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Most people credit me with the birth of the Brat Pack.
Thats flattering, but not really true.
What happened was, I destroyed the Brat Pack.
The Brat Pack was left for dead on the night I named them in 1985.
Elmos Firestars amused themselves for hours by repeatedly toasting na zdorovye!
Here wasHollywoods Brat Pack.
If anything, a good lawyer would get my sentence reduced to involuntary manslaughter.
Naturally, its calledBrats.In truth, I still dont understand why some Brat Packers feel so victimized.
I figured my cover story with Hollywoods Brat Pack splashed above a publicity still fromSt.
Nothing prepared me for the firestorm of attention that resulted.
It managed a mention in nearly everySt.
Elmos Fire-related story that year; I saw the phrase inserted in dozens of headlines, profiles and reviews.
Johnny Carson name-checked the Brat Pack in his monologue.
After a couple of weeks of silence, an exhausted, defeated Emilio finally called me at home.
It didnt go quite that way.
What the hell were you thinking?
Emilio asked, plaintively.
I dont know, I replied, honestly enough.
After a long beat of silence, I added, Im really sorry.
I wasnt, though.
And even after he hung up, I felt certain hed realize that the phrase would be forgotten.
He would have his still-ascending career, and I would have mine.
He burned people early in their careers.
He took on the wrong people, though.
Hes not Hunter Thompson or Tom Wolfe; hes David Blum living in a cheap flat.
Despite this tongue-lashing, I still maintain my story didnt change anyones career trajectory.
Was that my fault?
At the end of our interview, McCarthy and I even hugged it out, sitcom style.
Maybe all their success contradicts McCarthys thesis that the Brat Pack moniker mortally wounded everyone in its path.
