Heart-throb Cassidy is dead at 67
Sitcom star turned pop heart-throb David Cassidy enchanted a generation of teenage girls but died penniless after succumbing to first alcoholism and then dementia
MUSIC stars yesterday paid tribute to the singer David Cassidy after he died of organ failure aged 67 following a battle with dementia.
The one-time teen heart-throb, who shot to fame in the sitcom The Partridge Family, died on Tuesday in Florida surrounded by loved ones, after being rushed to hospital last week.
His family said he had passed away “with joy in his heart” and “free from the pain that had gripped him for so long”.
Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson led the tributes to the star, who enjoyed hits in the 1970s such as How Can I Be Sure and Daydreamer. Wilson tweeted: “I’m very sad to hear about David Cassidy.”
Singer Marie Osmond wrote: “Heartbroken over the passing of David Cassidy.”
Leo Sayer, who toured with Cassidy in 2012, said he was “the perfect pop star – he was a sweetheart and so
FANS of the American actor and musician David Cassidy, who died on Tuesday aged 67, will remember him not as the troubled, fallen star he became in recent years, but as the 1970s heart-throb whose boyish good looks sent millions of teenage girls into a frenzy.
By the age of 21 he was already the highest-paid performer in the world, having become an overnight sensation playing the part of singer and guitarist Keith Partridge in the smash hit musical-sitcom The Partridge Family.
The show, which ran from 1970 to 1974 and attracted 14million viewers in the US at its peak, told the story of a family who formed a rock and roll band.
It spawned five Top 40 hits in the UK alone for Cassidy and the sitcom band, including I Think I Love You and Breaking Up Is Hard To Do.
He fast became a solo superstar, clocking up seven Top 20 hits in the UK between 1972 and 1974, including a number one with Daydreamer. In 1973 he filled Wembley Stadium for six concerts and played to two sellout crowds of 56,000 in Texas in one weekend the same year.
His fan club was reported to have more members at that time than those of The Beatles and Elvis Presley combined.
Over the next 40 years, Cassidy continued to tour and record, releasing 12 studio albums and selling more than 30million records, with various Grammy nominations to boot.
Ever the heart-throb, he was also married three times: first to actress Kay Lenz from 1977 to 1983, then to South African horse breeder Meryl Tanz from 1984 to 1985 and finally, in 1991, to singer Sue Shifrin, with whom he had a son, Beau. The pair divorced last year. Between marriages, he had a daughter, Katie, by former model Sherry Williams.
Away from the charts, he was a regular on TV and stage, appearing in several Broadway shows, such as the original production of Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.
More recently, he took part in the 2011 US series of The Celebrity Apprentice – where he was the first to be fired by the now President Donald Trump.
However, over the decades, Cassidy’s life and health had imploded as he battled with alcoholism and later, bankruptcy.
There had been endless money troubles, including a protracted legal wrangle with Sony over the profits from The Partridge Family, which ended with him winning just $158,000 (£119,000) out of the millions in unpaid compensation he believed he was due.
In 2015 he was declared bankrupt with debts of hundreds of thousands, including a £220,000 mortgage and almost £30,000 on credit cards, which he blamed on the break-up of his third marriage. As a result, his fivebedroom, waterfront mansion in Fort Lauderdale, Florida – then valued at £1.9million – had to be auctioned off.
A year earlier he had been slapped with his third drinkdriving charge in the space of four years and was sentenced to 90 days in rehab and five years on probation. It forced him to admit publicly that he had been battling booze for years and that it had changed his personality.
His drinking had also taken its toll on his career, often leaving fans perplexed. Many walked out of one performance in Illinois in 2010 in disgust after Cassidy introduced his band five times, started one song three times and repeatedly fluffed his lyrics. One observer remarked: “He was either strung out on drugs or drunk.”
AT ANOTHER show in Las Vegas two years later he kept repeating himself and managed to sing only a handful of songs in 90 minutes.
Although undoubtedly his alcoholism played a part, these incidents may also have been early clues as to how Cassidy’s health would eventually unravel.
Already suffering with arthritis, earlier this year – after he was filmed slurring and falling off a stage during a gig – he announced he had been diagnosed with dementia, which had already claimed the lives of his grandfather and beloved mother, Evelyn.
Before her death in 2012, Cassidy declared that “watching your mother disappear and a loved one disappear is very, very difficult. It was really very emotional for me”. It is how Cassidy’s family will surely be feeling in the wake of his own death this week.
His publicist Jo-Ann Geffen revealed yesterday that the star had died of liver failure in Florida on Tuesday, just days after US media reported that he was critically ill in hospital.
“David died surrounded by those he loved, with joy in his heart and free from the pain that had gripped him for so long,” his family said in a statement.
Cassidy, who still lived in Fort Lauderdale, is survived by his two children – 26-year-old Beau, a singer-songwriter, and Katie, 30, an actress.
Brian Wilson, co-founder of the Beach Boys, remembered Cassidy as “a very talented and nice person”. He added: “I’m very sad to hear about David Cassidy. There were times in the mid1970s when he would come over to my house and we even started writing a song together.”
Paying tribute on Twitter, his nephew Jack said: “My uncle David Cassidy has sadly passed away tonight... & in the process of mourning I can’t help but thank God for the joy that he brought to countless millions of people!”
Though his death will not come as a surprise, it will certainly sadden the generation who lived through the phenomenon that was dubbed “Cassidy mania”.