Ally Sheedy Comes of Age in ‘Betsy’

Ally Sheedy felt trapped by all her coming-of-age roles so she dropped off the screen for a couple of years, but she’s back in “Betsy’s Wedding” and she’s come of age.

Sheedy’s reasons for disappearing were simple. She found herself playing the same kind of girl--not woman--and feared that it would stunt her professional growth. She took time out for other priorities.

Her career began in 1983 with “Bad Boys.” She quickly followed that with “War Games,” “Oxford Blues,” “The Breakfast Club,” “Twice in a Lifetime,” “St. Elmo’s Fire,” “Blue City,” “Short Circuit” and “Maid to Order.”

She was a movie star, but she also wanted to be an actress and the two are not necessarily the same.

In “Betsy’s Wedding”--which opens Friday--Sheedy portrays a cop, Molly Ringwald’s older sister, in a role that is not altogether sympathetic. She’s a mature young woman on screen, not a kid looking for the meaning of life.

At 27, she is playing a character near her own age.

“Working with Molly again was like a reunion,” she said. “We play sisters and having worked together made it easier for both of us. We have a past together. It wasn’t like meeting another actress and trying to fill in the details. We already had a relationship going.”

Sheedy is accumulating wisdom of her own. She did not want to become another ingenue in the passing parade.

“There were a great many natural ‘young’ roles. It’s really hard to sustain that sort of success. I decided to spend some time slowing down and studying.”

Purposefully, she took a two-year hiatus to study acting in New York and to complete her 12-year compilation of 50 poems, which will be published early next year under the title of “Yesterday I Saw the Sun.”

Now her ambition is to run in marathons. In her free time, she trains regularly, running as much as 15 miles in the mountains near her Malibu home.

Later this year she will star on stage in London in a one-woman show, “The Story of My Life.”

“For me, it’s the most exciting project I’ve ever undertaken,” she said.