Remembering Lani O'Grady On Her Birthday

I’ll crank one out to her brother in her memory.

How was her first name pronounced, anyway?

LANI DEAD???!!!

R1- He was so good looking there.

He looked liked Peggy Lipton's brother Robert Lipton.

Have you all forgotten about ME?

Dick was not a dick.

Lahnee I think it was. She was working with some kind of a weird health scam by phone at the end of her life. Someone I worked with called the number and it was answered by Lani O’Grady!! She did not want to talk about anything related to her acting career, especially Eight Is Enough.

There’s a plate of homemade wishes on the kitchen window sill.

The female agent in Licorice Pizza is supposed to be Lani and Don's mother

R6 I recall Dick Van P. in ads for Out Mag. having to do with something about pets & HIV patients so I'll always love him for that.

He wasn't the best tv dad for compliments however. On 1 show he referred to one of the girls as "the pretty one" & here he refers to Lani as the one "with the deep voice". I'm sure every girl would take that as a nice compliment 30 years ago. Most of the cast had their troubles/addictions so I'm sure DVP had his hands full with them as opposed to say Robert Reed & The Brady Bunch.

Poor thing was living in a trailer outside God forsaken Valencia when she died of a drug overdose. She and her brother should have kept their real last name (Agrati) instead of adopting those silly stage names. Agrati is so much sexier.

R10- On Eight Is Enough they never explained Dick Van Patten's New York accent.

Why was Don "Grady" and Lani "O'Grady?"

R13- I think Dianne Kaye was Jewish in real life.

R10, Van Patten said that Dianne Kaye was the "pretty one" which must have been a huge slap in the face to DL icon Susan Richardson, as it was Richardson and not Kaye who had her role cut to shreds in A Star is Born by Barbra Streisand for fear Suze would upstage her.

Exploitative but not mean-spirited look at her SAD LAST DAYS.

At least her TV father didn't ignore her. After I was married, I was never mentioned again!"

Vince Van Patten (son of Dick) was very cute on Apple's Way when I was 16. Girls had his picture in their lockers. I also saw him play tennis one time.

Dick Van Patten's success baffled me. I didn't think he was a particularly good actor. Not bad, but...I once read that the Lunts, when he auditioned for them, said something like "He's another Monty Clift" - who was a once also a young actor in their company. Dick Van Patten?!

I knew nothing about Lani until reading this thread. I liked her.

*(Clift was in the Lunt's acting company when he was younger. Later so was Dick.)

R18, agreed. I always figured it was because he was non threatening & sort of likable.

R20 Yes I guess so.

Btw, Eight Is Enough was based on the book by Tom Braden, who was later best known as the co-host of Crossfire, with Pat Buchanan, on CNN every weeknight. Braden represented the liberal pov.

Her mother was talent agent, Mary Grady.

R7 She had an ad in Variety newspaper for teaching acting classes out in the city of Sylmar. In high school I called it up and spoke with her. I acted like I didn't know who she was so she would run through her whole spiel and tell me about her career. She called me back a couple weeks later asking if I was still planning on signing up for her class.

There was nothing those Van Patten kids didn't stink up in the 70s.

Eight is Enough parents had an open marriage though “open” in DC usually means man sleeps with whomever he wants to sleep with and wife sleeps with whomever husband wants her to sleep with while husband watches

The fact Tom Braden & his wife were swingers has been effectively erased from the internet. Well, he was a founder of the CIA, so maybe a special wipe was instituted for his true marriage story.

Tom Braden undoubtedly knew Paul Manafort and Roger Stone as he was originally on the lust of friendly journalists in Nixon White House. Braden did tv shows with Pat Buchanan and Robert Novak where they were “opposing viewpoints” but all worked together