Most people here didn't see The Partridge Family in first run, when it was part of ABC's Friday night lineup (with The Brady Bunch, Love American Style, The Odd Couple, and Room 222). The show also sold a crapload of records, mainly because unlike all the other kids on The Brady Bunch, David Cassidy could actually sing.

I'm amused to read, years later, all the little dribs and drabs about the show:
- Shirley Jones (Cassidy's stepmother) actually did cut a couple of songs singing lead, but the production company decided not to release them as singles because they thought they'd cut into the Cassidy machine. (Huh? It's not like MOR radio wouldn't have played them.)
- Susan Dey had the hots for Cassidy and they did sleep together once, but Cassidy, in his own words, found "a certain sluttiness very attractive in a woman, and Susan just didn't have it." (What a guy, huh?)
- Cassidy wanted off the show (thus the entrance of four-year-old next-door-neighbor Ricky), but right after it did leave the air, a stampede at a London Cassidy concert caused the death of a teenage girl, and he was so shook up he went off the road (not realizing, without the touring and the show, he wouldn't stay popular).
- Bonaduce's parents fought constantly, and to get him out of that environment, he hung out with bachelor Dave Madden (Reuben Kincaid) a lot.
- Jeremy Gelbwaks' story is his family moved out east, so he quit the show, and he's still denying Bonaduce's claims that he picked physical fights on the set -- to the point where he's constantly fixing his own biography on Wikipedia.
- Suzanne Crough never once looked realistically like a musician. Fortunately for her, she grew up cute -- kinda like Chelsea Clinton, only without the entourage.

Anyway, here's a clip from the pilot -- you'll notice they were still dubbing for Cassidy at this point, rather than putting him on lead.

Partridge Family - WHAT? AND GET OUT OF SHOW BUSINESS