David Cassidy in the News
Forever Partridge
Despite New Gig, David Cassidy Knows He'll Always Be One Of The `Family'
May 25, 1997
By Brad Webber
Chicago Tribune
LAS VEGAS — David Cassidy, onetime titan of teen heartthrobs, still musters that Keith Partridge twinkle, sleep or no sleep.
Of course, asking why the 47-year-old actor didn't sleep the night before, as he claims, elicits just a shrug in a city where the neon never dims. Attribute the insomnia to keeping pace with his 6-year-old son, Beau, or, better yet, the demands of fronting one of Las Vegas' hottest tickets.
The prospect of the evening's upcoming two, 90-minute performances of singing, dancing, leaping about and just generally keeping your balance on a flying saucer seems to weigh heavily as he waits backstage at the MGM Grand Theatre. It's a burden the star of the '70s TV show "The Partridge Family relishes.
To Cassidy, 47, landing a two-year assignment as Michael Crawford's replacement in the $45 million, mystical-musical Las Vegas war horse "EFX"--which plays to more than 3,000 people most days--proves that his talents as a showman are no illusion.
In fact, keeping "EFX" one of Vegas' top draws in the wake of Crawford's exit last fall wasn't as easy as it looks.
"There wasn't really a story that you could follow," Cassidy says of Crawford's version, in which the Briton played Merlin, P.T. Barnum, H.G. Wells and the EFX Master (the omnipresent master of ceremonies for the show, sort of like the Wizard of Oz). "The show that was designed for him was, in the end, difficult to follow. And it was rather dark.
"I don't think people coming to Las Vegas want to see that. They don't want to see darkness, they want to be entertained. I thought it should be more contemporary, more fun."
The services of Little Feat producer Bill Wray were employed to pump up the beat, notably on the funky--believe it or not--signature tune "Intergalactic Circus of Wonders."
"I pushed pretty heavily on the singin', clappin'-your-hands sort of groovin', having a rhythm-and-blues kind of gospel feel in some of it," Cassidy says.
In the years between "The Partridge Family" (which aired on ABC from 1970 to '74) and "EFX," Cassidy has performed on Broadway and London's West End, recorded an album of minor success, written "The John Larroquette Show" theme song and developed an upcoming sitcom pilot for Fox ("Ask Harriett," a twist on "Bosom Buddies").
Playing the eldest child in a family of pop singers catapulted Cassidy to fame. Coincidentally, the show--which featured a family of five kids and a single mom tooling about in a Mondrian-inspired school bus for singing gigs--cast Shirley Jones, Cassidy's real-life stepmother, in the lead. While Jones and Cassidy were contractually obligated to do some actual singing, Cassidy's was the only voice that landed into the mix--and that only after Cassidy's agent begged producers to give him a crack at singing. The result: 25 million records sold around the world. The biggest hit, "I Think I Love You," notched 3 million.
At the height of "The Partridge Family" craze, Cassidy--rather, the fan magazine licensees of Screen Gems--every week received between 20,000 and 30,000 letters, which Cassidy says were promptly discarded after the companies logged the name and address of the fan for direct-mail pitches. There were 200,000 members of the David Cassidy Fan Club by mid-1972. And "Partridge Family" products emblazoned with Cassidy's visage included games; magazines; coloring, music and paperback books; pillow cases; toy guitars; dolls; lunch boxes; beach towels; and even a line of children's clothing.
Cassidy made about $8 million between 1970 and 1974, an enormous sum for an actor at the time (yet only a meager $15,000 on Bell Records royalties). But by 1980 his net worth plummeted to $100,000 and agents wouldn't return telephone calls. He finally got his career back on track with musical theater--George M. Cohan's "Little Johnny Jones" in 1981 and replacing Andy Gibb on Broadway in "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" in 1983--which led to a successful run of "Time" on London's West End and eventually "Blood Brothers" with Petula Clark and Cassidy's half-brother Shaun.
"People are always saying, `I had no idea you could do that,' " Cassidy says of his stage work. "I think they're surprised I'm as good as I am. They say, `You were so sweet and cute and it ("The Partridge Family ") was such a nice show.' . . .
"What I have continually tried to do is break the stereotype of all the things I have come out of.
"I have never, never (disavowed `The Partridge Family'), unlike a few people in the show who wanted to be cooler or hipper, not just see it for the success that it is. Isn't that cool or hip enough? When you change style and become an icon of that era, it is an albatross around your neck. There's nothing wrong with becoming a role model, nothing wrong with inspiring people to become musicians, to become actors."
CASSIDY ON BONADUCE, ETC.
On former WLUP radio-show host and "Partridge Family" co-star Danny Bonaduce: "I'm really happy for Danny. His life was a mess and he made a major turnaround. He's a very talented guy, a good human being beneath it. He's made a lot of mistakes and will continue to do so because it's in his nature. Unfortunately, he gets sucked into these things, as many people do in the entertainment business. Just getting your name in the papers and having people talk about you is not always a good thing."
On the genesis of a fad: "With seemingly any product, they (marketers and teen magazine producers) could find some way to trade on my name. I took a little vacation in Hawaii, where I strung some shells together on a string. I was photographed wearing that homemade necklace. The next thing I knew, magazines were talking about how much I loved to wear those pooka shells, and ads began appearing telling kids that if they'd just mail in their money, they too could soon be the proud owners of a necklace like mine. . . . (And I, of course, never made jack off those necklaces; others did)." (From Cassidy's book, "C'Mon Get Happy")
Stars who got their start on "The Partridge Family": Farrah Fawcett, Meredith Baxter, Jaclyn Smith. On his dad, actor Jack Cassidy: "He taught me a lot how to become a good parent--that is, do everything he didn't do. . . . It's not that my father didn't love me, it's just that he wasn't capable of consistently being there. His mood swings were gigantic. He was a manic depressive and an alcoholic and a gifted, wonderful human being who was damaged.
"It caused me enormous pain. The rejection. I felt abandoned. I felt like there must be something wrong with me. Why doesn't he love me? Well, he treated everybody like that. It's hard to understand when you're 3 1/2."
