David Cassidy in the News
Ex-partridges Pair Up For Mtv Awards
September 5, 1990
By Jay Bobbin
Tribune
The Laurie Partridge of the '60s and '70s became the Grace Van Owen of the '80s and '90s but this week, her former TV brother is with her again.
For the first time since The Partridge Family ended its network run in 1974, David Cassidy - who is now relaunching his recording career - will reteam with Susan Dey, co-star of NBC's drama series L.A. Law, when they announce one of the winners during Thursday's live telecast of the MTV Video Music Awards (to air at 9 p.m. on MTV and VH-1).
For the third consecutive year, Arsenio Hall will serve as host of the event at Los Angeles' Universal Amphitheatre; scheduled performers include Madonna, Janet Jackson, Phil Collins, Aerosmith, Motley Crue, INXS and rap star M.C. Hammer. Also slated as presenters are Sherilyn Fenn, Michael Ontkean, comedian Keenen Ivory Wayans, music groups Living Colour and Wilson Phillips, and actor-playwright Eric Bogosian and filmmaker Oliver Stone.
For all of the celebrities appearing, though, the most nostalgia is likely to be sparked by the reunion of Dey and Cassidy. Cassidy reports that he has stayed in touch with Dey since the show's demise.
Cassidy's first record in five years is slated for release this month on the Enigma label, and he concedes, ''I definitely was in full retirement for a good number of years, self-imposed originally.''
''I've been writing, and some of the people I've been writing with have gotten my songs exposed. I've got one on the new Asia album and another that's going to be on the new Cher album, so I guess it's my songwriting that brought back people's interest in my making records again.'' An appearance on a popular Los Angeles radio program evidently sparked Enigma's interest in signing Cassidy. ''During the course of those four hours,'' he says, ''I took a lot of phone calls and talked about who I was, and I think people's perception of me was really that of Keith Partridge, and they quickly saw that wasn't exactly the guy they were talking to.''
Although Cassidy scored a post-Partridge hit with his remake of The Association's ''Cherish'' and starred in the short-lived police series David Cassidy: Man Undercover, he reflects, ''It took people a long time to view me as something other than (the character of Keith). When you become that famous and that successful through television and merchandising - comic books, bubble-gum cards, lunchboxes, even the backs of cereal boxes - it's hard to have people take you seriously.''
Still, Cassidy deems the reception accorded the Partridge Family records ''a stroke of luck. You can't plan things like that. I've heard there's a remastered version of the Greatest Hits album on compact disc and cassette and it's done extraordinarily well.''
