By Erin Free
In this regular column, we drag forgotten made-for-TV movies out of the vault and into the light. This week: the 2000 biopic The David Cassidy Story, starring Andrew Kavovit (pictured right), Malcolm McDowell, Dey Young, Roma Maffia and Chandra West.
When singer and actor David Cassidy passed away in 2017 at the age of 67 after years of alcohol abuse, his eulogies were largely as shallow as the critiques that had plagued him for his entire career. Much was made of Cassidy’s teen idol status, his beginnings on the musical sitcom The Partridge Family, and the fevered, frenzied and near-deranged response that he drew from his principally early and pre-teen female fans. Little was made of Cassidy’s gifts as a singer, songwriter and performer, nor his abilities as an actor, or even his staggering facility for truly engaging an audience.
David Cassidy literally defined the unfairly maligned musical genre of “bubble gum pop” with the eight studio albums he recorded under the name of The Partridge Family (but which were basically him singing with the famed LA studio group The Wrecking Crew) and his various subsequent solo albums. The Partridge Family records are bright, effervescent, beautifully crafted works stacked with great songwriting and impressive playing, and their casual smearing as “disposable” is one of the true travesties of music journalism. And if you’ve seen the acclaimed Police Story telemovie A Chance To Live, then you know that David Cassidy can act too.
Despite his cheery image, Cassidy also had a dark side. He was plagued by family demons, struggled with alcohol addiction, and had trouble holding down friendships and romantic relationships. Cassidy also constantly battled with the image crafted around him by The Partridge Family publicity machine as a squeaky-clean teen idol. The singer/actor laid it all out with almost relentless candidness in his compelling 2007 autobiography Could It Be Forever? My Story. Before this literary near-exorcism, Cassidy executive produced the telemovie The David Cassidy Story, which was first broadcast by major US network NBC on January 9, 2000.
As with his book, Cassidy here appears to have a desperate need to let everyone know that he’s done it tough, and that his life hasn’t all been private planes, parties, adoring fans, sex, and money. The David Cassidy Story covers the life of Cassidy in bang-bang-bang telemovie fashion, moving like a freight train, and not always going into things in appropriate depth, but rating as a highly entertaining if slightly cheesy affair. And yes, there are wigs…bad wigs.
Director and TV vet Jack Bender does his best with an obviously limited budget and the script by equally prolific TV vet Duane Poole hits all the major plot points, while deftly abandoning others, obviously at Cassidy’s behest. Cassidy is played by TV actor Andrew Kavovit (who actually looks more like Cassidy’s half-brother and fellow teen idol, Shaun Cassidy), who at the time was best known for the soap As The World Turns, and has also starred in the likes of Star Trek and NYPD Blue. Kavovit is highly effective in the role, capturing Cassidy’s inherent sweetness and also his brooding petulance.
In just over ninety minutes, and at a truly hectic pace, we get Cassidy’s early leanings toward music; his eventual casting on the seminal 1970s TV series The Partridge Family (the story of a family pop group which starred Cassidy’s stepmother and Oscar winning actress Shirley Jones); his extraordinary, Beatles-like rise as a shrieked-over teen idol (the mass hysteria which plagued Cassidy’s 1974 Australian tour even prompted calls to have him deported!); the fact that he pretty much broke his beautiful The Partridge Family co-star Susan Dey’s (Katie Wright) heart; his brief marriage to gorgeous actress Kay Lenz (Sibel Ergener); his exploitation at the hands of TV producers and record companies; the racy Rolling Stone interview and cover photo that scandalised the pop world; and his eventual slide into booze and pills when his career fizzled out in truly desultory fashion.
While Cassidy’s fondness for groupies is hinted at in one scene, his prodigious appetite for putting away his youthful (but always legal) fans is certainly not explored in the same manner as Cassidy does in his, ahem, blow-by-blow autobiography. Even more curiously, the singer’s second marriage (a very difficult one by his accounts, to the troubled Meryl Tanz) is completely ignored, as is Cassidy’s long and often successful experiences in the world of horse breeding. Famed wild man and The Partridge Family co-star Danny Bonaduce barely rates a mention, even though the pair shared a long-lasting friendship.
Captured with the most depth are the essential relationships that drove Cassidy’s life and career. Matthew John Armstrong is solid as the composite character Nick Hiller, who combines the attributes of a few close Cassidy friends, while Dey Young nicely captures the sweet stability of Shirley Jones. Roma Maffia is funny as Cassidy’s old school Hollywood manager Ruth Aarons, and Chandra West does a very nice job as singer/songwriter Sue Shifrin, who helped Cassidy out of a very dark hole and remained his wife for over twenty years.
Outside of Kavovit as Cassidy, the biggest role in the film (and indeed, in the singer’s life) goes to cult legend Malcolm McDowell, who plays Jack Cassidy, David’s father. A loud, charismatic, boozy braggart, womaniser (and bisexual) and old school stage and screen actor, Jack Cassidy was also neglectful of his family and constantly bullied David about his career when he wasn’t ignoring him. It was a horribly fraught, defining relationship, and David Cassidy suggested McDowell for the role himself. The British master actor is great, sashaying across the screen and loading every self-serving line with pithy swagger and flair.
“I think he was brilliant,” Cassidy says in his memoir. “He completely captured my father, the madness as well as the humour. My father was up there, I’m sure, smiling. When you’re seeing other actors recreate your life, it’s very odd and it’s hard to be objective. I tried as much as possible. I was only on the set four or five times. I tried to stay away completely from Andrew Kavovit, who did a very fine job.”
With a clutch of nicely re-recorded Cassidy hits, the music feels right, and The David Cassidy Story certainly offers up a solid precis of a fascinating life. But considering everything Cassidy went through during his incredible career (and for star value, he also enjoyed friendships with heavy hitters like Elvis, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Elton John and George Michael), The David Cassidy Story might have fared better as a two-part mini-series. In short, this is an EP, when a double album would have been better.
Availability: The David Cassidy Story is pretty easy to find online, but it’s not in the best shape, though it’s certainly watchable.
