Actors

David Cassidy

Bill Thompson

Fifty years ago today, a TV show premiered on ABC, about a family that had formed a rock band. It was called “The Partridge Family,: and its star was a young actor-singer named David Cassidy.

Photo: ABC Television Network

In very short order, Cassidy became a full-fledged teen idol. Girls went crazy for him. He sold out concert Halls.

But as he revealed in a 1994 memoir, life was not exactly what it looked like on the outside.

You know, people often ask me which of my tem tjpisamd-plus interviews with my favorite. It’s hard to pin down one favorite, but the interview you’re about to hear is certainly in my top five. I found David Cassidy, who was it then 44 years old, to be one of the most thoughtful, introspective, smartest, and most likeable people I’ve ever interviewed.

David Cassidy died in 2017. He was 67.

Mickey Rooney

Bill Thompson

In nearly thirty years of interviewing celebrities and big names, I didn’t often get very Starstruck, but this day I did.

It’s hard to overstate how big a star Mickey Rooney was. For decades, he was one of the most recognizable names and faces in all of Hollywood. If you’ve ever watched one of his movies on one of the classic movie networks, you know his Andy Hardy series, and all those hey kids, let’s put on a show movies with Judy Garland.

To the general public, Mickey was known primarily for two things: his height, he was only five foot three, and his marriages, of which there were many.

So when he published his Memoirs in 1994, I jumped at the chance to interview him.

But as you’re about to hear, Mickey wanted to talk about not just the book he was there to promote, but all his other books. I think he was a frustrated author at heart.

Anyway, here now, from 1994, the great Mickey Rooney.

Had he lived, Mickey Rooney would ha veeb 100 today. He died in 2014, at the age of 93.

June Lockhart

Bill Thompson
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Today’s episode is for my baby boomers. Because we all remember June Lockhart, whether it’s from Lassie, Lost in Space, or even Petticoat Junction.

June Lockhart, child of Hollywood parents, has been a fixture classic TV for decades.

She typically played a firm but loving mom, someone we can all relate to.
I met her in 2001, after she’d written a memoir.

So here now, from 2001, June Lockhart.

June Loclhart is 95 now, and makes occasional appearances at classic TV fan showes.

Whoopi Goldberg

Bill Thompson
Photo: Daniel Langer

Whoopi Goldberg has been entertaining us for almost 40 years, in movies like “The Color Purple,” “Ghost,” and “Sister Act” as well as TV’s “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” and of course, on ABC’s “The View.”

I met her in 1997, after she wrote a book called “Book.” It was a kind of stream-of-consciousness effort, with chapters each having a single syllable word as their title.

And our interview was kind of stream-of-consciousness, too.

So here now, from 1997, Whoopi Goldberg.

Whoopi Goldberg will be 65 in November.

She lives in New Jersey.

Melissa Anderson

Bill Thompson

It was 46 years ago this week that NBC TV viewers first heard that theme music introducing a series called “Littel House on the Prairie.”

For the next eight years, it was a perennial viewer favorite.

One of the stars of the series was Melissa Anderson — known in those years as “Melissa Sue Anderson”; she’ll explain why, in this interview. Anderson played “Mary,” one member of the Ingalls family.

I met her in 2010, when she wrote a memoir about her years on “Little House.”

So here now, from 2010, Melissa Anderson:

Melissa Anderson will be 58 later this month. She became a naturalized citizen oif Canada in 2007.

And reruns of “Little House on the Prairie” can still be found on TV almost every day.

Maureen O’Hara

Bill Thompson
Maureen O’Hara (center) with Bill and Hillary Thompson

Irish-born redhead Maureen O’Hara knew from an early age she wanted to act. After years of training, she was finally “discovered,” if you will, as ayoung woman by Charles Laughton, considered one of thye world’s finest actors.

Her first movie came in 1938, and it launched an award-winning career that spanned decades.

I met her in 2004. She had just written a memoir that included her recollections of working with some of the greatest names in movie history: director John Ford. Her longtime friend and co-star John Wayne. Even John Candy.

And, as you’re about to hear, she was eyewitness to the start of one of Hollywood’s romances.

So here now, from 2004, Maureen O’Hara.

Maureen O’Hara died in 2015. Next Monday, August 17th, would have been her 100th birthday.

Tracey Ullman

Bill Thompson

She burst onto the American television scene in the late 1980s, when she hosted her own show on the fledgling Fox network.

Phoro: John http://www.celebrity-photos.comMathew Smith

And Tracey Ullman has been a favorite in this country ever since.

Her Fox show ended in 1990, and she next appeared on American television in 1996, on the HBO series Tracey Takes On.

I met her in early 1998, when she published a book that was companion to the HBO series.

So here now, from 1998, Tracey Ullman.

Tracey Ullman is 60 now. According to Wikipedia, she is the richest British actress and female comedian and the third richest British comedian overall.

Noel Neill

Bill Thompson

One of the most popular, and most iconic series from the early days of television was “The Adventures of Superman,” which ran from 1952 to 1958.

George Reeves was Superman / Clark Kent. Jack Larson played young photographer Jimmy Olson, and Noel Neill was reporter Lois Lane.

But, like so many TV stars, Neill saw her career take a new and unexpected path, and not necessarily the path she had planned.

I met her in 2003. She was still very popular on the campus and classic-TV circuit, and she was then promoting an authorized biography called “Truth, Justice and the American Way.”

So here now, from 2003, Noel Neill.

Noel Neill died in 2016. She was 95.

Jim Gaffigan

Bill Thompson

If you know Jim Gaffigan’s comedy, you know he has a big family, five kids.

He was one of six kids, his wife was one of nine. So they know big famililes.

I met Jim in 2013, when he wrote a memoir that was funny and poignant and reflective — as was our interview.

His book was called “Dad is Fat.”

So here now, from 2013, Jim Gaffigan.

Jim Gaffigan just turned 54 earlier this month. He and his wife Jeannie and their five kids live in Manhattan.

Ally Sheedy

Bill Thompson
Photo: Bridget Laudien

In the 1980s movies like The Breakfast Club, St. Elmo’s Fire, WarGames, and Short Circuit made Ally Sheedy a star. She was a prominent member of the so-called Brat Pack.

I met her in 1991 when, at age 28, she had just published a collection of her poetry. Many of the poems in her book dated back to her teenage years. But as she remionded me, it’s not like she was new to writing, or publishing.

So here now, from 1991, Ally Sheedy.

Ally Sheedy is 58 now. She was most recently seen in 2016’s X Men: Apocalypse. But her 1991 book Yesterday I Saw the Sun was the last book she’s published.