My father was back in my life.
Once he accepted the fact that I was determined to follow in his footsteps and make acting my profession, he tried to help me as best he knew how. He paid for my first professional photographers. He got me connected with agents, who could help find me parts to audition for. And—most significantly, over the long haul—he asked his manager, Ruth Aarons, who knew as much about the business as anyone, to give me whatever help she could. Ruth advised me initially as more of a friend than a manager per se; for the first couple years of my career she took no payment from me. If, thanks in part to her guidance, my parents together were able to make a couple of hundred thousand dollars in a year, Ruth naturally would take the 15 percent commission she’d earned. But if, as initially appeared likely, I might make a couple of thousand dollars in a year, she saw no need to take from me a few hundred dollars that I could really use. Ruth became almost like another parent to me. In fact, I got along better with her than with my father, since she wasn’t carrying any of the emotional baggage.
My father decided that the best way for me to get my start in show business would be to do exactly as he had done—learn my craft in the New York theater and gradually become a respected “working actor.” In this instance, I agreed wholeheartedly with my dad. He was, after all, the authority.
My dad always revered the world of the theater. He told me he appeared in some forty Broadway shows. He occasionally appeared in films; in 1962, for example, he’d been in The Chapman Report and in 1964, FBI Code 98. And television made fairly frequent use of his services, both in dramatic shows—in the mid-sixties he guest-starred on I Spy, The Girl from U.N.C.L.E., The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, and Coronet Blue—and in situation comedies, such as Get Smart, The Lucy Show, and Bewitched. He had a real flair for comedy, often playing vain, shallow buffoons. In the 1967–68 TV season he had a featured role (for which he received an Emmy nomination) on a CBS situation comedy, He & She, starring Richard Benjamin and Paula Prentiss. But he always returned to the theater—anything from summer stock to Broadway. He’d most recently been featured on Broadway in the 1964-65 success Fade out—Fade in, starring Carol Burnett and staged by George Abbott. Now, in the summer of 1968, he was preparing to costar with Shirley in a forthcoming Broadway musical, Maggie Flynn. It would be their first joint New York stage appearance since a 1957 production of The Beggar’s Opera. In the intervening years, of course, my father had made more of a name for himself. And Shirley had won a great following, thanks to many hit films, which in recent years had included The Courtship of Eddie’s Father (1963), Bedtime Story (1964), and The Secret of My Success (1965).
My father had rented a veritable castle, high on a hill overlooking the Hudson River in Irvington, New York, about forty-five minutes north of Manhattan. It was a stone-crafted mansion, complete with turrets, stained-glass windows, swords, and armor. There’d be plenty of room for him and Shirley, and my brothers Shaun, Patrick, and Ryan. I could live with them, rent-free—the first time I’d ever really lived with my father, stepmother, and my three brothers. In fact, there was a pool house I could use, so I could have privacy, too, if I wanted to entertain any young ladies. My father said he would help me find a part-time job and acting classes, and I could audition for roles in New York until I established myself as a working actor. It sounded almost too good to be true.
And it was.
For starters, the part-time job my father found for me was in the mail room of a textile firm in the city. At the time $1.85 an hour was the minimum wage. The boss said, “I tell you what, we’re going to give you two dollars an hour.” I earned $50 a week; I took home, after deductions, $38.80, which didn’t do much more than cover the costs of commuting from Irvington to New York City.
The youngest person I worked with was forty-eight. The next was fifty-five, and another was seventy-four. And I was eighteen. I had to don a light blue smock and sort mail. I was lonely. I had no friends. I lived in a fantasy world. These people spent their lives there, but I just couldn’t identify with them. I was a kid. They were old. I’d gaze at the breasts of this forty-eight-year-old woman and daydream, I wonder what she must have been like when she was eighteen. I wonder if I would have liked her. … The answer to that question in my mind was always yes.
I’d get up early in the morning to catch a commuter train filled with serious-looking adults from affluent Westchester County—all of these people in business suits, whose goal was to move up the corporate ladder. My whole life I’d felt different from most people somehow. And those feelings were never more intense than while riding on that train and working in that mail room. I’d tell myself, I don’t look like these people or think like these people. I had dreams that were different from theirs. I really wasn’t money-oriented (although I didn’t like being broke all the time, either)—I longed for artistic success as a working actor.
And I was starting to have doubts as to whether I’d ever attain that. In my first few months in New York, I went to nearly two hundred auditions, for parts on Broadway, off Broadway, off-off-Broadway, TV commercials, everything. I didn’t get one job offer. Not one. Not even for the smallest part. There’d be fifty guys competing for every part, even if the job paid no money.
I’d be so depressed, so despondent after auditioning. Each new rejection would resonate with old feelings I’d had of being so thoroughly rejected by my father, dating from when he’d walked out on me and my mom.
I made a much bigger deal out of being rejected than did the other aspiring actors I knew. I was plagued with self-doubts.
I’d think about it. I’d never had much success in school. I was considered a fuckup there. Maybe—I’d have to wonder sometimes—I wasn’t going to have much success in my career, or in life, either. I couldn’t dull those feelings with drugs or drink; I didn’t have much money for any nonessentials. (My dad, unlike my mom, wasn’t the sort of person you could hit for spending money.) And even if I had the money for pot, I didn’t have anyone to smoke it with. Let alone know where to get any. I didn’t have any friends.
I’d wonder sometimes what guys back in California were doing—Kevin Hunter, Sam Hyman, Steve Ross, Sal Mineo, Don Johnson, and others. All of them, I was sure, had to be leading happier, more rewarding lives than I was. Kevin was the only one I really wrote to. His letters were always a treat. And he was such a good writer.
I did nothing but work—half the day in the mail room, the rest of the day at auditions or acting classes. I’d had to cut my hair off for my stupid part-time job. I felt totally alone. Isolated. I’d lost my identity as a part of the hip, young sixties generation.
And my father didn’t seem satisfied with anything I did. He criticized everything about me, beginning with my wardrobe. If I’d wanted to attend high school dressed like a hippie, he felt that was one thing. But he was not going to have Jack Cassidy’s son going around New York looking like a bum.
My total wardrobe, when I arrived in Irvington from Los Angeles, consisted of one pair of regular shoes, one pair of tennis shoes, three pairs of jeans, six shirts, and a jacket. Standard teenage fare, right?
“How can I present you to my friends, the way you’re dressed?” he’d asked. “And what are you going to wear to New York?” I had to admit, that had been the last thing on my mind. My dad said it was essential I bought a good suit.
One day I told him, “Look, Dad, I’ve been going through the newspaper and I’ve found some really good buys on suits.”
So my dad said, “Really?”
I said, “Yeah, and I was wondering if I could go into Manhattan with you.”
He looked at the ads I’d found and declared curtly, “Look, you don’t want to shop at those places. I’ll take you into New York and I’ll get you some nice clothes.” I thought, I’m eighteen years old and my dad is going to buy me some clothes. Wow! Great. It’s about time, since he knows I’m only clearing $38.80 a week at work.
My dad takes me to Roland Meledandri, which must have been the most expensive clothing store in New York, to his very own tailor. He picked out a couple of suits for himself and then put me in this terrific suit. He also picked out for me an overcoat, a great sports jacket, and slacks. I’m trying on outfits, the tailor is marking them, the bill is running up to like $800—a fortune in those days—and I’m thinking, This doesn’t feel like me at all. I’m a hippie. But I know my dad is happy.
My dad put his arm around me affectionately—at times like that, I could really feel his love for me—and asked simply, “Well?”
I mean, what could I say except, “Gee, thanks—thanks a lot, Dad,” as we walked out of the store.
“Oh, you don’t have to thank me,” he responded, “because you’re going to pay for it.” What??? “You’re going to pay me fifteen dollars a week until you’ve paid it all back.” Motherfucker.
That was a significant day for me; I felt like I was finally seeing my father the way my mother had long seen him: that was a dirty trick to play on his son. Like, “How much in debt can I get my son to me? I’ll take him to the most expensive shop in town and make him owe it to me!”
My dad said that no one had given him money when he was young, and he expected me to do exactly what he had done. And you know what? I eventually paid him every cent back. That prick.
My relationship with my father was very strained, but I developed a good relationship with Shirley. Anyone who knows her knows it would be heard not to like her. She’s a wonderful human being.
But now, when I was eighteen, my dad—who hadn’t really been a part of my life at all in recent years—suddenly decided he was going to be my father. In Irvington-on-Hudson he laid down all sorts of ground rules for me that I’d never had when I lived with my mom, who always gave me a very free rein.
I’d say, “What the fuck are you talking about?” Hey! Don’t use that language with me!
He’d say, “You’re going to do this and that and gain some responsibility. You’re going to buckle down.”
He wanted to make up for all the years he hadn’t been around. Discipline. We always had a lot of friction. And heaven help me if I told him I’d done something like arrive at an audition fifteen minutes late. He’d rage, “You don’t show up for an eight o’clock call at eight-fifteen! That’s unprofessional!” And I’d be like, “Give me a fucking break, Dad. I’m not a professional. Yet. I’m eighteen years old.” But he was stubborn. And I was stubborn. We were very much alike, I think.
“Very much so,” Shirley says. Here’s her take on the situation: “Of all the boys—and I’ve said this many, many times—I think David is the most like his father. Not necessarily in terms of appearance, I’m talking about all of the mannerisms, the humor, so many things that he does. All of his expressions, his little looks, his walk—the whole thing. The interesting part is that David spent the least amount of time with Jack. So it has to be genetic.”
She also notes: “The truth is, Jack didn’t want David to become a performer too young. Jack really was not thrilled with David’s decision to go right into the business. He would have preferred it if David could have applied himself more in high school and have gone on to college.” Yeah right. Like you did, Dad?
Meanwhile, Dad and Shirley went on the road for previews of Maggie Flynn, prior to its scheduled October 23, 1968, opening at the ANTA Theater in New York. They were out of town when I got hired for my first real professional job, in a forthcoming new Broadway musical comedy, The Fig Leaves Are Falling, with Barry Nelson, Dorothy Loudon, and Jenny O’Hara. It was being staged by George Abbott, the legendary octogenarian director/writer/producer, who had worked in past years with both my parents. I’d be in four scenes and get to sing two songs with Dorothy Loudon. My dad and Shirley were thrilled when I telephoned them with the news.
Then I telephoned the people I worked for part-time, out at the mail room, and declared I’d never be going back to that hated job. “Send my final check to my home—no, better yet, keep my check!” I told them. What did I need with a check for $38.80? I was being offered $175 a week—a veritable fortune—to appear in a show staged by George Abbott. In a career spanning five decades, Abbott had worked on more Broadway hits—Pal Joey, On the Town, Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and countless others—than probably anyone else in the business. I could imagine The Fig Leaves Are Falling running for many years to come, and me collecting those huge $175 checks, week after endless week.
Ah … at eighteen I had a good imagination. The Fig Leaves Are Falling opened at Broadway’s Broadhurst Theatre on January 2, 1969. It closed on January 4, 1969.
My dad and Shirley’s show, Maggie Flynn, didn’t fare all that much better. Shirley’s popularity as a film star helped generate some ticket sales, but not enough. By mid-January we were all out of work. My dad and Shirley decided to return to California. He was soon playing guest roles on such TV shows as That Girl, Matt Lincoln, and That’s Life. Shirley, besides doing occasional TV guest shots, was acting in motion pictures once again: The Happy Ending in 1969 and The Cheyenne Social Club in 1970.
Fortunately for me while we were doing previews in Philadelphia, a casting director from CBS films saw me and wanted me to screen-test for a movie he was casting. So two days after we closed on Broadway I was on a plane back to Hollywood to test. Ruth began managing my career for real. She really cared about me, my dad, and my stepmom. And she was an extremely loyal person. If my dad wanted her to look after me, she would—even if there wasn’t any guarantee there’d be much in it for her. She helped me find a good agent and made sure the agent was sending me out to audition for appropriate parts.
For those who imagine that show business is all fun ’n’ parties, where everyone is guaranteed to immediately make a huge fortune, you should consider this: if you didn’t see me during the three-performance run of The Fig Leaves Are Falling on Broadway, you would have had no other chance to see me perform professionally in 1969 until the year was almost over. I didn’t get the film role I screen-tested for, nor did I get a number of other parts I auditioned for. In the final two months of the year, I was seen on episodes of two television series, The Survivors on ABC and Ironside, which was my first television lead, on NBC. And that was it for the year. My total earnings for 1968 had been well below the poverty level. And they weren’t much better for 1969. Ruth expressed great hopes for the future. So did I.
I was back living with my mom—and feeling a little too old for that. First we lived in the home we’d lived in before I’d gone to New York; then we moved into a small apartment. My mom covered up most of the cost, while I saved money. She made it clear that I’d have to become self-sufficient as soon as possible, because she’d decided she wanted to move back to West Orange. She had never really bought into the Hollywood lifestyle. And now, after two painful divorces, she really felt like returning to her roots. She felt that spending more time with my grandfather, who was eighty-one and in declining health, would be good for both him and her.
I caught up with some of my old friends, like Kevin Hunter, who wasn’t having luck at all finding work acting, and Sam Hyman, who had found steady, if far from high-paying, employment as an apprentice film editor. I wasn’t sure how serious Kevin was about making it as an actor. I thought that temperamentally he would have been better suited to be a writer. But we’d have fun goofing around. One night we both got on his lightweight girls’-model Honda 50 motorcycle and drove up to the Los Angeles V.A. Hospital. We scaled an eleven-foot fence and stole a big metal tank of nitrous oxide—laughing gas. We rode double back to his place with me carrying the tank. Got high on that for a week, then one night we went back to the hospital, returned the empty tank to the room we’d taken it from, and liberated another tank for us to party with. Had we been caught, I later learned, we could have been sent to a federal penitentiary. But we never thought about the consequences of our actions. We didn’t actually steal it. We just borrowed it for a week. We did return them, empty.
I started seeing Don Johnson again from time to time, too, once I was back in Los Angeles. (Sal Mineo was in London for a spell directing a play.) Don and I would often wind up seeking the same parts. Sometimes we’d both get shot down. But a couple of times, it came down to a choice between Don and me, and I was chosen. He was always really nice to me about it—this affable, Missouri-born fellow telling me as a friend he was happy that if he didn’t get the part, I did. I have to believe he must have resented at least a little that I was getting jobs he wanted—I certainly would have felt that way—but he was always decent about it. Don and I saw each other for the next few years around Hollywood; he was having a hard time getting work back then.
I wound up seeing Elliot Mintz a little, too. For a while we even wound up living right across the street from each other in Laurel Canyon. He was more interested in the struggle for political change than I was. I’d sort of become disillusioned with politics when Richard Nixon was elected President in 1968. I couldn’t believe people couldn’t see through Nixon’s act. (I felt the same way later, when Reagan was elected.) I was more concerned about building a career for myself, and a life.
When things start to happen for you in television, they can happen very quickly. The casting directors know about you, and the next thing you know you’re working a lot. That began happening for me. In 1970 I appeared on episodes of a half dozen network series. You could have seen me acting on The F.B.I. (the episode called “The Fatal Imposter,” airing January 4, 1970, on ABC); Marcus Welby, M.D. (“Fun and Games and Michael Ambrose,” January 13, 1970, ABC); Adam-12 (“A Rare Occasion,” February 14, 1970, NBC); Bonanza (“The Law and Billy Burgess,” February 15, 1970, NBC); Medical Center (“His Brother’s Keeper,” April 1, 1970, CBS); and Mod Squad (“The Loser,” April 7, 1970, ABC).
I was gaining experience quickly. My acting was lame on my first couple of shows. But I was really pleased with the job I did on Marcus Welby, playing a diabetic youth who wouldn’t take his insulin as a way to punish his father. I had to do some highly emotional stuff. Ruth said it was a great piece of work and would help me get more. And that sounded good to me. So long as I could make enough money to live simply, I’d be happy.
Sam Hyman and I used to enjoy driving up to Laurel Canyon. We decided to get a little home for ourselves up there. Because of his apprentice film-editing job and my assorted TV acting jobs, we had enough money to make a down payment on a home. My income was unsteady, but we knew we could carry the house for at least the next three months. We just crossed our fingers that I’d keep getting enough guest shots on television to cover our bills beyond that point. Because I was making more money than Sam, I offered to pay about two-thirds. Our monthly payments were $315; I paid around $200 and he paid the rest. Sam and I were good friends. We’re still friends. When I became famous, he went all around the world with me; he went through that whole period of time with me. Although we rarely see each other now, he’s still one of the only people I really can look at, talk to, and trust.
Back in that first home, in Laurel Canyon, we lived like hippies. No furniture to speak of. I found an old mattress someone had discarded, in back of a Von’s Supermarket, and carted it home. We had no money in our pockets, but we were in great spirits, nonetheless. We were the most successful guys from our high school years— the only ones who had made it and were living independent from our parents.
And we considered Laurel Canyon the hippest place in town. Bohemian Rhapsody. It was just very cool there—still very much the spirit of the sixties. Hippies next door, acid rock everywhere you went. My neighbor next door had the biggest tits. She used to just wear this T-shirt, walk around half-naked every day with the T-shirt flying. She was gorgeous. I used to think, This is the life. Sexual freedom in Laurel Canyon.
In mid-1970, with only eight scattered network TV appearances to my credit, I was hardly someone the average American would have known. I was just one of a thousand faces on the tube. But I could take pride—and figured my dad could also take pride—in the fact that I was becoming, like him, a reliable working actor. My career seemed to be on the upswing. And—at least as important—I was totally satisfied with my life outside of work. What more could I possibly ask for?
If anyone had told me, in mid-1970, that by year’s end I’d be a household word, a best-selling recording artist, the number-one teen idol, with my picture on the back of Rice Krispies, I would have asked him if the acid had kicked in yet!