David Cassidy on the Web
The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season
October 14, 2008
Sony Pictures // Unrated // October 14, 2008
List Price: $29.95
Review by Paul Mavis
http://www.dvdtalk.com
Hello, world, hear the song that we're singin',
Come on, get happy!
A whole lot of lovin' is what we'll be bringin',
We'll make you happy!
We had a dream we'd go travelin' together,
And spread a little lovin' then we'd keep movin' on.
Somethin' always happens whenever we're together,
We get a happy feelin' when we're singin' a song.
Travelin' along there's a song that we're singin',
Come on, get happy!
A whole lot of lovin' is what we'll be bringin',
We'll make you happy!
We'll make you happy!
We'll make you happy!
It took three years, but Sony has finally released The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season, a welcome addition to the DVD libraries of vintage TV fans - as well as a heartening sign from another studio that perhaps those series left hanging with incomplete season releases are finally getting some attention (Shout! Factory's second season of Adam-12 -- another three-year hiatus release - comes to mind). There isn't one kid of the seventies that isn't on intimate terms with at least one Partridge Family song, so this last "good" season of the series (you know...before Ricky) finally sates the senses of nostalgia-hungry vintage TV viewers looking for a trip back to the sun-soaked, cheerful Northern California world of The Partridge Family, where the still-raging counterculture war was safely put in its place by ultra-smooth, polished AOR song stylings and Disneyesque sitcom machinations.
The series' basic premise continues (but not unaltered) for Season Three: Shirley Partridge (Shirley Jones), the widowed mother of five, heads up The Partridge Family, a AOR-friendly pop/rock/Top 40 musical group consisting of, who else, herself and her talented brood. Preening peacock Keith (David Cassidy) is the band's idol-status lead singer and guitarist (who offstage, is a typical high-schooler, facing the double burden of getting through his awkward teen years as a famous rock star). Gorgeous high-schooler Laurie (Susan Dey) plays piano for the band, and serves as one of Keith's comedic foils. Little troll Danny Partridge (Danny Bonaduce) plays the band's bass (badly); he's the family's class-clown and financial schemer. And non-entities Tracy and Chris Partridge (Suzanne Crough and Brian Forster) play tambourine and drums for the band...and have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with any episodes in this third season. Rounding out the family band is cynical, put-upon band manager Reuben Kincaid (Dave Madden) who used to spare with Danny all the time over money matters, and who now simply acts as a slow-burn foil within the various sitcom frameworks.
Almost invariably, discussions of The Partridge Family series center around the "manufactured" nature of their music, with serious music critics at the time coming down usually on the side of "hideous-to-innocuous-to-bland" in describing the carefully crafted pop stylings of the studio group (only David Cassidy actually played on the records - with some minimal guitar licks here and there - while only he and Broadway and Hollywood A-list singer Shirley Jones contributed vocals to the hermetically-sealed Partridge Family albums). Coming on the heels of that other carefully manufactured musical group/TV series/merchandising bonanza The Monkees, whose unexpected (and relatively brief) monster success really pissed off the press, The Partridge Family didn't stand a chance in winning over any serious critics to their side (although I do believe they did have some unbiased followers in the British press, where the "group" is still huge today). Of course, the vast Middle American TV viewing audience didn't give a whit as to the "manufactured" nature of The Partridge Family group; if the songs were catchy and smartly produced, and the sitcom comedy was funny and wholesome, who cared if the group known as The Partridge Family playing on the radio and on the kids' Close-N-Play record players, was really a group of highly-trained studio musicians - and not the genial actors "playing" the Partridge Family on the tube? Nobody in the press at that time seemed to care that many of the "serious" bands scoring iconic hits in the sixties and seventies (The Mamas and the Papas comes immediately to mind) secured the services of highly talented session players all the time for their albums - so why should the American public? What ticked off the critics and the press about The Monkees and The Partridge Family was the open blatantness of the whole enterprise: naked commercialism (and capitalism) always makes those types so nervous - especially when those exercises prove to be so popular.
The problem with Season Three of The Partridge Family, though, is that the hits, the really big singles and albums, had by now pretty much dried up for the group. Sales of Partridge Family records were still viable (and merchandising was still significant), but clearly, the group had already peaked on the charts by the start of the 1972-1973 season. And like it or not, without hit musical numbers driving interest in the series, the show then had to survive on its own merits, which were noticeably weakening by this third go-around. Not that the public seemed to mind, though. Enjoying its place on ABC's celebrated early 70s Friday night "family block" of programming, The Partridge Family continued its winning Nielsen ways (The Brady Bunch preceded the show, and Room 222, The Odd Couple, and Love, American Style followed). The previous year, the series peaked at 16th for the year-end ratings (up from 25th for its debut season). This third season, The Partridge Family still stayed in the top 20, winding up 19th for the year. But had The Partridge Family been lined up directly opposite NBC's killer Sanford and Son (#2 for the year), instead of coming on right after it, it's questionable what its rating would have been. It would take next year's decision by ABC (on purpose, I've always felt) to deliberate move The Partridge Family out of its safe Friday night slot into the oncoming ratings' juggernaut of All in the Family on Saturday night, to finally kill the series.
Although truth be told, by this third season, the central premise of the series - a typical middle-class American family living a normal life at home while touring around the country as pop/rock superstars - didn't make much sense, anyway. And that confusion affected the quality of the stories. Early episodes of The Partridge Family emphasized the family getting acquainted with stardom - particularly Keith and his mobs of fans - while trying to maintain a normal suburban existence. But by this season, that conflict has been almost entirely eliminated. By this point, we're supposed to understand that the Partridges are a popular, successful group - but why do they keep playing these pokey little dates at ski resorts and community festivals where their audiences number in the tens? And how do they still maintain their quiet, peaceful suburban lifestyle, with no mobs of fans waiting to tear Keith apart, if they're that famous? They still drive that rattle-trap school bus (carrying almost no equipment themselves: no roadies) to their own small-time gigs, and despite their success, money still seems to be an undercurrent problem for Shirley.
Now, The Partridge Family doesn't have to be realistic in any sense of the word, but it's apparent that the concept, which was fresh and novel in the first two seasons, has pretty much been played out by now, as evidenced by the fact that hit records and actual recording gigs are never mentioned in these episodes. In fact, the homelife of the Partridges has now taken precedence, turning The Partridge Family more and more into a thoroughly traditional family sitcom (perhaps mandated by the producers since the group itself wasn't charting that high anymore?). And in that capacity - as a traditional sitcom - The Partridge Family unfortunately falls a little short. The fault doesn't lie with the performers; in fact, they're just hitting their stride in operating as a cohesive, funny team (Dey in particular really shines this season, coming up with a nicely mocking, open take on Laurie). But the stories lack any real impact (we're stuck with stuff like the Partridges dressing up like giant chickens, or wining a race horse with insomnia, or Ray Bolger showing up again in another embarrassing turn as Grandpa Partridge), and changes to the characters further hurts the show. Keith, supposedly a world-famous rock star, is no longer mobbed by the crowds, and goes about his business rather anonymously. At the start of the series, the producers very wisely decided to make Keith a comedic boob, contrasting his ease and appeal on the stage, with his unease and awkwardness at home. Keith never seemed to win in "real" life. But now, his conflicts seem entirely removed from his musical career, and without that dichotomy between superstardom adulation and fumbling, bumbling teen, his character essentially makes no sense. He's just another sitcom teen here.
As well, the other "breakout" star of the show, scheming little bastard Danny, has been altered, too, eliminating much of his huckstering, precocious financial finagling to instead concentrate, rather unflatteringly, on his own adolescence. Plots about Danny dieting and Danny falling in love with Jodie Foster (um...don't waste your time, Danny) ignore the hustling aspects of the Danny character entirely, leaving Bonaduce floundering in some rather unfunny situations. And with Danny's con-man machinations eliminated (after all, if the show wants to ignore the tensions of the "family-as-touring-band" premise, what is there for Danny to hustle?), the show effectively gutted the series' funniest character, Reuben Kincaid, who's robbed of his traditional sparring with Danny and is reduced here, to typical sitcom slow-burn foil. Shirley gets a semi-regular love interest (Bert Convey shows up twice...to no avail), and Laurie falls in love with a minister, but both angles are dropped without a word, and further prove that the series' producers didn't really know what to do with the overtalented (for this series) Jones, and the underappreciated Dey. And rather remarkably, the series still utterly ignores little Tracy and Chris. It's remarkable not because the series should have included them (it's hard to determine if either performer has any talent because they never do anything), but because their determined absence from making even the smallest contribution to the series is almost embarrassing in its totality.
Still...there is the undeniable charm of the lead performers who really hit their stride here in the third season, and that can, at times, make up for some pretty routine episodes. Watching Cassidy and Dey again (I haven't seen the show since its syndication days back in the early to mid-'70s), I was impressed with their complete comedic aplomb. Cassidy had the makings of a terrific light comedic lead (had he not been pigeonholed as a teen idol, and had the studio system been intact to take care of him and shepherd him through a film career), while Dey showed remarkably assured comedic timing (along with that sexy girl-next-door demeanor) - a lightness of touch that seemed bled out of her more self-conscious, self-serious later turns such as in her other big TV hit, L.A. Law. Too bad. The extremely gifted Jones, of course, was seriously underutilized here, but she does what's required of her here, while Madden's Kincaid, now limited by the altered Danny character, still provides some funny, acerbic laughs as the cynical manager. Episodes from Season Three may not match up with previous outings, but several are standouts, including A Penny for His Thoughts, where hilarious Stuart Margolin returns as Snake the biker (Margolin really is underrated in his 1970s TV appearances); Swiss Family Partridge, where a much-used sitcom dilema (a family stranded in a mountain cabin) is perfectly tuned to the strengths of the cast; Whatever Happened to Keith Partridge?, where Cassidy and Madden have a nice serious moment about Keith losing a film part; and of course, I Left My Heart in Cincinnati. A year before those brats the Bradys went to King's Island Amusement Park in Cincinnati, Ohio to film an episode, the Partridge Family showed up, and contributed a "perfect" Partridge moment. Danny and Keith and Reuben all compete for the same woman; Keith shows up in a rather revealing swimming costume; and we get to see endless shots of the cast riding the rides at King's Island. There's a moment in I Left My Heart in Cincinnati, where the family dances in a circle with Hanna-Barbera's The Banana Splits, while one of The Partridge Family's best songs, Together We're Better plays on the soundtrack. And as the camera pulls back, and we see the park and the crowd and the Partridges and the Splits, and we hear that song, it's a perfect tsunami of '70s nostalgia that effortlessly sums up the best quality of this show: it's happy. That may seem trite, but I can't think of a better goal to aim at for mass TV entertainment.
Here are the 25, one-half hour episodes of the three-disc set, The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season, as described on the DVD slimcases:
DISC ONE
The Male Chauvinist Piggy Went to Market
Keith's case of male chauvinism is tempered when Laurie beats up Goose, the school bully.
M is for the Many Things
It's a bumpy road on the way to accept Shirley's "Mother of the Year" Award. The family winds up in court.
Princess and the Partridge
Keith almost causes an international incident when he and a visiting princess sneak off for a private date.
Each Dawn I Diet
Danny bets Reuben that he can diet longer than Reuben can quit smoking.
A Penny for His Thoughts
Snake, the burly biker, returns - dejected because his girlfriend has turned down his marriage proposal.
You're Only Young Twice
Danny finds out that being treated like an adult isn't all it's cracked up to be.
The Modfather
After discovering group therapy, Shirley's parents try an unorthodox approach to put the "zip" back into their marriage.
A Likely Candidate
Keith becomes jealous of a Congressional candidate when the man starts dating his mother.
Swiss Family Partridge
When their bus breaks down during a torrential rainstorm, the Partridges find themselves stranded in a remote mountain cabin.
DISC TWO
Ain't Loveth Grand
When Laurie starts dating a handsome minister, Keith and Danny think she's going to elope.
Whatever Happened to Keith Partridge?
When a talent scout offers Keith a screen test for a part in a new film, Keith wins - then loses - the part.
Nag, Nag, Nag
Danny wins a racehorse named F. Scott Fitzgerald in a raffle. The problem? The horse has insomnia.
For Sale by Owner
The Partridges decide to sell their home, then change their minds -- only to discover Reuben has already sold it.
Aspirin at 7, Diner at 8
Shirley accepts a date from an old admirer and, later, has to figure out how to get rid of him -- and his mother.
For Whom the Bell Tolls
After Reuben gives the family a new burglar alarm system, an escaped convict breaks in and takes them all hostage.
Trial of the Partridge One
Laurie is falsely accused of stealing a test -- but refuses to identify the real thief: her friend, the principal's daughter.
I Left My Heart in Cincinnati
During a booking at King's Island Amusement Park, both Keith and Danny fall for an older woman -- the park's public relations liason.
DISC THREE
The Eleven-Year Itch
Danny is annoyed by the affections of an 11-year-old girl -- until he realizes he actually likes her.
Bedknobs and Drumsticks
Much to their chagrin, the Partridges film a commercial for Uncle Erwin's Country Chicken -- wearing feathered chicken suits.
Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex...But Couldn't Pronounce
A summer concert tour is in jeopardy because Keith Partridge, America's heartthrob, is flunking his sex education class in school.
Forgive Us Our Debts
A computer malfunction at Bartlett's Department Store wreaks havoc with Shirley's credit rating.
The Partridge Connection
When Danny is accused of shoplifting, he refuses to perform with the family on the night they are to be collectively named, "Citizen of the Year."
The Selling of the Partridge
Keith runs for class president of San Pueblo High against Phyllis Goldberg, a better qualified candidate.
Diary of a Mad Millionaire
The Partridges help coax a reclusive millionaire out of his self-imposed exile.
Me and My Shadow
The chase is on! If the Partridge family can hide from a famous mystery writer for 24 hours, he'll donate $25,000 to their private charity.
The DVD:
The Video:
The full-screen, 1.33:1 video transfers for The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season look quite good, even though I did spot the occasional scratch or dirt speck. Colors for the most part are strong and saturated, although the picture could be a tad soft at times. No compression issues to speak of, either.
The Audio:
Unfortunately, all we have for the audio tracks for The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season are original English mono -- a definite let-down for those fans who'd like to hear their fun songs in stereo arrangements. Close-captions are included, as well.
The Extras:
There are no extras for The Partridge Family - The Complete Third Season. Too bad.
Final Thoughts:
The Partridge Family in decline. Characters are significantly altered, episodes leave behind the problematic nature of the "world-famous-touring-band-still-living-in-suburbia" central premise, and the radio hits stopped coming. But there are still enough "Partridge moments" with the excellent cast to recommend this third outing. I recommend The Partridge Family...but beware the coming of Ricky in Season Four.
