Today in 80s history! What happened on August 2nd in the 80s? Find out what happened today in 80s Movies, 80s Music, 80s TV Shows, and 80s Sports! Also find out about celebrity birthdays for the legends, icons and characters we grew up with in the 80s!
TODAY'S 80S BIRTHDAYS
Apollonia Kotero (Purple Rain) - 67
August 2, 1959
Victoria Jackson (Saturday Night Live) - 67
August 2, 1959
Joanna Cassidy (Zhora in Blade Runner) - 81
August 2, 1945
REMEMBERING
Wes Craven (A Nightmare on Elm Street)
August 2, 1939 - August 30, 2015 (Age 76)
Carroll O'Connor (In the Heat of the Night, All in the Family)
August 2, 1924 - June 21, 2001 (Age 76)
TODAY IN 80S MUSIC
80s Music Released on August 2nd
1986 - "Glory of Love" Was #1 in America
Artist: Peter Cetera
Note: Cetera left Chicago and immediately landed a two-week #1 with the theme from The Karate Kid Part II. Every slow dance in the summer of '86 owes him something.
1980 - "Magic" Was #1 in America
Artist: Olivia Newton-John
Note: Four straight weeks at the top for the ballad from Xanadu — a film received so badly it helped inspire the Golden Raspberry Awards, off a soundtrack that went double platinum anyway.
TODAY IN 80S MOVIES
80s Movies Released On August 2nd
Weird Science (1985)
Release Date: August 2, 1985
Director: John Hughes
Starring: Anthony Michael Hall, Ilan Mitchell-Smith, Kelly LeBrock, Bill Paxton and Robert Downey Jr.
Budget: $7.5 Million
Box Office: $38.9 Million
Note: Hughes wrote it in two days, which tracks. Two nerds build a woman with a Memotech computer and a Barbie doll, and somehow it ends with bikers crashing a house party. Anthony Michael Hall dropped out of European Vacation to do it.
Fright Night (1985)
Release Date: August 2, 1985
Director: Tom Holland
Starring: Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Amanda Bearse and Roddy McDowall
Budget: $8 Million
Box Office: $24.9 Million
Note: The kid next door figures out his neighbor is a vampire and nobody believes him — so he hires a washed-up horror host to help. Opened the same day as Weird Science and lost the box office, won the reruns.
Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird (1985)
Release Date: August 2, 1985
Director: Ken Kwapis
Starring: Caroll Spinney, Chevy Chase and Waylon Jennings
Box Office: $13.9 Million
Note: Big Bird gets fostered out to a family of dodos in Illinois and runs away home. Somewhere in the middle he gets painted blue and put in a cage, which a lot of us were not emotionally prepared for.
Parenthood (1989)
Release Date: August 2, 1989
Director: Ron Howard
Starring: Steve Martin, Mary Steenburgen, Dianne Wiest, Rick Moranis and Keanu Reeves
Budget: $20 Million
Box Office: $100 Million Domestic
Note: A stacked cast, a Randy Newman score, and the roller-coaster speech. The first film shot at Universal Studios Florida, and one of the ten biggest of 1989.
TODAY IN 80S TV
No 80s TV News for today in the 80s!
TODAY IN 80S SPORTS
1982 - Rickey Henderson Stole 100 Bases in Back-to-Back Seasons
Event: MLB
Details: Nobody had ever done it twice in a row. Henderson finished 1982 with 130 steals, a single-season record that has not been within 30 of since.
TODAY IN OTHER 80S NEWS
No other news today in the 80s!
