October 29, 1972. Heathrow Airport lay under siege by thousands of screaming girls.
As the doors of a certain plane opened, the pitch rocketed with every last girl — and they were all girls — desperate to attract the attention of their idol.
Osmondmania had arrived in Britain and was focused squarely on 14-year-old Donny.
Now, many of those “girls” will be eagerly snapping up tickets for Donny’s tour of Britain in January, 2017, celebrating his life in show business.
Back in the 70s, his hit single Puppy Love had won the hearts of schoolgirls across the land, all eager to rise to his plea: “Someone help me, help me, ple-e-ease.”
Some went to extraordinary lengths. One girl tried to abseil down the front of a hotel to his window. Another put herself in a crate and attempted to have herself posted to his suite!
The huge crowds seemed permanently on the brink of riot, posing serious problems for police more used to burly testosterone-fuelled football crowds. These were different hormones all together.
But how had a squeaky clean, teenage Mormon come to be the stuff of teenage fantasy?
The Osmonds’ dad, George, was the architect of his family’s lives.
Strictly authoritarian, his children addressed him as Father or Sir and mum Olive as Mother or Ma’am.
Childhood squabbles at home in Ogden, Utah were met with the belt and the parties obliged to apologise — and smile.
The two eldest brothers, Tom and Virl, were born deaf, but George channelled the musical talent of the next four, Alan, Wayne, Merrill and Jay, into the strict discipline of a barbershop quartet.
A contract at Disneyland led to a regular TV slot on The Andy Williams Show and the quartet becoming a quintet when Donny joined them.
At five years old, he upstaged his older siblings on US network primetime TV. It was something they were going to have to get used to.
There is something unsettling about recordings of those young boys with their matching dickey bows, razor- sharp partings and terrifyingly- precise dance routines.
Audiences loved them, though, and along with later addition Jimmy, they were show regulars for eight years.
By the time Donny hit his teens, the Osmonds had pop aspirations. They landed a recording contract and their first release, One Bad Apple, rocketed to No 1 in the US. It had been written for The Jackson 5, who didn’t want it.
Other hits followed, but in the UK, it was Donny’s first solo release that sparked a firestorm in the passions of the teenyboppers.
Puppy Love with its rousing orchestral opening and plaintive lyrics tugged at young heartstrings.
Girls dreamed of being the one Donny was hoping and praying to have “back in his arms once again”.
Love it or loathe it, there was no escaping Puppy Love in 1972!
Offstage, Donny’s look was defined by his trademark floppy caps. On stage, like his brothers, he donned studded and fringed white jumpsuits. Groovy!
On a second UK tour, desperate fans on Heathrow’s roof garden crushed forward so hard, a railing and masonry crashed to a lower balcony only narrowly missing more fans below.
To get in and out of their hotels, the Osmonds were bundled into bread vans. They were receiving 50,000 fan letters a week.
And yet Donny was lonely. Brought up in a celebrity bubble, he had missed out on many normal experiences — including making friends.
Donny’s solo career surged with chart toppers such as The Twelfth of Never and Young Love. He also had hits with sister Marie, including Morning Side of the Mountain.
US TV bosses loved the partnership. A Donny and Marie TV special was made and a series commissioned. And another. And another.
Broadcast here too, fans lapped up the weekly offerings of their idol. But it was the beginning of the end for Osmondmania.
The show was padded with sketches of Donny and Marie goofing around.
They were preserved as their younger teenage selves in showbiz aspic. Meantime, their fans were busy growing up.
Personal happiness for Donny compounded the problem. In 1978, aged 20, he married his secret girlfriend Debra Glenn.
Even disgruntled Father could see this was a bad business move.
The family firm had built its own TV studio, but ratings for the increasingly-uncool Donny and Marie Show were falling.
After series four, the network dropped the show.
Donny was never again to achieve the heights of adulation of his teenage years.
He appeared on Broadway in the title role of the musical Little Johnny Jones, but it opened and closed the same night following damning reviews.
Embezzlements against the Osmonds led to net losses of more than £60 million and Donny had to tour in half-empty college gyms.
Puppy Love, his greatest hit, was now a jibe, an insult sung in falsetto in his wake wherever he went.
Michael Jackson advised him to change his name to find success again. A publicist suggested he get himself busted for drugs possession!
In the end, it was hype around his initially-anonymously-released single, Soldier of Love, that won him kudos and more hits in the 90s.
He made a triumphant return to Broadway in the lead role of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and also bagged the film role.
Becoming a US Dancing with the Stars Champion further enhanced his popularity.
These days, he is a regular fixture in the updated and incredibly-popular Donny and Marie Show in Las Vegas.
A happily-married dad and grandad, Donny has much to smile about.
Maybe it was just puppy love, but Donny, now 58, still has a fine voice and charm destined to delight packed houses across his Soundtrack To My Life Tour this January.
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