Come On Get Happy? ~ A Book Review of 'Random Acts of Badness'

Normally I would not own up that I just read an autobiography by Danny Bonaduce.  For me to openly admit this is akin to someone else coming clean about their drug history for public consumption, which ironically, is Bonaduce’s story.  If you, dear reader, are still with me, allow me to point out that when I first spied this book it was in the discount area of a bookstore sandwiched between all the ‘Dora the Explorer’ novelty games.  Yes, games, not books.  This struck me as very funny that poor Danny Bonaduce is the Rodney Dangerfield of former child actors – no respect.

I should confess, I was drawn to this confessional because I have always been a fan of ‘The Partridge Family.’  As far as mindless 70’s sitcoms went, I thought it was funny show.  I always enjoyed the triangle of intrigue between, Reuben Kincaid (the band’s manager played by Dave Madden) Keith Partridge (David Cassidy) and Danny Partridge (Bonaduce).  I was surprised to learn, in a Gen X sort of way, that ‘Partridge’ only lasted 96 episodes, which tends to explain why it doesn’t seem get a lot of air time on cable networks.

Overall, the thing about Danny Partridge was that he fell into the classic American Tom Sawyer mode and in many ways was the heart of the show despite David Cassidy’s pop star appeal and Shirley Jones’s background in musical theater.  Danny Partridge as played by Bonaduce was the right combination of charlatan, brother, and redheaded stepchild.  If he seemed like a know-it-all brat on the small screen, apparently he was all that and a bag of chips, along with a carton of cigarettes, in real life.

Bonaduce alludes to a childhood involving a rageoholic father, but doesn’t dwell on it.  Apparently, his parents divorced for reasons the reader knows by reading between the lines, and father and son eventually become estranged.  The end result, Bonaduce’s mother couldn’t control his behavior post sitcom and thus surrendered him at sixteen to live in an apartment and drain the savings he earned off the series.

Bonaduce attended high school at the now defunct Cal Prep where his fellow classmates included such luminaries of intellectual excellence as Michael Jackson, Christopher Brando, and Tony DeFranko.  To say this school was dedicated to pampering the pampered and indulging the indulged is an understatement.  Upon graduation Bonaduce was probably already addicted to drugs.  From there, everything else went down hill.

As I noted earlier, I came across this book in the discount section.  I was with a friend and made some joke about it which led me to opening it up and reading the chapter about Bonaduce’s boxing match with Donny Osmond (is he still hanging out on Gather?) which was surprisingly well-written and about as funny as one could assume a boxing match between an Osmond and former Partridge would be.  My friend bought the book for five bucks and then I borrowed it (don’t look at me like that, I lend her things all the time).

Aside from that particular chapter, this book isn’t an upper.  Perhaps because it was written in 2001 and thus I know that Bonaduce didn’t remain sedate – he starred in a reality program that I never watched but was aware of through various clips on ‘The Soup,’ (it appeared as if Bonaduce’s life was very raw and not amusing).  Diagnosed as bi-polar, Bonaduce demonstrates a destructive streak throughout the book.  It wasn’t as if he was the first celebrity to lose it all and end up living in poverty while at the same time still being recognized for his signature role, but he does seem to have a sense of humor that remained in tact despite his reduced circumstances.  Within the pages, he appeared both humble and a braggart and his tome read like a Howard Stern effort with literary references and addiction tales thrown into the mix.

I don’t know if I could exactly recommend reading this book because it left me feeling both emotionally spent and unsatisfied – there is a lot more written about Bonaduce’s life on the street than amusing anecdotes from his Danny Partridge days.  I do admire that at the time it was published he appeared to have been able to get his life together enough to hold down a job and presumably stay off drugs.  He credited his wife with much of his success, which read as if he put her on a pedestal, which is always a red flag to me because the inevitable happens and the overly praised often quickly fall from grace.  As I was doing research on this article, I came across information stating the two were divorcing.

By the end of the book, I thought Bonaduce was both clear-minded and muddled in his thoughts.  The overall affect was that I felt this book presented the facts, but left out too much feeling.  Reading it was like sitting at a dive bar and listening to a stranger tell an engaging story which leads to another story and then another.  After an hour all the stories sound the same, but you aren’t drunk enough yet not to have noticed.