The Today Show is hosting a series of television family reunions this week. Yesterday, it was the cast of Eight is Enough, minus Adam Rich, who played adorable Nicholas, who unfortunately picked up a not-so-adorable drug habit and is MIA. Today, it was the Partridge Family, with David Cassidy, my first true love, Danny Bonaduce, and the two people who played the largely silent youngest children (Suzanne Crough and Jeremy Gelbwaks – I had to google that). Shirley Jones is apparently out on tour, Dave Madden (who played Reuben Kincaid) is retired and afraid to fly, and no one seems to know what happened to Susan Dey, who seemingly disappeared after L.A. Law.
I don’t really like these reunion shows, because these former child stars, be they overweight, or balding, or fighting substance abuse (or all three) are painful reminders of my own mortality. I much prefer the almost androgynous appeal of the twenty one year old David Cassidy, who, to my pre-pubescent year old eyes, was as manly a man as there ever was. You can’t imagine how crushed I was when I was not allowed to go see him at the Montreal Forum in 1972. I wasn’t old enough, I was told, although apparently my friend Josie was, even though she was a whole year younger than me, and she wore a bubble top and platform shoes and talked about it for weeks afterwards and sang songs from the show, and played his albums over and over and over.
I got my revenge on Josie almost 20 years after that when David Cassidy came through town to revive his almost defunct career with a tour and a new album. I was scheduled to interview him for the radio station where I was working at the time, and even though I had met more than my share of stars by that time, and even though he was an old man in his forties (!), I had to admit to a certain excitement. I wasn’t alone: somehow word got out, and by the time he arrived at the station, a huge crowd of ridiculously hopped-up grown women had gathered outside the station and in the lobby, some of them dressed in vintage seventies fashion (bubble tops, platform shoes, culottes … one can only shudder).
David Cassidy turned out to be very pleasant. A bit weary, with slightly thinning hair and crinkly eyes. Most surprisingly, he was wee. Just an elf of a man, really, as so many of these larger-than-life celebs turn out to be. I don’t think his career got the kickstart he was hoping for, but judging from his appearance this morning on the Today show, life has been pretty good. I just wish he wasn’t so old. Because that means I must be getting there too. As must be Josie, although I bet she’s still out there wearing platform shoes, and singing “I think I Love You”, over and over and over.