Ever wonder what it would be like to date Davy Jones? Sure you have! Well, let one of his favourite girlfriends, Twiggy-like singer Marcia Strassman, tell you what it’s really like . . . as told to Carol Taylor
Article published in IN magazine, April 1968
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones | They met in New York City, among the towering grey buildings and rehearsal halls when both were struggling for recognition and daily meals. He was in Oliver! and she was in Best Foot Forward. A mutual friend introduced them backstage one evening after a performance of Oliver!
Now, he’s Monkee Davy Jones, the singing idol of teenagers all over the world. She’s Twiggy-built singer-actress Marcia Strassman, who recorded the hit version of “The Flower Children.”
Today, the young man from Manchester, England and the slender girl from Fort Lee, New Jersey are a familiar pair at such ‘in’ night spots as “The Factory”, where they frug away an evening, or Steffanino’s for a cozy, quiet dinner, or The Ad Lib on Sunset Strip to catch some rising performer. Recently, they “caught” the Lewis and Clark Expedition at Ledbetters, a famous spot with Western Gay 90’s atmosphere.
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones
When I went to interview her, Marcia answered the door to her recently acquired Beverly Hills apartment dressed in brown plaid, leggy hip hugger slacks and a dark brown, crepe body shirt. She extended her long, tapered hand in a firm but warm handshake and sat down with a huge glass of diet Pepsi.
She’s a tall (5’9″), svelte, throaty-toned girl with soft brown, boyish, close cropped hair, and huge, pensive, expressive, long lashed eyes and a sensual mouth.
“How did you become a flower child!” I asked sharing a soft drink.
“I didn’t start out that way,” she laughed. “I auditioned for Best Foot Forward nine times, and enrolled in a professional children’s school (she was 15 then) in preparation for my stage debut. When Lisa Minelli left the show, the producers asked me ‘to replace her, so I did.
After the show closed, the next thing I did was Days of Dancing at the Actor’s Studio in New York with Shelly Winters and Robert Walker, Jr. I worked in some commercials in between, and then I toured with Walter Pigeon in Take Her, She’s Mine. Then I moved out here and signed a contract with Universal Pictures and records. My first record was “The Flower Children,” and I’m recording a new one called “Self Analysis.” “
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones
Is being tall a disadvantage?” I asked.
“I found it to be a disadvantage in the past, especially in New York, where all the parts for young girls are ingenue roles. I’m too tall and my voice is too deep for those parts. But here in Hollywood, you have to be different from all the other thousands of girls wanting to be a star, and my height makes me different. It keeps me remembered.”
“What about when you and Davy date?” I continued. (He’s a mere 5’3″).
“I don’t think that height makes any difference to either of us. We’re just two people who happen to be of different heights,” she commented, tapping her slim fingers on the coffee table.
“What is a fun date for you generally like?” I wanted to know.
“Going to the beach for dinner and then a movie or playing pool or going to someone’s house and being with people you like and just talking. I love British films and Big Sur country.”
“Do you primarily date people in show business, like Davy?”
“Yes, they’re the only people I know or come into contact with. I always look though for honesty and warmth. If I don’t like someone when I first meet them, then I never really do, and I never trust them, because in the past those friendships always let me down in the end.”
“How long have you known Davy?” I continued.
“I’ve known him for five years,” she said in a husky voice, stretching her legs out on the sofa.
“What’s it like to date Davy?”
“If we go to some place like the Whiskey A Go-Go, people stare or scream, or cars screech and if we go to other places that are a little less ‘in,’ it’s just like any other date.
“If someone comes up to Davy for an autograph, I just disappear until the fan or fans leave. I’m not one of those people who can sit there and look interested in something or someone else and pretend not to notice what’s going on.”
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones
On the set of the Monkees’ regular TV series the atmosphere is always spontaneous and light hearted.
“It’s chaos and always funny,” Marcia giggled. “The other day Mick and Davy unrolled a whole huge roll of scotch tape all over the set and people kept walking into it and getting stuck.”
“Do you think success has changed Davy, Marcia?” I questioned.
“Basically he’s the same guy he’s always been. Having money and being famous have made changes in his life, but not his personality.”
Davy himself views show business rather sceptically.
“You never know what will happen in this business. I’m gonna make a couple hundred thousand, then I’m gonna get outta here and set up a riding stable at home. I want to be a jockey again,” he admits, the huge famous grin momentarily vacant from his mobile face.
On a recent trip back to Manchester, where he bought his father a huge new home, he took out a jockey license and rode 26 winners. Davy was a jockey in England long before he came to America to become a singing idol.
“What are the other Monkees like?” I inquired of Marcia.
“I don’t know Mike really. Mick, well, he’s crazy and fabulously funny. Peter is brilliant, a real intellectual.”
And what about Marcia Strassman, one of the very few girls Davy Jones continues to see on a regular basis? She’s a candid person with a sense of humour; a mischievous quality that is uniquely her own. But she is also an opinionated, determined and, talented young lady, who knows where she’d like to go.
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones
“The most important thing in my life is becoming a star. That might eventually give me inner peace, but what then is inner peace? I’m sure wealth and fame give some people inner peace. But I might find out that being a star doesn’t give me any kind of peace at all.
“I want to become a star and a good actress and have a couple of Oscars on my bookshelves. Right now I’m just trying to get work. I just completed my first movie and I’d like to do another one. I don’t want to settle for being just a good, steady actress, who can always find work, but who no one ever recognizes on the street.
“And someday I want to get married, but that’s not as important right now as working on my own career.”
Marcia sauntered across the living room, flipped on the stereo and the soundtrack from the movie, Privilege (about a singing idol who was manipulated by everyone) and glanced out of the French windows. She gets away from the constant pressures and problems by usually staying at home and off the telephone.
“I can’t paint or sculpt or any of that. I like to just drive to the mountains or along the beach, especially when the guy next door is practicing on his horn. But someday I’d like to go to London. I love Los Angeles, but it would probably be England where I’d like to be, because I like the way children are raised there. They have a real progressive parenthood. And, also, I like the geographic location of England just a couple of hours to Rome or Paris or anywhere else in Europe that you would want to go.”
Marcia Strassman | A Date With Davy Jones
However, she did recently return home to New Jersey and visited New York also. In fact, one of her very first stops was Davy Jones’ new shop Zilch on Thompson Street in Greenwich Village.
“Davy says he’ll eventually open a bunch of them throughout the country. It’s groovy shopping there—but it’s so hard commuting!” she added with a laugh.
I thought as I pulled out of the driveway and waved goodbye—if this were really a fairy tale about just a pretty flower child and a prince with a sunburst smile they’d have nothing but flower petals and sunshine strewn on the path before them. But this is Hollywood—and reality is that Davy Jones and the Monkees will be on tour throughout the world tomorrow, and Marcia Strassman will either be on a studio sound stage or in a recording studio. And that doesn’t leave much time for romance.
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