Did you ever notice one of the Von Trapp children became a love interest for Peter Brady?

The youngest Sound of Music star was one of the many teens on The Brady Bunch.

Left image: The Everett Collection

"Why am I always last?" Gretl von Trapp asks in The Sound of Music. "Because you are the most important," musical agent Max Detweiler tells her. It's charming lines like this that have made the 1965 musical such an enduring classic. 

Gretl is the youngest of the von Trapp family in the Julie Andrews picture. The character was just a child, around six years old, but the producers managed to find an actor with years of experience. Kym Karath was merely three when she appeared in Spencer's Mountain, the 1963 film based on Earl Hamner Jr.'s novel, which later inspired the long-running series The Waltons. The movie cast Karath alongside Veronica Cartwright. Karath and the Cartwrights would cross paths again, of course. Angela Cartwright played her older von Trapp sister.

Karath would later reunite with Angela on Lost in Space — and appear on The Waltons, but that is not what we are here to talk about.

Did you ever notice that this erstwhile von Trapp was a Brady Bunch love interest?

Harvey Klinger. George Glass. Millicent. Jennifer Nichols. Dr. Vogel the Dentist. Every kid in the Brady clan had a memorable love interest… or two or three. Kerry Hathaway is one of many.

You remember Kerry as Jan's friend — and Peter's crush — in "Cyrano de Brady." Peter enlists Greg's help in wooing the blonde, a tactic taken straight from Cyrano de Bergerac. Of course, Kerry ends up falling for Greg.

Anyway, that was none other than Kym Karath as Kerry! She had only a few more appearances onscreen following this, including the aforementioned Waltons episode, "The Thanksgiving Story."

Karath only has eyes for Greg

Karath could likely relate to her adolescent Brady Bunch costars. The von Trapps were essentially a similar bunch of young stars half a decade earlier. Akin to the six Brady Kids, the children cast in The Sound of Music dubbed themselves "the SoM 7." 

"We're beyond friends. We're [a] second family," Karath said in The Daily Mail in 2016. "As adults, we were deeply bonded, so our lives have really interwoven with each other." Sounds familiar!

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16 Comments

bradyguy 8 months ago
Since we're on the subject of The Sound of Music...would anybody like to complete one of my Brady Bunch Trivia (Essay) questions??

Complete the Brady Bunch/Sound of Music connection - we already have Kym Karath, Nicholas Hammond, and Gil Stuart.
DeniseKennedy 50 months ago
Karath wasn’t the only (or even the first) SoM cast member to appear on BB: “The Babysitters” (S2, Ep2) featured Gilchrist (“Gil”) Stuart as “Restaurant Captain”. (He played “Franz” in SoM.)
Lantern 50 months ago
I remember the episode where Jan made up a boy named "George Glass". At one point, she wanted to pretend he was calling her, so she called the telephone operator and asked that the Brady phone be rung back; she then pretended to be talking to "George". I heard that operators were inundated after that with real requests for telephone callbacks.
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bradyguy ClarenceMYeates 8 months ago
Ya! Ya...ya!
PN 51 months ago
Kym was in the Lost Civilization episode of Lost in Space as the sleeping beauty. Angela Cartwright was only at the very ending scene when the chariot returned to the Jupiter 2. The princess never left the underground world.
Todd 51 months ago
And then Charlie could have sung "adieu adieu too you and you and youoo and pointed at Doug three times in
hummas 51 months ago
She asked Clay Boy to take her to the toidy in Spencer’s Mountain Kim Karath
Barry22 51 months ago
I think Nicolas Hammond who played the younger Von Trapp brother, also appeared in The Brady Bunch.
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Jon Barry22 50 months ago
Nick Hammond played the older brother, Friedrich. in "The Sound of Music". Duane Chase played his younger brother, Kurt.
bradyguy Barry22 8 months ago
Nope...Hammond played the older brother, Friedrich. As did I...in high school! 😁
bradyguy Jon 8 months ago
Oops. Sorry, Joh. You had already made this correction...3 1/2 years ago!! My bad...
bradyguy Barry22 8 months ago
Also....Spiderman...Spiderman...he starred in the show...Spiderman...
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