November 21, 2017
by John Larson
Singer/actor David Cassidy has died at the age of 67. He passed away on November 21, 2017, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where he had been hospitalized for organ failure. Earlier this year, Cassidy announced that he was diagnosed with dementia and would stop performing. Cassidy, a former teen idol, first rose to fame in the early 1970s as the star of the musical sitcom “The Partridge Family,” which also starred Shirley Jones, his stepmother at the time. Cassidy is best known for the Partridge Family hit “I Think I Love You.” According to a Cassidy family statement published by the Associated Press: “David died surrounded by those he loved, with joy in his heart and free from the pain that had gripped him for so long, Thank you for the abundance and support you have shown him these many years.”
Cassidy came from a showbiz family. His father was actor Jack Cassidy. David’s half-brother Shaun Cassidy was briefly a teen idol in the late 1970s as an actor and singer. David’s daughter Katie is an actress.
Although he starred in well-received productions on Broadway and in Las Vegas, David was never able to recapture the success that he had in the 1970s. His career in subsequent years was an up-and-down rollercoaster of attempted comebacks and deliberate efforts to shed his past image as a teen idol. A self-admitted alcoholic, David was arrested multiple times for DUI. He was married and divorced three times, with his last marriage ending in 2014. David Cassidy is survived by his daughter Katie and son Beau.