My Affair of the Heart with Rick Springfield

If I start to think back to when I first heard of Rick Springfield, I suddenly feel very old. Let’s just say I was a child when my older sister bought a cassette tape called “Working Class Dog”, whose album cover had a dog dressed in a white shirt. I was so amused by the sight, I was hooked before I even heard the song “Jessie’s Girl”.

During the summer of 1981, we started watching the soap opera “General Hospital”, because we wanted to see Rick Springfield as Dr. Noah Drake. To this day, I still follow both “General Hospital” and the career of Rick Springfield.

I’ve watched Rick Springfield guest star in various television shows, read his surprisingly good autobiography, “Late, Late At Night”, and last month, I went to see the movie “Ricki and the Flash”, starring Meryl Streep and featuring none other than Rick Springfield in a supporting role. I hadn’t seen him in a movie since Hard to Hold back in 1984! Thankfully, his acting has improved tremendously. The scene featured below actually tugged on my heartstrings and started getting me all teary when Rick’s character says, “It doesn’t matter if the kids love you or not. It’s not their job to love you. It’s your job to love them.” Pass the Kleenex please!

Two weeks ago, my sister and I went to the Canadian National Exhibition to see Rick Springfield live in concert at the Bandshell. The price of admission was $6 after 5:00 pm, making this show the biggest concert bargain ever! Now a 66-year-old senior citizen who can still rock out, Rick said he hadn’t been back in Toronto since the summer of 1982. We would have been too young to see him back then but we did see him play at Casino Rama in 2009. The show was similar but this time around he played music from his upcoming album and a cover of Katy Perry’s “Roar” instead of Paul McCartney’s “Jet”.  He also brought Canadian actor Yannick Bisson (Murdoch Mysteries) out on stage, who he had worked with on the show High Tide. For an hour and a half, I giggled at the ridiculous videos from the 80’s playing in the background while I howled along off-key to Rick Springfield singing songs from my childhood. What a great evening!