Could It Be Forever? My Story
Read Could It Be Forever? My Story Online
Authors: David Cassidy
My Story
David Cassidy
C’Mon, Get Happy . . .
Copyright © 1994 DBC Enterprises, Inc.
Could It Be Forever?
Copyright © 2007 DBC, Inc.
The right of David Cassidy to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.
The original print edition included a photographic section, which has been removed from this edition.
First published as an Ebook by HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP in 2012
Every effort has been made to fulfil requirements with regard to reproducing copyright material. The author and publisher will be glad to rectify any omissions at the earliest opportunity.
Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library
eISBN: 978 0 7553 6468 8
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CONTENTS
6 Get in the Partridge Family Bus
10 The Reluctant American Idol
11 Brown Rice and Tetracycline
12 Pooka Shells and Stolen Identity
15 Congratulations, Here’s Your $15,000
16 From the Sublime to the Ridiculous
17 I Love You, You’re Famous, Now Go Away
18 The Naked Lunchbox Experience
21 Alone Again . . . Naturally
22 Life Is Just a Bowl of Pits (Without the Cherries)
27 Light at the End of the Tunnel
30 So . . . You
Can
Go Home Again
David Cassidy was born in New York in 1950 to actors Evelyn Ward and Jack Cassidy. David’s career took off when, in September 1970,
The Partridge Family
aired on American television. He was catapulted to stardom as an actor and as a singer/songwriter, breaking box office records across the world.
Since
The Partridge Family
, he has had hit records, earned an Emmy nomination for one of many guest starring roles on television, starred on the Broadway stage in
Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
and
Blood Brothers
, and in London’s West End in
Time
. He headlined in Las Vegas for over 2,000 performances and then produced, wrote and directed
The Rat Pack is Back!
, which has enjoyed a long and successful run in Las Vegas and continues to tour throughout the US.
He has written a string of songs and television themes. Year-round, he continues to perform for his loyal fan base in concerts worldwide. His passion is his love for thoroughbred horses, which he owns, breeds and races. David currently resides in New York and Florida with his family.
In the seventies, when he was just 20 years old, David Cassidy achieved the sort of teen idol fame that is rarely seen. He was mobbed everywhere he went. His clothes were regularly ripped off by adoring fans. He sold records the world over. He was bigger than Elvis. And all thanks to a hit TV show called
The Partridge Family
. Now, in his own words, this is a brutally frank account of those mindblowing days of stardom in which being David Cassidy played second fiddle to being Keith Partridge. Including stories of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll that explode the myth of Cassidy as squeaky clean, it’s also the story of how to keep on living life and loving yourself when the fickle fans fall away.
‘The story . . . is often harrowing, as Cassidy details the terrible emotional, physical and financial toll of the treacherous Faustian pact that is global fame. It should be required reading for all participants of
Pop Idol
or
Fame Academy
since it presents some dire warnings about the perils and pitfalls of celebrity’
Scotsman Magazine
‘Brutally frank’
Daily Mail
A
s human beings, what have we got other than the relationships that we make in our lives? As you’re lying on your deathbed, do you think,
God, I wish I had spent more time at the office
? I think not. You thank God you were able to stop, look into somebody’s eyes and say, ‘You know what? I love you. Thank you. You mean something to me. Thank you for what you’ve given me. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your life. Thank you for being a part of mine. Thank you for every breath that I’ve been able to take. Thank you for all of the support and the love that you’ve given me. Thank you for making a difference in my life.’
This book could not have been written without the help and support of so many people who have touched my life along the way. My friends, colleagues and, most of all, my closest family: I wish to thank you
all
from the bottom of my heart. And, alas, special thanks to Jo-Ann, who has toiled through the long nights.
Happy trails,
David,
2007
Henry Diltz (photographer):
David is a really interesting guy. He is witty. And he’s intelligent. He’s an Aries, which is kind of a go-for-it sign. One time David told me, ‘You know what it’s like to be an Aries?’ He said, ‘It’s like, if there’s a brick wall in front of me, I put my head down and just go for it.’ I mean, just full speed ahead, and that’s the way he is on stage and that’s the way he is in his life.
I will now attempt, at the tender age of 56, to give you the unadulterated truth about my life and experiences. Although, as a celebrity, I’m certainly not curing cancer or doing anything else earth shattering, hopefully there is something of significance to be learned, insofar as the human experience is concerned. What is unique about my own experience is that the fame happened to me at a truly remarkable time on this planet, a time that we’ll never see again. A time of innocence, of lost innocence, of helter skelter, of purple Osley, of Nixon, of Hendrix, of the Beatles, and, yes, of
The Partridge Family
. A time of madness and psychedelia, of euphoria, and the silent moral majority. A time of indulgence and of overindulgence.
As children of the 60s, we went into the 70s with insatiable appetites for change. We were witnesses to social revolution as we boogied ourselves through that decade with reckless, careless abandon. ‘’Cause that’s the way, uh-huh, uh-huh, we liked it.’ Actually, we
loved
it.
And now, with that time long behind us, I have written this from a new perspective, as I am no longer the same person. My life has gone through a tremendous metamorphosis. No apologies; no, ‘Sorry folks, I did it, but I really didn’t mean it.’ With all this in mind, you’re probably now thinking,
Oh, it’s a Hollywood kiss-and-tell book!
Rather, this is my way of setting the record straight, of providing a measuring stick of true growth to pass along to my children. I am still amazed by it, awed by it, and often proud of it. I have been questioned endlessly for over thirty years about my life and career. However, I simply wish to live in the now. Fortunately for me, I have a great now. Now is where my happiness lives. But, man, did it take me a long time to get over that hump.
When people say to me, ‘Don’t you get sick of being asked the same questions over and over again about what happened when you were on
The Partridge Family
,
and what it was like to be a teen idol?’ I’ve tried answering them this way. It would be like every person who met you, who was introduced to you, only ever asking you about the great touchdown you made in the closing seconds of that one college game on a Saturday in October half your life ago. Of course it was great, of course you’ll never forget it, of course at that moment it seemed like the world was focused on you and you alone. It was your moment. But for you, it’s over. You aren’t in college any more. And as much as they’d like to see you in the cleats, pads and helmet again, it’s just not gonna happen.
In addition to revealing my innermost thoughts and life experiences, I have found photographs never before seen by anyone outside my family and friends – until now. I spent many hours going through boxes of memories and searching through tens of thousands of shots from my friend Henry Diltz’s photo collection, taken over the years when he was my official photographer and travelled the world with me. Some of the photos were sent in by fans; I had never seen them before! I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
There has been catharsis in the process of writing this book and, yes, even nostalgia, too – sometimes pleasant, sometimes very difficult. What you need to know is that I really do love you all for being there with me then, and for still being here with me now.
Y
ou want to know my most vivid childhood memory? It’s early 1956. I’m five, nearly six, and I’m playing with a couple of my friends out in the street in front of our house at 23 Elm Street in West Orange, New Jersey. They begin to taunt me with that casual cruelty kids can have.
‘Hey, Wartie, your parents are divorced.’
They called me Wartie because my grandfather’s last name was Ward. And at this time in my life, my mom and I lived with my grandparents, in the same house they had lived in since 1918. We moved back there so she could work on the road, performing her nightclub act with the Blockburn Twins. She did national theatre tours and
things, and would be gone for weeks and months at a time.
‘No, they aren’t,’ I respond, unnerved.
I have never heard the word ‘divorce’ before, but somehow I know what it means.
‘Maybe in a play they are, but not in real life.’
My parents, Jack Cassidy and Evelyn Ward, were actors – not very successful ones, but they’d appeared in plays and musicals, sometimes together, mostly apart.
‘They’re divorced,’ one of my friends assures me, like it’s a well-known fact. But nobody I know has parents who are divorced. That just doesn’t exist in my world. I suddenly feel very uneasy. I think that was the first time I can remember feeling naked. I ran into the house for assurance.
Even though I’m sure my mom will say, ‘Don’t be silly,’ I ask her hesitantly if she and my dad are divorced. She takes a long breath and says, ‘Why don’t you ask your father that? You’re going to see him next weekend.’ That was enough for me to feel whole again, at least until I saw my dad.
I don’t see a lot of my father lately. He’s usually on the road, doing plays, as my mother often explains to me. The plays keep him very busy – so busy, in fact, that even when he promises he’s going to come visit me, he isn’t always able to keep his promise. I’m used to that. After all, this is Jack Cassidy we’re talking about, folks.