By Gavin Boyle
Susan Olsen, who played Cindy on THE BRADY BUNCH, shared that after finding success on the show, her father wanted her to quit because of the fame.
“My dad was certainly no Hollywood parent,” Olsen told PEOPLE. “He put up a resistance for each of us kids getting involved in the business, but, you know, we all enjoyed it, so he let us do it.”
Olsen’s siblings found mild success in the industry too. Her oldest brother, Larry, starred in ROOM FOR ONE MORE amidst a decade-long career, while her younger brother, Christopher, starred in THE IRON CURTAIN and THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH across from Jimmy Stewart.
Related: THE BRADY BUNCH Stars Share Secrets to the Sitcom’s Success
“None of the kids had to deal with a lot of fame. I’m sure my brothers had a bit of it. I had situations where I got mobbed by fans. People would find out where I lived, and we’d be having dinner, and they’d be looking in the dining room window,” Olsen recalled. “My dad hated that we’d go out to eat at a restaurant and people would come up. He was really, really, really not into fame.”
“That’s when he started trying to bribe me to get out of the show,” she added. “He thought the whole thing was too unnatural, and so, he’d tell me, ‘We’ll get you a horse and riding lessons at Foxfield [Riding School]. Just quit this show.’ And I’m thinking, we can’t afford a horse, let alone Foxfield. Like yeah, that’ll last a year, and then I’ll have no horse and no TV shows.”
For her part, Olsen was not a fan of the fame either. She understood that it was ridiculous and not something she was really made the handle. Though she loved working in the industry, fame was a large reason why she left it.
“I loved the work. I loved my castmates. I really loved the industry. I really liked what I did. I was a kid who wanted a job. [But] fame to me was silly,” Olsen said. “Just really ridiculous. It was like fool’s gold.”
Nonetheless, THE BRADY BUNCH remains one of the most iconic shows in all of television. Surprisingly, however, the show’s original idea would have made it look a lot different as the showrunners planned on focusing on the parents rather than the kids.
“We began the show with a family unit, and then it evolved,” Lloyd Schwartz, a writer and producer on the show, said on an episode of “The Real Brady Bros.” podcast. “It was originally supposed to be about the parents, and the kids were there — six kids were there — and then we realized that the kids couldn’t [not] affect the parents…They were involved in their own lives, and the parents could be there to help them. And so that’s how our show evolved, but it was originally going to be about the parents. But that’s why in the second year we changed the song: ‘So that’s how we became the Brady Bunch.’”
While Olsen may have exited the industry after THE BRADY BUNCH, she is still remembered by millions for her performance and was one of the key players in making the show what it was.
Read Next: Did You Know This Fun Fact About THE BRADY BUNCH?
Questions or comments? Please write to us here.
– Content: +4Share:
– Content: +1