The Dick Clark Nobody Knew
The legendary New Year’s Eve host overcame a heartbreaking family tragedy and depression to build an empire. His friends tell Closer how the star found strength in adversity
For decades, America rang in the new year with Dick Clark. Like an old friend who dropped by only occasionally, we enthusiastically invited him into our homes to help us celebrate the most festive night of the year. Dapper in his sharp suit, the boyishly handsome TV host would smile at the celebrants who gathered in New York City’s Times Square to watch him introduce the latest musical acts — everyone from Three Dog Night in 1973 to Lady Gaga in 2011. Then he’d count down the seconds until midnight on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve. “While most people are preparing to party, it’s a workday for us,” Dick said. “I just handle it as a busy day.”
The television star and prolific producer, who became a household name at 27 when American Bandstand premiered nationally in 1957, liked to stay in motion. He suffered heartbreak — including the death of his brother at a young age, two divorces and battles with insecurity and depression — but never let it stop him. “He was a perfectionist,” Dick’s former publicist and longtime friend Paul Shefrin exclusively tells Closer. “He worked extremely hard and he pushed others to work hard, too.” Dick’s ambition and demanding lifestyle continued until 2004, when he suffered a stroke at age 75. Forced to relinquish his quest for perfection, the star ultimately found grace and strength in adversity.
Growing up comfortably in New York’s Westchester County, “Dickie” idolized his older brother, Bradley, calling him a “quiet, very loving, wonderful guy ... everything I wasn’t.” When Bradley died in action during WWII’s Battle of the Bulge, the loss left a profound emptiness in 15-yearold Dick’s life. “I was in a depressed state,” he recalled of his teenage years.
To assuage his grief, Dick attempted to follow in Bradley’s footsteps by joining the high school football team. “He
tried but he was terrible,” Ray Smith, a co-author of Bandstand Diaries: The Philadelphia Years 1956–1963, tells Closer. “He was a small, short man, and his self-esteem went down the toilet because he wasn’t like his brother.”
Yet Dick possessed other qualities: drive, relentless energy and — even as a child who scavenged the neighbor’s trash for items to sell — a gift for making money. “He’s always been that way,” his mother, Julia Clark, recalled. “He’s always busy.” Dick finally found his calling after spending hours in his bedroom studying radio broadcasts. He sought comfort in what he called “the disembodied fantasy world that came out of the speaker.” Dick also joined the drama club to break out of his shell. At graduation in 1947, his classmates voted him “Most Likely to Sell the Brooklyn Bridge.”
AMERICAN DREAM
By 1956, Dick had married his childhood sweetheart, Barbara Mallery, and was hosting a radio program in Philadelphia. His fate changed when Bob Horn, the emcee of Bandstand,a local TV dance show, was fired after two DUIs and allegations of sexual impropriety. The producers hired Dick, with his squeaky-clean image, to save the show.
The new host immediately made changes, such as requiring the program’s teenage dancers to dress up. “The guys had to have jackets and ties; girls could wear nothing tight. Everything was on the up and up,” says Smith. Unlike his predecessor, Dick didn’t fraternize. “Everybody loved Bob, who was very friendly; Dick was more of a father figure,” dancer Bunny Gibson exclusively tells Closer. “When the camera was off, it was really hard to talk with him.”
Renamed American Bandstand, the show went national in 1957, making Dick and its group of dancers overnight stars. “We would follow the regulars, try their hairstyles, look to them for fashion, learn the music and the dances,” Sharon Sultan Cutler, co-author of Bandstand Diaries, tells Closer. “They taught us how to be teenagers.”
Dubbed “America’s oldest living teenager,” Dick didn’t enjoy sharing the spotlight with actual high schoolers. He refused to allow camera hogging and let go of anyone who got on his bad side. “As people became more popular, one by one they got banned,” recalls Gibson. “We were all afraid.” Even Arlene Sullivan, one of the best-loved regulars, felt it: “Dick said in a meeting that when you’re 17 you have to leave,” she recalls. “He got rid of half the room that day.”
Dick also dismissed anyone who tried to use American Bandstand to start a career. “[Dancer] Kenny Rossi got a singing contract and he got let go,” recalls Cutler. Acting in commercials was forbidden. “Dick said because we were amateurs, we weren’t able to do any of that,” Sullivan says.
While Dick may not have allowed Bandstand’s dancers to take other jobs, the same rule didn’t apply to him. In the 1960s, the series moved to California and Dick began hosting game shows, including the long-
running Pyramid. His company — Dick Clark Productions — also put together annual TV events like the American Music Awards, the Golden Globes and his New Year’s Eve telecast.
FAME & MISFORTUNE
Yet success and a $100 million fortune didn’t bring Dick happiness. “Early on, he was a drinker, a smoker, and had a mouth you wouldn’t believe,” confides Smith, who adds that Dick’s marriage to Barbara, mother of his son Richard, now 59, suffered as a result. “I don’t think I ever saw her smile,” he says. “She raised Richie by herself, which is probably why she left Dick.”
A year later, in 1962, Dick married his former secretary Loretta Martin, and they had two children, Duane, 53, and Cindy, 52. (All three of Dick’s kids followed his path into TV production.) Dick’s second marriage lasted less than a decade. “He had this thing about money,” explains Smith. “I think money replaced family.”
In 1977, Dick wed Kari Wigton, a Dick Clark Productions employee, who became his executive assistant. “He’s tough, he can be moody, he’s a worrier,” Kari once said of their 35year marriage. “But I’m fairly happy and up nearly all the time, so we balance each other perfectly.” Adds Sullivan: “He depended on Kari. They really loved each other.”
Finding happiness at home may have helped Dick become more gracious. When American Bandstand celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2002, he belatedly admitted the debt he owed to its dancers. “He finally said that the true stars of the show were the kids! That brought tears to my eyes,” says Gibson, who attests that Dick grew warmer later in life. “The two of us finally connected adult-to-adult, as opposed to a kid and a father figure.”
Dick’s humility deepened when he suffered a stroke in his sleep two years later. Forced to slow down, he chose to focus on the positive. “He wanted to show that having a stroke doesn’t mean your life is over,” Shefrin says of his friend, who returned to New Year’s Rockin’ Eve in 2005 despite his physical disability. “I wanted to do it very badly,” Dick confided. “I don’t enjoy retirement. I’d rather be working.”
When he died of a heart attack in 2012, few took the news as hard as Bandstand’s original dancers. “I cried when I heard. He was a part of my family,” says Gibson. While Dick’s millions of fans share in the sorrow, New Year’s Rockin’ Eve rolls on with his handpicked successor, Ryan Seacrest, as the emcee. “I am honored that he has entrusted me with such a role in this national tradition,” Ryan says. “Dick Clark is an American icon.” — With reporting by
Katie Bruno
“It’s a fascinating life and it’s a reflection, probably, of my odd nature.”
— Dick