Everyone knows The Brady Bunch. No matter what decade you were raised in, you at least know of and probably spent a reasonable amount of your childhood being exposed to America’s most famous blended family. Despite the popularity of The Brady Bunch, you’d likely be hard pressed to come with the first names of all nine members of the household (10 if you want to include the family dog.)
Much to middle daughter Jan’s dismay, almost everyone remembers the eldest daughter Marcia … Marcia, Marcia, Marcia! Capitalizing on that popularity, Dancing with the Stars has cast Marcia’s original actress, Maureen McCormick, in season 23. Here are four other things you need to know about Maureen McCormick.
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She’s Been on Many Reality Shows
Dancing with the Stars is not Maureen McCormick’s first foray into reality TV, not by a long shot. Maureen has worked as an actress following the end of The Brady Bunch (though a lot of her gigs have been portraying Marcia) but she has been on a bit of a reality TV kick since the 2000s. After appearing on VH1’s Celebrity Fit Club in 2007, Maureen has appeared on CMT’s Gone Country and its spin-off Outsiders Inn. Most recently, before Dancing with the Stars, she appeared on Australia’s version of I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!
It’s Maureen’s Gone Country experience that is probably the most interesting. The show was all about turning celebrities into country singers. It gave Maureen a chance to show off her own singing voice, which is surprisingly polished and pleasant. It turns out that Marcia’s singing on The Brady Bunch was not entirely faked or dubbed.
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She’s Struggled with Drug Addiction
Like many child stars and many child stars who have appeared on Dancing with the Stars, Maureen McCormick struggled with drug addiction, depression and eating disorders following her stint on TV. Maureen went into detail about her struggles in her memoir, Here’s the Story: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice. She also gave an interview to Today.com when the book was being released.
During the interview, Maureen said, “I hit rock bottom when I was doing The Brady Brides. I was supposed to be at the studio, screen testing to pick the guy that would play my husband. At this time, I had been up for three days doing coke and was playing solitaire in my closet. My agent had to go to the sixth floor, climb into my place, tear off my clothes and get me in the shower. He said, ‘You have to get to Paramount right now, and you have a problem.’ I couldn’t hide anymore. Everyone knew — the producers knew, everyone at Paramount knew, the guys testing to play my husband knew. It was the first time I had to face that I really had a problem.”
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She Did Date Her (TV) Brother
There have been a lot of scandalous rumors and jokes about the sex and romance that must have been going on behind the scenes on The Brady Bunch. In one case the stories are true, though they aren’t nearly as wild as people might imagine. During The Brady Bunch Maureen did briefly date actor Barry Williams, who played her brother Greg. According to both Maureen and Barry’s memoirs, the two did kiss during the filming of the Hawaii episode of The Brady Bunch but things did not last very long. The shortness of the relationship was mainly because producers were terrified what a potential break-up would do to the show.
She’s Not Afraid to Make Fun of Marcia
Though Maureen has made a career out of her most famous role she is not afraid to have fun with Marcia Brady. She has made several cameos where she has poked fun at herself and Marcia in TV shows and movies. One of the best has to be her time on Scrubs when she appeared in a dream sequence of main character J.D. as he imagined his wedding to Marcia Brady.
Watch Maureen McCormick compete on Dancing with the Stars season 23 starting Monday, September 12 at 8pm on ABC.
(Image courtesy of ABC, videos courtesy of CMT and YouTube)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
Derek is a Philadelphia based writer and unabashed TV and comic book junkie. The time he doesn’t spend over analyzing all things nerdy he is working on his resume to be the liaison to the Justice League.
