Pretty in Pink Trivia
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48 free Pretty in Pink trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
Pretty in Pink is the John Hughes film that almost had a different ending. Written by Hughes, directed by first-timer Howard Deutch and built around Molly Ringwald as Andie Walsh, the 1986 film pits a working-class senior against the 'richies' at her school, with Jon Cryer's Duckie pining from the sidelines and Andrew McCarthy's Blane caught between them. This quiz covers the story and characters, the cast and the actors who nearly got the parts, the record store and the prom dress, and the behind-the-scenes history: the Psychedelic Furs song that inspired the script, the ending test audiences rejected, the wig Andrew McCarthy had to wear for the reshoot, and the OMD song written in under 24 hours to score it. There are questions on the soundtrack, the box office, the reviews and the film's afterlife too. Difficulty runs from easy to hard, so it works for a movie night, a pub quiz round or an 80s-themed party. Every answer was checked against the Wikipedia articles on the film, its songs and its cast, and each question shows its source.
30 of 48 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which actress did the studio want for Andie in Pretty in Pink before John Hughes insisted on Molly Ringwald?
Jennifer Beals
Jennifer Beals was fresh from Flashdance, but Hughes had written Andie for Ringwald and held out; she said anyone else in the part would be like somebody wearing her clothes.
Q 02What has become of Andie's mother before Pretty in Pink begins?
She left the family
She left the family three years earlier, and Jack is still too heartbroken to hold down a job, until Andie tells him bluntly that her mother is not coming back.
Q 03John Hughes wrote Pretty in Pink but handed the directing to which first-timer?
Howard Deutch
Howard Deutch had been cutting trailers and shooting music videos when Hughes, who preferred to be writing scripts, trusted him with his first feature.
Q 04Who plays Andie's best friend, Duckie, in Pretty in Pink?
Jon Cryer
Jon Cryer won the part after Anthony Michael Hall turned it down; Ringwald had wanted Robert Downey Jr., but came round once Cryer made Duckie his own.
Q 05Who plays Blane McDonnagh, the 'richie' who asks Andie out in Pretty in Pink?
Andrew McCarthy
Andrew McCarthy got the part because Ringwald told the filmmakers he was the kind of boy she would fall for, not a square-jawed jock like the front-runner, Charlie Sheen.
Q 06Who plays Steff McKee, Blane's wealthy and spiteful best friend, in Pretty in Pink?
James Spader
James Spader had never been to a prom himself: he left school at seventeen to act, and said in 1986 that he would have been one of the film's misfits, not one of its rich kids.
Q 07Who plays Iona, Andie's quirky boss at the record store, in Pretty in Pink?
Annie Potts
Annie Potts, Ghostbusters' receptionist Janine two years earlier, plays the boss who talks Andie into going to the prom with the tale of a friend who always regretted missing hers.
Q 08Which veteran actor plays Andie's underemployed father, Jack, in Pretty in Pink?
Harry Dean Stanton
Harry Dean Stanton plays Jack Walsh; he had just starred in Paris, Texas (1984) and Repo Man (1984), and here he buys Andie the pink dress she reworks for the prom.
Q 09What is the name of the record store where Andie works in Pretty in Pink?
Trax
Trax is the new-wave record store run by Iona: Blane first approaches Andie there over a pile of uncool records, and Duckie performs his Otis Redding lip-sync between the racks.
Q 10Why does Steff really have it in for Andie in Pretty in Pink?
She turned him down
She turned him down: Steff propositions Andie early in the film and is rejected, and at the prom Blane finally says it to his face, that he could buy everything except her.
Q 11Which band's song gave Pretty in Pink its title?
The Psychedelic Furs
The Psychedelic Furs' 1981 single gave the film its name after Ringwald played it to Hughes; the band then re-recorded it with a saxophone for the opening titles.
Q 12Which OMD song, written for Pretty in Pink, reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1986?
If You Leave
If You Leave plays over the prom finale; it became OMD's biggest American hit yet stalled at No. 48 back home in Britain.
Q 13About how long did OMD take to write and record Pretty in Pink's replacement prom song?
About a day
About a day: with a tour two days off, OMD wrote through the night until 4 a.m., sent over a rough tape and were back in the studio finishing it a few hours later.
Q 21In Pretty in Pink, what is the name of Steff's girlfriend, leader of the 'richie' girls who torment Andie?
Benny Hanson
Benny Hanson, played by Kate Vernon, mocks Andie's thrift-shop clothes in class and later rounds on Blane at Steff's party for bringing her along.
Q 22Who did Molly Ringwald say Pretty in Pink's Duckie was based on?
A gay pal of hers
A gay pal of hers, her best friend in those years, whom she got a job on the set as a production assistant at 20; theirs, she says, was always 'an extremely nonromantic relationship'.
Q 23Which studio released Pretty in Pink?
Paramount Pictures
Q 14Hughes asked OMD to write the new song at 120 BPM to match which track the actors had danced to on set?
Don't You (Forget About Me)
The prom footage had been shot with the cast dancing to Simple Minds' 'Don't You (Forget About Me)', the Breakfast Club hit, so Hughes wanted the replacement song at the same 120 BPM.
Q 15What did the original ending of Pretty in Pink, rejected by test audiences, show?
Andie pairing off with Duckie
Andie pairing off with Duckie, the two of them dancing together at the prom, was booed at the first test screening, so Hughes wrote a new finale and the prom was restaged for a single day's shooting.
Q 16Blane wears a wig in Pretty in Pink's reshot ending because the actor had cut his hair for what?
A stage play
A stage play: he was playing a soldier on Broadway in The Boys of Winter when the call came, and has joked ever since that the hairpiece looks like a rodent on his head.
Q 17In Pretty in Pink, Andie sews her prom dress from her father's gift and whose old dress?
Iona's
Iona's old prom dress and the one from her father become a single pink gown; Molly Ringwald hated the result so much that she burst into tears when she first saw it.
Q 18Which Otis Redding song does Duckie lip-synch to in the record store in Pretty in Pink?
Try a Little Tenderness
Duckie's record-store lip-synch to 'Try a Little Tenderness' is in the film, but the track was left off the soundtrack album.
Q 19Who plays 'Duckette', the girl who beckons Duckie at the end of Pretty in Pink's prom?
Kristy Swanson
Kristy Swanson, later the title character in the 1992 film Buffy the Vampire Slayer, plays 'Duckette'; the moment was added so Duckie would not end the reshot finale alone.
Q 20Which comedian plays the nightclub bouncer in Pretty in Pink?
Andrew Dice Clay
Andrew Dice Clay, not yet famous, plays the bouncer who never lets Duckie into the club and sums up his plight in one line: 'Love's a bitch, Duck.'
Paramount Pictures made it the studio's first wide release of 1986, opening on about 800 screens at the end of February; a week later it was the most popular film in America.
Q 24Why does Pretty in Pink's Andie go to prom alone?
To show she's unbroken
To show she's unbroken: Andie says she just wants them to know they didn't break her, then sets off for the prom without a date in a dress she has made from two.
Q 25Which X-Men producer earlier produced Pretty in Pink?
Lauren Shuler Donner
Lauren Shuler Donner, billed then as Lauren Shuler, already knew Hughes: he had written Mr. Mom, her first feature as a producer, three years earlier.
Q 26Which 1987 film from the same writer and director replayed the Pretty in Pink triangle with the genders swapped?
Some Kind of Wonderful
Some Kind of Wonderful swaps the roles, with Eric Stoltz as the working-class artist and Mary Stuart Masterson as his tomboy best friend; one reviewer dubbed it 'Pretty in Blue', to its director's dismay.
Q 27Which Smiths song appears on the Pretty in Pink soundtrack?
Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want
The Smiths' 'Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want' is on the soundtrack; the Dream Academy's instrumental cover of the same song turned up in Ferris Bueller's Day Off that year.
Q 28Which Echo & the Bunnymen song was recorded specifically for Pretty in Pink?
Bring On the Dancing Horses
'Bring On the Dancing Horses' was written for the film and first appeared on the band's compilation Songs to Learn & Sing, months ahead of the soundtrack album.
Q 29Which band performs 'Positively Lost Me' on screen in Pretty in Pink yet has no song on its soundtrack album?
The Rave-Ups
The Rave-Ups owed the spot to Molly Ringwald, a fan whose sister was dating their singer, Jimmer Podrasky; the soundtrack album still left the band off.
Q 30Which record label released the Pretty in Pink soundtrack album in 1986?
A&M Records
A&M Records was also OMD's American label, and was so keen to cash in on the soundtrack's biggest hit that it pressed the band for a new album within months.