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Obit: David Nelson, 74; "Ozzie And Harriet"

Ironic that the Nelson family was considered the quintessential American family on TV during the 1950s and early 60s when in fact they were the complete opposite in real life.

David dropped out of high school. Ozzie was a workaholic. And Rick later became involved in drugs.
 
I had heard earlier that David had dropped out of high school,too. Drop out of Hollywood High?! The obit says he did graduate and at least attended USC.
 
The Voice of Reason said:
Ironic that the Nelson family was considered the quintessential American family on TV during the 1950s and early 60s when in fact they were the complete opposite in real life.

David dropped out of high school. Ozzie was a workaholic. And Rick later became involved in drugs.
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Thats the way it usually is. Take Lucille Ball for example..everyone "loves" Lucy. Many years ago I had a co-worker who back in the early 60's ( 1964 to be exact ) had actually worked with Lucy. Of course I had asked him what Lucy was really like, however the words he had used to describe Lucille Ball, well Radio-Info will not allow them to be used here. :eek:

And yes whnever he told his story to Lucy fans it was always "..NO NO NO..Can NOT be true..Lucy is such a nice woman..". Even if the closet they had got to Lucy was watching her on television.
 
mleach said:
Take Lucille Ball for example..everyone "loves" Lucy. Many years ago I had a co-worker who back in the early 60's ( 1964 to be exact ) had actually worked with Lucy. Of course I had asked him what Lucy was really like, however the words he had used to describe Lucille Ball, well Radio-Info will not allow them to be used here. :eek:

And yes whnever he told his story to Lucy fans it was always "..NO NO NO..Can NOT be true..Lucy is such a nice woman..". Even if the closet they had got to Lucy was watching her on television.
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Look at Red Skelton as another example. He came across the air as the nice god loving guy when in truth he treated his writers like crap, and showed porno movies at his house.

Milton Berle was another "monster" to his staff; especially his writers.

What you see on TV are people acting out a role. I'm willing to bet that 8 out of 10 Hollywood celebrities are mean SOB's in real life.
 
Milton Berle was another "monster" to his staff; especially his writers.

Yeah, but the difference is Berle never pretended to be a "nice" guy. He was a d*ck and didn't care who knew it. If you worked for him or associated with him, you knew what you were getting.
 
There were many child TV stars of the 50s and 60s whose lives went downhill after their shows ended. Rusty Hamer, who played Rusty on The Danny Thomas Show, ended up committing suicide. Anissa Jones, who played Buffy on Family Affair, died of a drug overdose. Just a pair of examples of child TV stars who couldn't live up to their small screen images. :(
 
radioguy39nj said:
There were many child TV stars of the 50s and 60s whose lives went downhill after their shows ended. Rusty Hamer, who played Rusty on The Danny Thomas Show, ended up committing suicide. Anissa Jones, who played Buffy on Family Affair, died of a drug overdose. Just a pair of examples of child TV stars who couldn't live up to their small screen images. :(
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In the case of Anissa Jones it was her personal choice to leave show business only to end up being associated with a bad crowd and not too mention a very horrible home life to boot too. Come to think of it I think it was the bio on E! that had mentioned that Jones had actually received a number of offers to do TV and even movies after Family Affair including a few from Sid & Marty Kroft and even Disney..but Anissa didn't want any part of it. It was her choice which ended up being a bad choice for her.
 
I have no strong feelings either way about David Nelson, but this thread has taken an odd turn from mentioning that he didn't lead a perfect life - to comparing him to big stars that were "monsters" and others that died young from suicide and drug ODs.

What's the deal with that? No, he didn't lead a perfect life...I haven't either, have you people? Nelson lived his life, took a wife, raised a family, continued to work in television with moderate success. Then he died at a reasonalby old age from cancer.

Give the guy a break.
 
To understand the appeal of "Ozzie and Harriett" you have to understand the comedy shows of the 50's. As outlined in David's obit in the L.A. Times that was the most popular show on TV for some time and the Nelsons were "America's family". Although we knew it had to happen someday it is saddening for those who grew up with them to see the passing of the last of a family who were such a large part of our childhood. I can clearly remember as late as '58 every schoolmate I knew was a faithful viewer of their show - if not only to watch Rick Nelson sing.

As some incorrect information about David has been posted here I suggest reading David's obit:
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-david-nelson-20110112,0,1039470.story
 
Lkeller said:
I have no strong feelings either way about David Nelson, but this thread has taken an odd turn from mentioning that he didn't lead a perfect life - to comparing him to big stars that were "monsters" and others that died young from suicide and drug ODs.

What's the deal with that? No, he didn't lead a perfect life...I haven't either, have you people? Nelson lived his life, took a wife, raised a family, continued to work in television with moderate success. Then he died at a reasonalby old age from cancer.

Give the guy a break.
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I believe what it is, is that many many believe ( though not so much with those on this site ) have this this "idea" that those who appear on TV ( heck even radio ) are exactly the same person in real life as they had appeared on the air and when they hear otherwise, they just can't believe it. After spending close to 20 years in the business I am still surprised when I hear from those who are "shocked" when they hear otherwise such as that friendly local morning dj who reality is an SOB (of course not saying that David Nelson was ). I myself had learned that bit of logic the hard way when I had interned in local Denver radio & TV 21 years ago.

Afterall the "stars" are people too as they do have a life.
 
And we all have good and bad day's, perhaps some of these folks ran into these stars on a bad day. And Lucy was a business woman so someone working with her is going to have a much better picture of what she was really like. Sorry to hear of David Nelson's passing, I'm sorry for his family and fans and happy for him as he has now been reunited with his family in the afterlife!
 
I've read a few bios on Lucille Ball and from her own daughter Lucie there seems to be a consensus, that Lucille didn't become "the 'B'" word until after she left Desi. Before that Lucille left most of the creative and corporate work to Desi. He handled the behind the scenes stuff. After Desi left, Lucy took on that role and according to Lucie Arnaz Jr, didn't really like running a company. She got even worse when she bought out Desi and even worse after she sold Desilu and formed a new production company.

Everyone has different stories. I have the "Family Affair" DVDs and Kathy Garver and others discuss child stars. She notes that Anissa didn't want to do show business things. Garver also claims that Anissa hardly died broke having over a hundred grand in the bank at the time of her death.

Garver and others on the DVD noted the biggest difference between child stars like her and Johnny "Jodie" Whitaker, was her parents had regular jobs and never spent one dime of her money. Whitaker's father was his manager and used his "salary" to support the family. Although Whitaker reports he had close to a million dollars available to him when he turned 21, and blew it as an alcoholic.

Pamelyn Ferdin (Voice of Lucy on "Peanuts" cartoons) was on the DVDs and noted that her mother was astonished that she wanted to quit show biz and go to school, which she did. She became a nurse.

I think a big difference is child stars (as well as other stars) didn't really earn the same amount as stars do now. Jerry "Beaver" Mathers said he was offered an "extention" contract after "Leave it to Beaver" was cancelled and his parents asked him, did he want it. He said "No, I'd rather go to high school." So he did. And when asked what he did with all the money he earned, he said, "I went to college." And he said, his parents never spent any of his money and what he earned paid for a car and his college education.

So even though he was the "star" of a series, and his parents did right by him, he still only earned enough to pay for a car and a college educaiton. Hardly a fortune.

I think a lot of it goes into how the parents are involved with the kids.
 
I think it was easy to see though the interviews that Lucille Ball did that she was tough and didn't stand for any nonsense. She had to be strong to keep going as long as she did. I seem to remember son Desi was going around with Patty Duke and although Patty denies it I heard at the time Lucy didn't like that at all.

Paul Peterson of "The Donna Reed Show" fame used to have a support group for child stars. He said when it came to TV fame parents are often caught like a deer in the headlights. I think the child stars that suffer the most are the ones that get caught up in it and then when it's over, then when it's over they have no idea what to do. If you peak before you're 18 and then nobody wants you anymore that must be a real downer!

Here's to David Nelson and all the other in all the perfect TV families. Thanks for all the entertainment through the years.
 
Goonight, Ozzie. Goodnight, Harriet. Goodnight, Ricky. Goodnight, David.
 
Want to read a great book? Get "A Book" By Desi Arnez. The man was the brains of the pair and his book say's it all! He pioneered the three camera film concept for filming sitcoms. The industry owes him some serious credit. He was a genius and did some real work putting Desilu together! A great read. The Nelson's will be missed for sure.
 
Neil Rattigan said:
Ozzie, for example, would only have Ricky perform on their show. He even turned down Dick Clark, and their shows were on the same network, ABC.
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This is why it bothered me when Brad Paisley portrayed Ricky in a fictitious Bandstand appearance on American Dreams. Elvis Presley and the Beatles also never made Bandstand appearances, but it was never misrepresented on Dreams that they ever did. Since Clark produced Dreams, it puzzled me as to why he would stage a fictitious Nelson appearance on Bandstand.
 
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