This Brady Kid Hated Doing ‘The Brady Bunch Variety Hour’
The Brady Bunch Variety Hour ran for just a single season, from November 1976 to May 1977, and according to a teenage Christopher Knight, one season was more than enough.
The Sid and Marty Krofft-produced series changed things up for the lovely lady (Florence Henderson) and a man named Brady (Robert Reed), taking their blended family out of the suburbs and onto a soundstage.
The Brady Kids — Maureen McCormick, Susan Olsen, Barry Williams, Mike Lookinland, and Christopher Knight — were suddenly throwing a weekly variety show that would feature appearances by Tony Randall, Donny Osmond, Farrah Fawcett, Tina Turner, Vincent Price, Charo, Rich Little, Redd Foxx, the cast of What’s Happening!!, Paul Williams, and more.
The Brady Bunch Hour aired in ’76, two years after the final episode of The Brady Bunch aired. And most of the original cast came back, save for the noticeable exception of Eve Plumb (resulting in Geri Reischl replacing her as the new “Jan Brady”),
From the sound of it, Knight wished he had followed in Plumb’s footsteps. When speaking with the Utah Sun-Advocate in 1977 (via MeTV), the star who played middle son, Peter Brady, explained how he’d fallen out of love with the Brady life.
When the cast came together to decide if they’d do another season of The Brady Bunch Hour or, as Knight put it, “go their separate ways,” the choice was obvious for him.
“I really didn’t want to do them,” said Knight. “I wanted to act.”
After The Brady Bunch Hour, Knight would appear in Happy Days, The Bionic Woman, and ChiPs. He’d land a central role in Joe’s World, a single-season sitcom starring Ramon Bierri.
Knight would return to the Brady-verse soon afterward. He’d star in the 1981 television movie The Brady Girls Get Married and 1988’s A Very Brady Christmas. Most recently, he and Barry Williams started The Real Brady Bros, a podcast series where the two recap the original Brady Bunch series.
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