Barry Williams(I)
- Actor
- Writer
- Animation Department
Barry William Blenkhorn grew up in Santa Monica, California and, after
he turned 4 years old, he became one of those annoying kids who were
bound and determined to get into show business. He was neighbors with
actor Peter Graves whom he idolized
and asked for advice on how to become an actor and his response was
that he just thought about it. At the age of 11, he changed his name
from Barry William Blenkhorn to Barry Williams. He then got an acting
coach and took some scene study courses in Sherman Oaks and took
courses for film and television techniques which later he landed a lead
role in an educational school industrial called "Why Johnny Can Read"
and landed roles in TV commercials. Then he had guest roles in TV shows
such as
Run for Your Life (1965),
Here Come the Brides (1968),
It Takes a Thief (1968),
Marcus Welby, M.D. (1969)
and
Mission: Impossible (1966),
but then success came for him when he landed the role of "Greg Brady"
in the blockbuster hit family sitcom series
The Brady Bunch (1969).
After the first season, he and his TV siblings made a Christmas album
signed by Paramount Records which sold terribly as critics called them
6 kids who couldn't sing so Barry took singing lessons and released a
single by the same record company called "Sweet Sweetheart" hoping to
have a solo album released but producers thought he should wait for
that moment while he was making records with his TV siblings as they
made 3 more records, did summer tours and had their own animated TV
series The Brady Kids (1972)
on which some of their songs were featured. After the series ended in
1974, Barry started performing solo in concerts and then took up
musical theatre and landed numerous successful roles in shows like
"Pippin", "West Side Story", "Oklahoma", "Movie Star", "Grease", "The
Music Man", "Romance/Romance", "City of Angels" and "The Sound of
Music" and still did the odd acting appearance in front of the camera
like in Police Woman (1974),
Three's Company (1976),
Highway to Heaven (1984),
Murder, She Wrote (1984),
and a stint on the daytime soap
General Hospital (1963) and
the MTV series
Hollywood 7 (2001)
as well as in all the "Brady Bunch" reunion shows. In 1978, he did try
taking a shot at pursuing a solo career and signed up with Private
Stock records but their label went out of business. However, in 1999,
he did release a tribute album called "The Return of Johnny Bravo"
doing cover songs that expressed him as a singer as well as celebrating
30 years of
The Brady Bunch (1969). He
continues to do musical theatre as well as touring with his music and
public speaking.