune to your consultations. They’re quite aware of what they’re going through…” – David Bowie
The Breakfast Club Plot:
This famous John Hughes movie from 1985 is about 5 very different stereotyped teenagers who have been sentenced to all day Saturday detention. While spending the entire day together, they slowly start to open up to each other about their personal issues. At the end of the day, they shatter their stereotypical titles and find a deeper understanding that you can’t always judge a book by it’s cover.
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The Breakfast Club Style:
Costume designer, Marilyn Vance intentionally created each character’s look by adding many layers of clothing to symbolize how each character removes a layer at a time throughout the film just like they are shedding their walls and revealing intimate parts of themselves with their fellow members of the “breakfast club”. “Each layer is a little piece of that person. All their hang-ups are discarded as they start becoming relaxed with each other”, Vance explains.
Because the film covers only the span of time that they are in the school library, the only costume changes that occur are when a character removes a layer of clothing.
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The Criminal-John Bender
Played by Judd Nelson, John Bender is the bad boy of the group. His style has 5 layers yet each is somewhat easy to pull off. He wears a long, oversized tweed wool coat, a denim jacket, a flannel shirt with the sleeves cut off and a long sleeve white t-shirt that looks to be a thermal.
On the bottom he wears oversized dark gray sweatpants and harness boots or black combat boots.
With this costume there is room to not get it perfect but still pull off the very iconic look. John’s red bandana tied around one boot and his fingerless gloves are an absolute must to tie this look together.
The famous scene at the end of the film where he walks through the football field, all his layers are on display. Get all those layers right and be sure to button up the jean jacket so the plaid shirt is seen beneath too!
It’s interesting because John Bender’s look could be included in a 90s costumes idea post as well! Talk about grunge!
Shop John’s Outfit:
The Princess-Claire Standish
Played by Molly Ringwald, Claire is the popular girl of the group. She wears head to toe Ralph Lauren in a brown pencil skirt with brown equestrian style boots. Her top is a baby pink v-neck tee with the sleeves rolled. She also wears a white lace neckerchief but this isn’t seen very much throughout the movie.
She wears diamond earrings (that are referenced several times in the movie), a thick brown leather belt, a watch with a brown leather band and a brown leather bomber jacket which is only worn at the beginning and end of the movie. This brown midi skirt is hard to find but I linked one that is as similar as I could find on Amazon.
If you choose Claire to dress up as, you must make sure you get the “spoiled rich girl” look covered.
Her makeup is light and feminine and her short red hair is a must.
Shop Claire’s Outfit:
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The Basket Case-Allison Reynolds
Allison is played by Ally Sheedy and is the “emo” kid of the bunch. She wears a black oversized sweater, a bulky grayish/black skirt with gray/black leggings, white scrunchy socks and super dirty high top converse with black shoestrings. She wears a huge gray hobo bag as a crossbody and a black and white scarf. Her black sweater seems to have another black shirt underneath but it’s not easily seen throughout the movie. I personally would add a black turtleneck.
She wears heavy, smudged black eye liner and her short brown hair is shaggy and often in her face.
Allison is definitely my favorite character of the movie.
Shop Allison’s Outfit:
The Jock-Andrew Clark
Andrew, played by Emilio Estevez wears a varsity style jacket. Again, like John, he’s a master at layering. He also wears a zip up blue hoodie, a thermal white shirt and a blue tank top underneath. He wears medium wash jeans and white sneakers.
Shop Andrew’s Outfit:
The Brain-Brian Johnson
Brian wears an inside out dark green sweatshirt, khakis, blue tennis shoes, tube socks and was seen in a pivotal scene in black wayfarer sunglasses. Brian was played by Anthony Michael Hall who became quite type casted as a nerd in later films such as Weird Science and Sixteen Candles.
Shop Brian’s Outfit:
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All 5 of these costumes are easy to pull together whether you have the items in your closet, visit a thrift store or order from Amazon. This definitive movie of the 80s is so well-known that all five characters make easily recognizable cool costumes. These are the perfect 80s costumes for a Halloween party!
“You See Us As You Want To See Us, In The Simplest Terms With The Most Convenient Definitions. But What We Found Out Is That Each One Of Us Is A Brain… And An Athlete… And A Basket Case… A Princess… And A Criminal. Does That Answer Your Question? Sincerely Yours… The Breakfast Club.”
xx, Jenni
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