It’s one thing to believe that all child actors are cursed; it’s another to actually watch one die. But that’s seemingly the moneymaking goal behind VH1’s totally irresponsible yet all-consuming “Breaking Bonaduce.” At age 12, on “The Partridge Family,” Danny Bonaduce played a mature businessman in the body of a roly-poly, freckle-faced-cherub—“a midget in a kid’s suit” as he was called in one episode. At age 47, Bonaduce is an alcoholic, violent, big baby in a body sculpted by steroids and stress. The fact that this show has made it to a second season at all is a sick miracle considering that the filming of season one was temporarily halted when the star slit his wrists. He was, however, able to convince the network that being televised was the only thing keeping him going and, if they pulled the plug, the series might not be the only corpse on its hands.

Bonaduce handles his cravings for fame and attention with roughly the same success that John Belushi handled his speedballs of heroin and cocaine. One moment he’s the charming father to his two children, whom—at this point—seem healthy. Or he’ll have a useful therapy session with the doleful Dr. Garry, his VH1-approved therapist. But then he’ll fight with his wife or go off his meds and one can almost see the devil horns poking through his tuft of red hair. Fists are thrown, expletives are deleted, and the production crew freaks out, reminding us that we are all accomplices in this slow suicide.

His wife Gretchen is at the heart of his unrest. They married on a whim, seven hours into their first date after she informed him there would be no sex without a ring. Sixteen years later, they are on the verge of divorce, her sexual desire extinguished. Most every episode includes at least one instance of horny Danny getting shot down just as he thinks he’s finally going to score. Gretchen is shown, by turns, being a victim, a bitch and a role model. As an attractive, intelligent, frigid mom who sings with a band called the Muddflaps, she is also a twisted reminder of Danny’s fertile TV mother/bandleader of yore, Shirley Partridge, a merry widow with five kids and a keyboard. “C’mon Get Happy” was that show’s theme song. “Breaking Bonaduce” opts for ominous bass chords behind video of Danny teetering along the precipice of a skyscraper.