Alan Ruck confessed he didn’t believe that 1986’s “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” which he starred in was going to be a big hit.

“I didn’t think it would,” he said. “(Co-stars) Jennifer (Grey), Mia (Sara), Jeffrey (Jones), and I saw a rough cut in March 1986. Of course, it hadn’t been sweetened. The soundtrack wasn’t perfect. We were all a little freaked out by it,” recalled Ruck, 67, of Los Angeles.

Ruck — who recently won a Screen Actors Guild Award (his second) and was nominated for an Emmy and Golden Globe for his role as Connor Roy on HBO’s “Succession” — will reminisce about filming “Bueller” when he hosts a 7 p.m. screening of it on Saturday, May 4, at the Royal Oak Music Theatre, 318 W. Fourth St.

“My agent came up with this idea — ‘Would you be interested in doing a tour? They’ll screen (“Bueller”) and there’ll be a Q&A with a moderator afterwards, then a meet-and-greet.’ I thought: ‘Sure, that sounds like fun. I’m hitting the road.’ It’s not much more involved than that; it’s like a personal appearance, along with a screening of the movie,” Ruck said.

“Bueller” was written in less than a week and directed by the late John Hughes, a Lansing native who grew up in Northbrook, Illinois. Hughes was best known for his coming-of-age teen comedies portraying honest depictions of suburban teen life, including 1984’s “Sixteen Candles,” 1985’s “The Breakfast Club,” and 1986’s “Pretty in Pink.”

“I don’t think anybody since John has written about teenagers as well as he did — no other screenwriter anyway,” Ruck said. “He had great love and respect for kids. He didn’t talk down to them or write down to them, he didn’t hold them up to ridicule, and he honored them as complete human beings who were in the process of whoever it is they needed to become. He honored that journey and their struggles. I think that’s why his teen movies have more depth out of anything that’s come out of Hollywood before and since.”

“Bueller” grossed $70 million on a $5 million budget and was the 10th highest-grossing film of 1986. It received commercial and critical acclaim from fans and critics alike. In 2014, “Bueller” was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.

The movie opens with popular high school senior and all-around “righteous dude” Ferris (Matthew Broderick) feigning illness — totally buffaloing his parents (Lyman Ward and Cindy Pickett) but not his sister Jeanie (Grey) — to skip school on a beautiful spring day. Ferris recruits his uptight, hypochondriac BFF Cameron Frye (Ruck) to join him in getting his girlfriend Sloane Peterson (Sara) excused from school, so they can have an adventure in downtown Chicago.

However, Dean of Students Ed Rooney (Jones) is on to Ferris. Determined to expose Ferris, Rooney pulls out all the stops, even breaking into Ferris’ home, but becomes victim to several pratfalls.

Meanwhile, Ferris, Cameron (wearing a Detroit Red Wings jersey), and Sloane drive around in a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California Spyder, owned by Morris (who’s never seen), Cameron’s domineering father. Two valets take it for a joyride, running up the mileage. As they fail to rewind the odometer in an effort to put everything back the way they found it when Ferris forced Cameron into taking it on their day trip, Cameron lashes out in a fit of rage and ends up destroying the car. Ferris offers to take the blame, but Cameron won’t let him. Confident and determined, he will face his father.

Cameron is never seen again in “Bueller.” Ferris tells Sloane that for the first time in his life, Cameron will be all right. Asked what happened to Cameron once Morris returned home and saw what happened to his prized possession, Ruck has no answers.

“I guess some people would like to believe that Cameron’s father came home and they had one hell of an argument, that maybe the father made a realization, maybe things were tense for a while but they got better. The way he’s described, I wouldn’t be surprised if he physically assaulted Cameron in some fashion,” Ruck said. “Some people think Cameron died, that his father threw him out the window on top of the car. I don’t know that I think anything; I think it’s up to you to decide.”

According to Ruck, if Hughes wanted the audience to see what happened to Cameron, he would’ve shown it.

“It’s left up to the imagination of the viewer, so any ending you project on Cameron is completely valid,” Ruck said. “It’s up for the audience to fill in the blanks, not me.”

Ruck was 29 when he played Cameron. The Ohio native already worked with Broderick on 1985-86’s hit Broadway play, “Biloxi Blues.”

“My agent got me an audition with the casting directors. They thought I was good enough, so they got me to come back and read with Matthew for (Hughes),” Ruck said. “It was a wonderfully easy callback for me because Broderick and I had been working together on Broadway at that point. … We were already pals. It was a great part and a big movie and I got to do it with my buddy, so that was a no-brainer.”

Originally, the parts of Ferris and Cameron, respectively, were offered to Anthony Michael Hall and Emilio Estevez — two actors Hughes worked with previously — but they turned them down.

“John was smart to hire Matthew,” Ruck said. “Matthew had a lot of practice breaking the fourth wall and talking to the audience directly. … He was a natural at that.”

One story both Ruck and Broderick have shared over the years about “Bueller” has been the wardrobe test. Ruck, Broderick and Sara were filmed walking around Chicago to see if the wardrobe looked fine. However, the next day, executive producers Michael Chinich and Tom Jacobson expressed their displeasure about the wardrobe test to Hughes. Both Ruck and Sara were scared. It was Broderick who calmed everyone done, according to Ruck.

“Then Broderick came in — ‘How’s everybody doing?’ Then he saw John, smoking furiously in the corner. ‘Apparently not well. What’s wrong?’ He was told the same thing. Broderick said very calmly, ‘I never knew anybody was supposed to glow in a wardrobe test.’ … That somehow defused everything,” he said.

Ruck said he’ll always be in Hughes’ debt.

“He gave me this great part in this movie that’s made me known to this day,” he said. “It launched me in whatever fashion. It’s been a bumpy ride, but a good ride for me. I’m nothing but grateful to John Hughes.”

Ruck gave his insights about its staying power.

“The movie’s really about love if you think about it. It’s about a guy who can do anything he wants with his day off and what he chooses to do is cheer up his melancholy friend,” he said. “There’s nothing malicious in the movie. Even the menace of Rooney is so silly. He’s such a silly guy for an authority figure. It’s a lighthearted, feel-good movie. It’s not trying to make a statement of any kind. There is some teenage angst in it. You could say Cameron was emotionally abused, but that’s as dark as it gets. It’s a happy film and I think that’s why it lasts.”

Tickets for the May 4 screening range from $34.50 to $64.50. A meet-and-greet package is available for $199.50.

For more information, contact 248-399-3065 or visit royaloakmusictheatre.com.