Photoplay - August 1971

Bobby Sherman -
What Every Woman Who Wants Him Must Know

If you've got a notion about dating Bobby Sherman, let this be a warning to you:   he's left enough gals with broken hearts to fill a ten-mile stretch of the Los Angeles freeway.  By the time he was 21, Bobby already had an older woman in his past - a divorcee with two children.  It wasn't exactly an unhappy romance - just an impossible one.  "I loved her and I liked her children very much," Bobby says.  "But my parents weren't too happy about my romance with her.  They pointed out to me the roadblocks I'd have to face if I married her. . . for one thing, her ex-husband was living, and he'd be visiting his children in our home."  Little by little Bobby came to agree with his parents' views, deciding that this situation was more than he could handle.  Slowly, his relationship with the 26-year-old divorcee cooled until they reverted to being "just friends," which is what they still are today.  Now, there is a new girl in his life - 18-year-old Patti Carnel.   Bobby's serious about her all right, but just how serious even he doesn't know.   For there are other problems in Bobby's romantic life, problems which go back to his first days in Hollywood.  Then, he was an innocent.  His environment as a child led him to be honest and trusting.  And when he stepped into the treacherous, cut-throat world of show business, he was like a waif in a storm.  Not anymore.   The rush of popularity which came with his first fame left in its wake a strangely cautious young man.  No longer naive.  No longer trusting.  To understand why Bobby feels the way he does toward women, one must appreciate the chain of events that lead to his present fame.

For Bobby Sherman, life began in Santa Monica, California, where he lived with his parents, Juanita and Robert Sherman, and his five-years-older sister, Darlene.  And there is only one word which can accurately describe Bobby as a boy - shy.

Twice during his first six years, Bobby's family moved: first to Los Angeles, then to the San Fernando Valley.  Each uprooting was a nightmare for the small boy.   "It took me the longest time to make friends," Bobby remembers, "and each new neighborhood was the start of new torture."

Once, Bobby decided to solve his friendless dilemma by creating his own friend - "Frank."  He and his imaginary buddy were inseparable for months, and often drove around in Bobby's toy jeep.

"He was very real to me and we had some marvelous conversations those many months - until I finally made some real, live friends.  Then one day, as I began to come out of my shell, it occurred to me that Frank hadn't been around for awhile."

Later, when Bobby entered Birmingham High School in the Valley, it was another kind of timidity which tormented him - uncertainty about his future.

"I had a need not only to make people like me," Bobby admits, "but to try to make things right.  It was the same in high school, which is probably why I majored in psychology when I went to college.  I didn't simply want to analyze people by probing into their lives; I wanted to really understand people."

He knew by then that there was much to understand, that things weren't always as they seemed.  Even in high school, Bobby had begun to have romantic troubles.

It all came about when he achieved stardom on the football team.  Soon he was named Captain, then placed on the All-City team.  And girls by the score tried to share the spotlight.  This was when Bobby first began to ask himself, "Does she like me for myself, or because - -?

The question tormented him again when he entered Pierce College to study theatre arts.   It was there that Bobby discovered his singing voice was good enough to get him past the doing-it-for-the-fun-of-it stage.

Everything happened so fast - Sal Mineo, Natalie Wood, Roddy McDowell, and Jane Fonda "discovered" him at one of the celebrity gatherings.

In a mere matter of months, Bobby was summoned to the ABC studios for an audition.   They were looking for someone to head up a new network program called "Shindig."  Bobby was the one.

"Shindig" ran a year and went off the air.  When Bobby looked around for another TV spot, there wasn't any.  Now Bobby had hit a low point in his life - but he had also learned another lesson.

Many people had been kind to him when he first hit success; many had sought his company.  But not until his TV show was phased off the air did the young singer realize how many of these were phonies.

And there was another lesson too.  "I made big money while on "Shindig," says Bobby, "and blew it.  Later, I realized the mistake."

Without success and without money, Bobby soon found himself without the entourage of willing females he'd known before.

The next time success came again - in the form of his series, "Here Come The Brides," Bobby was more cautious about the women he escorted.  He knew there were no easy solutions, that he could be at fault as well.  "I'm still growing and discovering," Bobby said at the beginning of the show, "a human being in the process of becoming. . ."

And many of his "discoveries" concerned the opposite sex.  The Bobby Sherman you see today isn't simply playing hard-to-get - he's had it with woman who love only his celebrity, and determined not to be trapped by such a one again.

His motto as he approaches the ripe old age of 25 is that time-worn maxim:   "All's fair in love and war."

Take the way he met Patti Carnel, the beauty he's dating now.  "The best way to explain it," says Bobby, "is that I met Patti through a girlfriend of hers I happened to be dating.

"When I saw Patti I thought to myself, 'Boy, this one is out of sight!'  Then I went up to her and said, 'I don't like to do this. . .but is there any way I can get in touch with you when I'm not seeing this girl I'm dating?'

"There was nothing serious between the other girl and me, and Patti knew it.   So, she said, 'Yes.'  It was all done very diplomatically."

Will his romance with Patti lead to marriage?

"I'm not ready to tie down any girl. . .nor am I ready to be harnessed," says Bobby.  "There's just too much that I've got to do right now."

There are days, however, when he looks at the life his sister leads with a twinge of jealousy.  Darlene seems so content rambling around her Maryland home, caring for her husband and four children.

"Someday when I find the right girl and get married," Bobby says wistfully, "I'd like to have four children, too.

"But I'm not going to rush into anything," he adds at once.  "My mother and father have been married 32 years, and that's the kind of enduring marriage I want for myself.  That's why I'm being careful. . .that's why I won't allow myself to get too serious with any girl."