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August 10, 1998
BY MIRIAM DI NUNZIO STAFF REPORTER
You'd never know it from a glance at the publicity photos--Bobby Sherman is 55 years old. No way. No matter. He's still ``Here Come the Brides'' cute.
All right, let's admit it. We were kids when that TV show became a big hit for ABC back in the late '60s. Sherman and his television character, Jeremy Bolt, were big business among girls nationwide. Lunch boxes, 45s, posters, pictures, fan magazines--we bought them all, traded them, pined for the items we couldn't have.
| Former Hermit Noone has got a lovely patter
With sales of 52 million records and 23 Top 10 hits, Herman's Hermits became one of the most successful British invasion bands of all time. (They even out-sold the Beatles in 1965.)
Their hits included ``There's a Kind of Hush All Over the World,'' ``I'm Into Something Good'' and ``Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter.'' But the Hermits' 10-year career had run its course when they disbanded in 1972.
For Peter Noone, the Herman of the Hermits, it was the best time of his life--until, of course, the Teen Idols Tour, he says.
Noone, a classically trained musician, also has worked as an actor, boutique owner and was the host of VH1's ``My Generation'' for three years. With laptop in tow, he keeps in touch daily with his legions of fans through his Web site, www.peternoone.com
Speaking in between bites of hotel-pillow chocolate, he flashed his dry wit while discussing everything from fame to underwear:
On show business: ``I would hate to suggest that I or any of these people I'm working with on the tour are lightweights. But you know, it's not brain surgery. It's about how you can make the audience not be disappointed. And you have to look good, because the audience doesn't want to see three fat guys.''
On the drug scene in the '60s: ``I hated that whole paraphernalia-psychedelic scene. It was a bore. It was a guy thing. Nowadays? I don't drink. I don't smoke. I don't swallow. I don't inhale. I don't exhale.''
On rock 'n' roll in the '60s: ``We were all kids. If you study rock 'n' roll, there are not many great rock records made by people over 25, save for the Stones. You had to have your own sound back then. You couldn't sound like the Beatles or the Dave Clark Five. That's why we did the first English accents on rock 'n' roll records.''
On his tour co-stars: ``I don't wear makeup or do my hair. I mean, I don't want to look like John Davidson. Davy and Bobby spray themselves with formaldehyde for about an hour before every show. I tease Davy, because his repartee is not too good. Neither is his toupee.''
On the tour groupies: ``They're older than they used to be. When they throw underwear on the stage, it's much bigger these days.''
--Miriam Di Nunzio
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He was the genuine article. A bona fide teen idol.
Sherman still can lay claim to that status; he's part of the Teen Idols Tour, which comes to the Rosemont Theatre on Saturday.
Sharing the concert bill are two other '60s pop stars--Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits and Davy Jones of the Monkees. But enough about them.
``I'm so amazed at the reaction because it's been about 25 years since I've been out there,'' Sherman says, calling from a tour stop in Louisiana. ``I didn't know what to expect--from the size of the crowd to the level of enthusiasm they bring. It's like going back to the early '70s.''
As the '70s ended, Sherman's show business career faded. By the early '80s, he turned to a new career as an emergency medical technician. Devoted to his new calling, he landed a job in 1991 with the Los Angeles Police Department, where he still works as the chief emergency medical training officer.
Volunteering countless hours each month, Sherman instructs police academy cadets and recertifies police officers in CPR, first aid and other lifesaving procedures. In June, he graduated with the rank of technical reserve specialist officer for the LAPD. He doesn't need the money--he donates his salary.
``It's been the most rewarding endeavor in my life,'' he says. ``Many times, police officers are the first ones on the [accident] scene, and if there's a medical emergency they have to deal with, they're trained to handle it.''
He's had a lot to handle over the years. In true Hollywood style, Sherman was ``discovered'' in 1964 at a tony party after his girlfriend asked him to sing ``Happy Birthday.''
``After much champagne--I sang,'' he says laughing. ``Afterward, Sal Mineo, Natalie Wood and Jane Fonda came up to ask who was handling me? I had no idea what that meant, but they took my number, and three days later, a guy called me, said he was an agent and asked me to meet him at [ABC] studios.''
Sherman, on summer break from college, flipped a coin to decide his fate. It came up heads and off he went to a job as a $750-a-week singer for the TV music series ``Shindig.''
``When they couldn't get the original artists to come on and sing their latest hits, I'd do the honors,'' he says. ``So it was Bobby Sherman singing `Can't Get No Satisfaction,' which of course paled in the translation, but we were current.''
When ``Shindig'' went off the air in 1966, Sherman toured briefly with a Dick Clark ensemble concert show and then nabbed a guest spot on the Monkees' hit TV series.
``It was a fun opportunity, but more importantly, it put me at Screen Gems [productions], where I got an audition for a new project, `Here Come the Brides.' ''
Sherman worked on the series five days a week, toured on the weekends in concert--this time as a solo artist--and averaged 30,000 pieces of fan mail weekly.
``I was always on the road or in the studio. It was great and surreal on the road. I could lip-synch to a Supremes song and nobody would have known the difference because the fans just screamed through everything.''
Hits such as ``Julie, Do Ya Love Me,'' ``Hey Little Woman,'' and ``Easy Come, Easy Go'' added up to record sales of more than 10 million. He racked up guest shots on TV shows, had his own series, ``Getting Together,'' and then seemingly left it all behind.
``It never was a matter of walking away from show business, but moving on to other interests,'' Sherman says. ``Things got cold around 1975. That's what this business does. It has peaks and valleys, and what performers have to realize is that when it does get cold, you have to have other things prepared to do. Otherwise, you go batty and do a lot of stupid things, and a lot of other performers have done just that. Luckily I had the time and ability, so I produced, directed.''
Some of his abilities turned out to be non-musical. While navigating the Los Angeles freeway system, Sherman decided to switch to a medical career.
``I'd be driving and see an accident site, and there would invariably be people standing around, not being able to help, not because they didn't want to, they just didn't know what to do,'' he says. ``So I'd stop and render some basic aid.''
``Bobby took this all very, very seriously from the onset,'' says former Los Angeles Deputy Fire Chief Alan Cowen. ``He sweated out the books, the classes, the 120 hours of intense training it took him to become an EMT-1 in Los Angeles. He affected so many people's lives through his records, now he's affecting their lives by saving them, if the situation arises.''
And, yes, on occasion, women recognize Jeremy Bolt when Officer Sherman comes to the rescue.
``It happens,'' he says, laughing. ``They'll look at me, then at my nametag, then they smile and say, `You're him.' It actually helps because it makes them forget about their pain. All of a sudden, I'm a human placebo.''
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