David Cassidy on the Web
Cassidy TV
July 24, 2009
By Scott Collins
Los Angeles Times
http://lohud.com
Nepotism is not unknown in the TV business, but with his latest project, Shaun Cassidy has taken family ties to a new extreme.
Real-life brothers David Cassidy and Patrick Cassidy play middle-aged brothers who are former rock gods in the new series "Ruby & the Rockits" on ABC Family. (ABC Family)
Cassidy is the 1970s teen idol who has spent the past 15 years as a television writer-producer of cult dramas with a sci-fi bent ("American Gothic," "Invasion").
Now he has turned his attention to musical comedy with ABC Family's "Ruby & the Rockits," a Tuesday night hour about two middle-aged brothers, former rock gods who get reacquainted after the long-lost daughter of one of them re-enters the picture.
One of the leads is his half-brother, David, who had his own heartthrob stint on "The Partridge Family," the early '70s sitcom about a family of rock singers that "Ruby" deliberately echoes.
The other is stage actor Patrick Cassidy, the younger brother whom Shaun admits torturing endlessly during childhood and beyond, according to Patrick. (The title character, David's 15-year-old daughter, is played by former "Spy Kids" star Alex Vega.)
Ryan, the youngest Cassidy brother, is the show's lead set dresser.
Is it all too twistedly self-referential? As the writer in the family, Shaun Cassidy is aware of the dangers.
"The double-edged sword of working with family is it can be the most fulfilling experience you've ever had," Cassidy, 50, said during a recent interview. "But the flip side is it can also be the most tortuous and most stressful, because it's your family and the lines can get blurry."
The brothers are all sons of Jack Cassidy, the comic actor whose presence hangs over the family nearly 33 years after his death. David is the son of Cassidy and Evelyn Ward; Cassidy later married actress Shirley Jones, the mother of Shaun, Patrick and Ryan.
According to Shaun, his father's personality inspired the character of David Gallagher, the narcissistic performer whom David Cassidy plays on "Ruby."
Even today, the sons seem to wrestle with ambivalent feelings toward their father. David has described Jack in interviews as an alcoholic, a sufferer of bipolar disorder and a closet bisexual who broke his heart by abandoning him when he was young.
But David, who at 59 has thinner hair but is nearly as lean as during his pop-idol days, now offers a balancing perspective: "If you put all my brothers together, we would add up to all the talent that was in my father."
The burden of spinning laughter out of this tangled family history fell to Shaun. The key, he realized early, was to satirize the pop-music stardom he experienced during the days of disco suits and shag hairdos.
He remembers being flown to a gig in Hawaii when he was 19 and seeing thousands of fans spelling out his name with their bodies on Waikiki Beach. It was surreal, he says.
With "Ruby," Shaun saw a way for the family to work together in a project recalling another Cassidy opus. "He said, 'I kind of wanna do a new "Patridge Family," ' " said Kate Juergens, ABC Family head of programming.
The premise has David and Patrick Gallagher, hit-making brothers behind '80s group the Rockits, find their lives upturned after David's daughter Ruby finds him.
"It's not about a famous family," Shaun Cassidy said. "It's about a real family that happens to have music and some show business just in the wallpaper. It's just part of the fabric of the environment - which, again, is how we grew up."
