Barry Williams Says His Relationship with Brady Bunch Costar Maureen McCormick Was ‘On-Again, Off-Again’

Decades after starring as step-siblings Marcia and Greg Brady on The Brady Bunch, Barry Williams says his offscreen romance with Maureen McCormick was “on-again, off-again” — but that he always made it a point to be on set when she had romantic scenes to film with other actors.

On an episode of the rewatch podcast The Real Brady Bros — a re-run of which aired this week — former costar Christopher Knight spoke to Williams about one of the show’s most iconic episodes, “The Subject Was Noses,” which originally aired on Feb. 9, 1973.

The 1973 episode centers on an iconic moment when Peter (played by Knight) throws a football at Marcia’s face, breaking her nose and prompting a jock to cancel his date with her.

During the filming of the episode, Knight spoke of Williams’ “relationship” with McCormick, saying, “it did look like she was dating somebody very close to her on the set, judging from the relationship that I was witnessing between the two of you during this show.”

“You two were looking a little bit close, a little bit less like brother and sister and more like …” he added.

“You mean dreamy eyed?” asked Williams, 70, who played eldest sibling Greg.

“The longing kind of wide-eyed. Yeah. That was you. And she was looking dreamy,” Knight, 67, responded of McCormick, who played Marcia. “Yeah. You guys you were going through a good week, I would say.”

“It was sort of like on-again, off-again with Maureen and I throughout the years. There was always a little dance being played that was broken up by hiatus,” Williams said.

Elsewhere in the episode, Williams said that, even as he harbored feelings for his costar, he tried to keep their relationship professional when on set.

“When she was pretending to have be affectionate with other guys and going out on dates and stuff, I liked to just stay out of the way and let her do her job and focus on and concentrate until, you know, until an episode that called for us to be sitting next to one another,” Williams said.

When Knight asked if Williams made it a point to be on set when McCormick had to film a romantic scene with another actor, he said, “At all times. Always … Just to have a presence.”

In an interview with Oprah Winfrey in 2013, Williams revealed that he and McCormick had dated at one point, and that he was her first kiss.

“That was in Hawaii while we were filming those episodes. We snuck away, it was a full moon, and walked along the sand. Well, I knew where that was headed. Of course, I set it up,” he shared.

McCormick, 68, has also opened up about the time, writing in her book, Here’s the Story: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice, “We couldn’t hold back any longer. It was our first kiss, and it was long, passionate and deep. It was wonderful, too, though as we continued to kiss and press against each other so closely that we could feel each other’s body heat, a part of me — a tiny part, admittedly — said to myself, `Oh my God! I’m kissing my brother. What am I doing?’ “