McCormick runs the ‘Inn’ for new CMT sitcom
Here’s the story of a lovely lady who’s transforming her “Brady Bunch” image.
Forever known for her iconic television role as Marcia Brady, the blond beauty who famously took a football hit to the nose, Maureen McCormick recently competed in the first round of the Country Music Television singing contest “Gone Country.” She returns to CMT by starring in the comedy series “Outsider’s Inn,” premiering at 9 p. m. Friday (the same night “Gone Country” launches its second season at 8 p. m.).
Essentially playing herself, same name and all, McCormick is captivated by a bed-and-breakfast inn she finds in Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains and decides to take it over. Her real-life husband and daughter are mentioned though not seen, but her “Gone Country”-mates Bobby Brown and Carnie Wilson are on hand, helping her run the operation.
McCormick’s CMT association isn’t such a far cry: She had the title role — and did her own crooning — in the 1997 TV movie “Get to the Heart: The Barbara Mandrell Story.” She recalls having done “Gone Country” as “a dream come true. To be a Nashville singer has always been a dream of mine, but this new show is more like ‘Newhart’ meets ‘The Simple Life.’ It’s semiscripted, so I don’t consider it a reality show; it’s more of a hybrid.”
Other television stars have put fictionalized spins on themselves, perhaps most famously in “Seinfeld.” Despite such precedents, the pleasant McCormick says “it’s very strange. When you see me on the show, I’m totally being myself. What you see is what you get. You see my reactions to various situations that I normally wouldn’t be experiencing.”
It’s a position McCormick might not have put herself in earlier. Previously more guarded about her life and times than some of her “Brady Bunch” comrades, notably Barry Williams (who wrote the best-seller “Growing Up Brady”) and Christopher Knight (who has shared his marriage quite publicly on the VH1 series “My Fair Brady”), she’s changed that stance greatly.
McCormick has talked about her “Brady”-era bout with bulimia. And last year alone, she shaped up before a national audience on VH1’s “Celebrity Fit Club,” she discussed her family problems on “Dr. Phil,” and she revealed the cocaine addiction she had for several years. She’ll offer more details in her autobiographical book “Here’s the Story: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice,” to be published in October.
“Warts and all, that’s what I’m doing,” McCormick confirms, “and I absolutely love it! I love not hiding and just being me. I think I’m at a point in my life where I’ve grown to accept the good and the bad and the ugly. I think a lot can be learned when you reach that point.”
Still, McCormick had — but rarely used — the right to draw the line on “Outsider’s Inn” ideas, lest viewers confuse “television Maureen” with the real one.
“There’s an episode where I get hypnotized and before the whole thing happened, they said, ‘If you don’t want to do this, that’s OK.’ I said, ‘No, let’s go for it. I’ve never done it.’ This is the most fun I’ve ever had in my whole career,” she says.
Reuniting with Brown and Wilson was a big factor in doing this show for McCormick. “The chemistry between us was just immediate. All three of us have been through a lot in our lives. We’re all survivors, and I think we’ve all formed a really strong bond with one another.”
As for other “Outsider’s” reunions, McCormick is purposely cagey on whether any other ex-“Bradys” find room at the inn. “There are some surprises, definitely,” she allows. “I do have some friends who show up, let me say that.”
Communication remains strong among those who were bunched as Bradys. “Florence Henderson and I just did a spoof for the TV Land Awards, and it was incredible to see her,” McCormick says. “We’re getting together for lunch very soon, and I’m also getting together with Chris Knight and Barry Williams for dinner.”
The “Brady Bunch” legend that has followed McCormick for almost 40 years remains “a real, real trip” for her. “I’m still amazed when a 5-year-old comes up to me and says, ‘Marcia’s my favorite!’ When I was in Tennessee filming this show, this one little girl came up and had a Marcia doll, a Marcia bobblehead, just everything Marcia. It was so funny to see. It always throws me off when new generations are growing up with it.”
And McCormick knows it could have been a different story, had any element of the classic series changed — like Gene Hackman being cast as family patriarch Mike Brady instead of Robert Reed, which was the original plan.
“I never, ever had any idea” the show would be so enduring, McCormick says. “It’s just been a part of Americana, and it doesn’t go away. It just seems to get stronger.”
On the cover: Carnie Wilson, from left, Bobby Brown and Maureen McCormick.
