DAVIS, Mac 1942-

PERSONAL: Original name, Scott Davis; born January 21, 1942, in Lubbock, TX; son of T. J. and Edith Irene (Lankford) Davis; married Sarah Barg, 1971 (divorced, 1976); married Fran Cook (marriage ended); married Lisa Kristen Gerard; children: Joel Scott, Noah Claire, Cody Duke.

ADDRESSES: Home—Los Angeles, CA. Agent— Metropolitan Talent Agency, 4526 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90010.

CAREER: Singer, songwriter, and actor. Vee-Jay Records, Georgia, regional manager, 1964; Liberty (music label), head of publishing company, beginning 1967.

Actor in films, including (as Seth Maxwell) North Dallas Forty, Paramount, 1979; (as Bill Dekkar) Cheaper to Keep Her, 1980; (as Johnny Hooker) The Sting II, Universal, 1983; (as Wilbur "Will" Clark) Possums, Monarch Home Video, 1998; (as Bellington) Where the Red Fern Grows, Doty-Dayton Releasing, 2000; (as Frank Thompson) True Vinyl, 2000; and (as Sammy Bones) Jackpot, 2001.

Actor in television series, including (as host) The Mac Davis Show, 1974-76; and (as Davy Crockett) Davy Crockett, National Broadcasting Company (NBC), 1987. Actor in television pilots, including Almost Home, 1985, and (as Reese Elliot) Daytona Beach, American Broadcasting Companies (ABC), 1996. Actor in made-for-television movies, including (as T. K. "Tom" Kenny) Brothers-in-Law, ABC, 1985; (as Jake Ramson) What Price Victory, ABC, 1988; (as Norm) Blackmail, 1991; Indecent Seduction, 1996; (as Clayton) Still Holding On: The Legend of Cadillac Jack, Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), 1998; (as Norm Dustin) For My Daughter's Honor, CBS, 1996; (as Norman) Angel's Dance, Home Box Office (HBO), 1999; (as balladeer) The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood, NBC, 2000; and (as Sheriff Underwood) Murder, She Wrote: The Last Free Man, 2001.

Actor in television specials, including America, 1970; Love! Love! Love! 1972; Tennessee Ernie Ford's White Christmas, 1972; (as host) I Believe in Music, 1973; Christmas with the Bing Crosbys, 1974; (as host) Touch of Gold '75, 1975; (as host) The Mac Davis Special, 1975; (as host) The Mac Davis Christmas Special, 1975; (as host) The Mac Davis Christmas Special . . . When I Grow Up, 1976; Bob Hope Special: Bob Hope's All-Star Comedy Spectacular from Lake Tahoe, 1977; (as host) Mac Davis . . . Sounds like Home, 1977; (as host) Mac Davis: I Believe in Christmas, 1977; You Put Music in My Life, 1978; (as host) Mac Davis's Christmas Odyssey: Two Thousand and Ten, 1978; (as host) A Christmas Special . . . With Love, Mac Davis, 1979; A Johnny Cash Christmas, CBS, 1980; (as host) Mac Davis 10th Anniversary Special: I Still Believe in Music, 1980; (as host) Mac Davis: I'll Be Home for Christmas, 1980; Walt Disney: One Man's Dream, ABC, 1981; (as host) The Mac Davis Christmas Special, 1981; (as guest) Grandpa, Will You Run with Me? 1983; (as host) Mac Davis Special: The Music of Christmas, 1983; The 19th Annual Country Music Association Awards, 1985; Bob Hope's High-Flying Birthday, NBC, 1986; Christmas in Washington, NBC, 1986; Texas 150: A Celebration Special, ABC, 1986; (as host) The 21st Annual Academy of Country Music Awards, 1986; The American Music Awards, 1987; Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, 1992; The 26th Annual Country Music Awards, 1992; (as host) America Comes to Graceland, syndicated, 1993; (as host) Elvis: His Life and Time, syndicated, 1993; (as host) The Legend of the Beverly Hillbillies, CBS, 1993; National Memorial Day Concert, PBS, 1993; (as host) Happy New Year America, CBS, 1994; The 28th Annual Country Music Association Awards, 1994; The 30th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards, 1995; (as host) All-Star Countryfest '96, 1996; and Dolly Parton: Treasures, CBS, 1996. Guest host, The Midnight Special, 1973-80; guest star on television shows, including King of the Hill, 2000, and The Client, 1995-96.

Played Will Rogers in stage production The Will Rogers Follies, Palace Theater, New York, 1992; The Mac Davis Show, KZLA-FM, Los Angeles, CA, radio host, 2000—.

AWARDS, HONORS: Inducted into Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, 2000.

WRITINGS:

America Comes to Graceland (television special), syndicated, 1993.

lyricist

Song Painter, 1971.

I Believe in Music, 1972.

Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me, 1972.

Mac Davis, 1973.

Stop and Smell the Roses, 1974.

All the Love in the World, 1974.

Burnin' Thing, 1975.

Forever Lovers, 1976.

Thunder in the Afternoon, 1977.

Fantasy, 1978.

Mac Davis: Greatest Hits, Columbia, 1979.

Texas in My Rear View Mirror, 1980.

It's Hard to Be Humble, 1980.

Midnight Crazy, 1981.

Forty '82, 1982.

Very Best and More, Mercury, 1984.

Soft Talk, 1984.

Twenty Golden Greats, 1984.

Till I Made It with You, 1985.

Will Write Songs for Food, Sony, 1994.

A Man Don't Cry, 1995.

I Sing the Hits, Sony, 1996.

Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me/Stop and Smell theRoses, Collectibles, 1997.

The Best of Mac Davis, BMG, 2000.

Country Spotlight #1, Direct Source, 2000.

(With Barbara Mandrell) Country Spotlight #2, Direct Source, 2000.

(With Lee Greenwood) Dueling Country, Direct Source, 2001.

Wrote numerous songs for several different country and pop singers, including "A Little Less Conversation," "Memories," "I Believe in Music," "In the Ghetto," and "Don't Cry Daddy" for Elvis Presley; "White Limozeen" for Dolly Parton; "Everything a Man Could Ever Need" for Glen Campbell; "Something's Burning" for Kenny Rogers and the First Edition; "Watching Scotty Grow" for Bobby Goldsboro; and "I Believe in Music" for Gallery. Coauthor, The Will Rogers Follies. Wrote songs for the films Live a Little, Love a Little, 1968, Norwood, 1970, and Against a Crooked Sky, 1975. His songs have appeared on various compilations, including Elvis Aaron Presley: The Tribute, 1994, and Seasons for Singing: A Celebration of Country Life, 1995.

SIDELIGHTS: Mac Davis was one of the most popular pop-country singer-songwriters of the 1970s and early 1980s. Davis has scored several top-ten hits in his career, including "Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me," which hit number one on the pop charts after its release in 1972; "Hooked on Music," which reached number two on the country charts; the number-nine country hit "Texas in My Rear View Mirror;" and two number-ten songs, "It's Hard to Be Humble" and "I Never Made Love (Till I Made Love with You)." In addition to those songs, which Davis performed himself, he also wrote the platinum hits "In the Ghetto" and "Don't Cry Daddy" for Elvis Presley. "A Little Less Conversation," a song Davis wrote for Presley's 1968 film Live a Little, Love a Little, was not a chart-topper when it was first released, but after it appeared in the soundtrack of the 2001 film Ocean's Eleven and in a Nike World Cup soccer commercial, a remixed version of the song hit number one on the British charts and was in the top sixty in the United States.

Since 2000, Davis has hosted his own country-music radio show on a Los Angeles radio station. With his show, he is attempting to bring back the more classic, roots-oriented style of country music, which contrasts sharply with the youth-focused, pop-style country that most stations play today. "In country, once you're forty, you literally drop off the face of the Earth," Davis told Jon Matsumoto of the Los Angeles Times. Davis learned this first-hand when he released his album Will Write Songs for Food in 1994 and could not get any stations to play it because he was too old. Despite this, Davis's show has proved to be very popular. "There are people out there who say, 'What in the world has happened to Waylon Jennings? Why don't I hear anything from him anymore?' Or Dolly [Parton] or Emmylou Harris," Davis told Matsumoto. "I get mail that literally says, 'Thank you, thank you, thank you for playing these songs that I've been wanting to hear.'"

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

books

All Music Guide to Country, Miller Freeman Books (San Francisco, CA), 1997.

Carlin, Richard, The Big Book of Country Music, Penguin (New York, NY), 1995.

Contemporary Theatre, Film, and Television, Volume 34, Gale (Detroit, MI), 2001.

Gammond, Peter, The Oxford Companion to PopularMusic, Oxford University Press (Oxford, England), 1991.

Stambler, Irwin, and Grelun Landon, The Encyclopedia of Folk, Country & Western Music, second edition, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1983.

periodicals

American Film, July-August, 1984, Thomas Wiener, review of North Dallas Forty, pp. 67-68.

Country Music, July-August, 1980, Neil Coppage, review of It's Hard to Be Humble, p. 94.

Entertainment Weekly, October 21, 1994, Ken Tucker, review of Elvis Aron Presley: The Tribute, 1994.

Jet, August 6, 2001, Sylvia P. Flanagan, review of Jackpot, p. 64.

Los Angeles Times, April 13, 2000, Jon Matsumoto, review of The Mac Davis Show, p. F30.

New Leader, June 1, 1981, Robert Asahina, review of Cheaper to Keep Her, p. 22.

New York, August 3, 1992, John Simon, review of TheWill Rogers Follies, p. 50.

New York Times, May 9, 1981, Janet Maslin, review of Cheaper to Keep Her, pp. 13, 48; February 18, 1983, Janet Maslin, review of The Sting II, pp. 21, C10; May 16, 1983, John J. O'Connor, review of Country Comes Home, pp. 14, C18; July 19, 1992, David Richards, review of The Will Rogers Follies, p. H5.

People, May 26, 1980, Gail Buchalter, "Talk about Splashy Comebacks: After Divorce and Dejection, Mac Davis Is Making Waves Again," pp. 88-91; May 11, 1981, review of Cheaper to Keep Her, p. 22; January 18, 1982, "Look Who's Turning 40! A Bevy of Birthdays in '82 You Never Thought Possible," pp. 32-35; March 14, 1983, review of The Sting II, p. 18; May 23, 1983, review of Country Comes Home, p. 9; December 12, 1983, review of Mac Davis Special: The Music of Christmas, p. 11.

Rolling Stone, March 3, 1983, Michael Sragow, review of The Sting II, p. 36.

Stereo Review, August, 1980, Bob Allen, review of It'sHard to Be Humble, p. 94; June, 1983, review of Forty '82, p. 80; August, 1984, Peter Reilly, review of Soft Talk, p. 76.

Variety, September 24, 1980, review of Cheaper toKeep Her, p. 20; January 19, 1983, review of The Sting II, p. 21; May 8, 1985, review of Brothers-in-Law, p. 162; December 31, 1986, review of Christmas in Washington, p. 44; January 27, 1988, review of What Price Victory, p. 78; October 21, 1991, Van Gordon Sauter, review of Blackmail, p. 75; June 29, 1998, Ken Eisner, review of Possums, p. 40.

Washingtonian, March, 1983, Pat Dowell, review of The Sting II, p. 57; April, 1983, Pat Dowell, review of The Sting II, pp. 59-60.

online

CMT.com,http://www.cmt.com/ (August 12, 2002), Edward Morris, "Mac Davis, Billy Strange Recall Writing Elvis' 'New' No. 1 Hit."

MSN Entertainment,http://entertainment.msn.com/ (March 25, 2003), "Mac Davis."

Nashville Songwriters Foundation Web site,http://www.nashvillesongwritersfoundation.com/ (October 1, 2000), "Mac Davis, Allen Reynolds, Billy Edd Wheeler, Randy Goodrum Are Newest Members of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame."

TV Tome,http://www.tvtome.com/ (March 25, 2003), "Mac Davis."

West Texas Music Hall of Fame Web site,http://www.westexmusichof.com/ (March 25, 2003), "Mac Davis."*