Christopher Atkins: PopWatch 'Teen Idol' Q&A (Part 4 of 4)

He was the definition of man candy in the early '80s -- a fact that the autographed nude photo collection in the (censored) store section of his official web site is happy to remind you of. Today, Christopher Atkins -- best known for baring all (or nearly all) in The Blue Lagoon, TV's Dallas, the cult favorite The Pirate Movie, and that rare male foray into the stripper genre, A Night in Heaven -- is hoping for a comeback on VH1's newest celebreality show, Confessions of a Teen Idol (premieres Jan. 4). PopWatch caught up with Atkins, now a doting father of two with a career building luxury pools, as he was heading to the park to play ball with his son, Grant, a standout shortstop and pitcher at UNC Charlotte. (Daughter Brittney is in film school.) We talked about wild nights at Studio 54, the role he lost that would've changed his career, how he knows for a fact that I'm not the only fan of The Pirate Movie, why he agreed to do Confessions (and why his kids will be embarrassed), and what's next.

Read our interviews with 'Teen Idol' castmates Adrian Zmed, Eric Nies, and Jamie Walters.

PopWatch: How did Confessions of a Teen Idol come to you?

Christopher Atkins: Well... The true story of it is, the pilot supposedly came about because of me. I don't know if I'm supposed to say that or not. A friend of mine asked me to come over and install a television wall hanging thing, the tray the flatscreen goes on, so I went over there and I was helping her out. She was dating someone who ended up being one of the exec producers on the show, and she said to him, "You won't believe who's hanging a TV for me right now." He just thought Wow, that's kinda a cool idea. I wonder what these guys are all up to these days, and if it might make a fun show. So they were sorta chasing me down for a year to be in the show. They could never tell me what the show was about.

Did they tell you any of the circumstances they'd be putting you guys in? [They attend group therapy sessions with a "celebrity psychology expert" among other things.]

No, they really didn't. They kinda just asked, "What are the things that you wouldn't do?" Which is pretty much everything that they had us do. [Laughs]

In the premiere, Baywatch's David Chokachi is already threatening to leave the show. Did you ever reach that point?

Oh, yeah.... But at the same time, that's what made the show different. There were some things that were in-your-face and tough to swallow. That can be really hurtful or incredibly magically beautiful. I had both of them happen to me on the show. There were some things that you didn't know about the other guys: Billy shared a really interesting time in his past that none of us knew, where he was sleepin' in a car and all the rest of the stuff, and what motivated and drove him. I think it will be very revealing. It looks into the lives of some guys who, in their day, had tremendous fame. There wasn't a place on the planet that I could go that I wasn't mobbed at one point in time in my life. It's cool to be able to reveal that to people -- the good, the bad, and the ugly. It's not all good.

Is there a moment you're most nervous about seeing?

It's called all eight episodes.... My daughter is already planning a big party at the house [for the premiere]. My son was all excited about it, I think, until he saw me in my old spandex pants trying to play a guitar on a car in the trailer. He was like, "What the hell, dad?" I said, "Dude, that's an '80s gold spandex pant, and I hope your whole college baseball team sees it, because you're gonna never live that one down. 'That's your dad?' 'Yep, that's my dad.'"

Why are you in an '80s gold spandex pant?

I had to be an '80s rocker. [Laughs] When they showed us the outfits that we had to put on, I thought What would embarrass my kids the most? And that's what I went for. That's what I live for.

Watch a trailer for Confessions of a Teen Idol

Speaking of the '80s, we had readers submit questions for you, and I was surprised that the movie mentioned most was your 1982 musical, The Pirate Movie. I've always wondered if other people loved it as much as my sister and I.

I'll tell you a very interesting story about that movie. That movie didn't do anything at the box office, which was too bad. It had its troubles when we shot it. They had to change directors and all kinds of stuff. And then one day, that I was in Canton, Ohio and doing a play with a university out there -- they have celebs come out and work with their theater department -- and the kids said, "Here, we have a surprise for you." They sat me on a couch in one of their houses or wherever, and like 15 of 'em came flying out from around a corner and performed the freakin' Pirate Movie in front of me. I mean, word-for-word, the dances exactly. I was catching flies. My jaw was down to my knees. Oh.My.God. [Laughs] From that time on, it seemed like there's a huge generation that loved that movie. I'm sitting here thinkin' to myself, Paramount probably owes me a bunch of money from that, 'cause I had a percentage in that film... You don't know how many people loved that movie. It absolutely shocked me because it came and went. As a cult film, it's huge. There's fan sites everywhere. As a matter of fact, one of the fan sites is now my official web site. I said, "God, I love the site. You're awesome. Do you want to do my official site?" So this woman and I became friends.

This reader question is a great one: Why didn't you get to do a commentary track for The Pirate Movie DVD? Were you ever approached? What would you have said?

No, I wasn't approached. I wish we [he and costar Kristy McNichol] were. I probably would've talked all about the singing and dancing. It's one of my big jokes today that I have a gold album because of that movie and I can't sing in the shower. Everybody sounds good in the shower but me, that's how bad of a singer I am. The dancing: I'm a great athlete, but I can't dance. I'm such a bad dancer, they always put me in the back. [Laughs] It was probably my most fun movie to make, after The Blue Lagoon. It was six months in Australia. I had fencing lessons, we did rope courses so we could all of this stuff on the boat and make it all look good and real. The worst part about it was that the Pirate King [Ted Hamilton] was one of the producers, and he never went to the lessons or practiced the choreography, so every time we'd do a fencing scene, I'd come away with welts all over me. He kept whacking me with his sword the whole time. [Laughs] Man, that hurts.

Watch a clip from The Pirate Movie

In the premiere of a Confessions of Teen Idol, you talk about how you spent a lot of nights at Studio 54. What are your best stories... that you're willing to share?

[Laughs] Studio 54 was a wild and crazy place. I met everybody. I've got a picture of me and Christie Brinkley from Studio 54 that I cherish. Me and Lorna Luft [Grease 2's Paulette] ended up in Snoopy's doghouse one time. They had a whole Snoopy set there or somethin', and we ended up in the doghouse together, just hiding away from everybody and laughing our butts off.... It was insane. There was one time in particular, I was there with one of my best friends from where I grew up, and we come out of the club at 4 in the morning or something ridiculous, and I couldn't find my car. I was plastered. I'm going, "They stole it! They stole it!" We ran into these cops, and one recognized me, and he goes, "Hey, hey, get it! Get in! I gotta take you some place." So we get into the back of this cop car, and my friend is all scared to death, and I'm all, "Woohoo! Hey, turn the lights on, man! Come on!" They hit the lights, and it turns out they took us to an embassy, and there was a woman in one of the little guard shacks at the embassy and they're yellin', "Hey, we got Christopher Atkins in the back of the car!" It was the funniest thing. Then they took us and found my car, dropped us off, told me I shouldn't drive -- so that was all good. My friend turns to me and goes, "I've been in the back of cop cars before, but they never drop me off." [Laughs] That was pretty fun. New York cops are the best, man.

You also mention in the premiere that partying cost you Kevin Bacon's role in Footloose. I never knew that.

I was back in the day, partying my butt off. They needed me to go meet the producers, and I went in half-cocked because I was on my way to go someplace and they called me at the last minute. I went in with it in the bag, and just absolutely blew it. That's a true story. It probably would've changed my whole career, too. But things are meant for a reason. I haven't touched anything in 22 years. When I had my kids, I just wanted to be a dad. I didn't want to party anymore, and I was lucky enough to stop.

Watch the trailer for 1983's A Night in Heaven

Tell me about your life since then.

I've worked pretty much consistently -- I've done over 70 films -- but I never chased it. I did all those movies that you wouldn't want your dog to watch, but I did 'em to keep going. You really have to chase it, and I wanted to be a dad more than anything else in my life. At 16-years-old, I was teaching sailing in New York, and every check that I got, I took a dollar away and put it in the bank for someday when I had kids. When all of the sudden I was 24, and I had my son, I found myself -- and it was probably one of the downfalls of my marriage -- I found myself more motivated by my son and then when my daughter came, my two kids, than anything else. I kinda focused everything on that. I didn't want to miss a minute. Probably because I'm a big kid, too. But I'm here right now. I just pulled up to the park, my son's pulling a bucket of baseballs out of the back of the car, and I'm gonna go hit grounders and help catch him. He's a Division 1 ballplayer hoping to get drafted by the pros this year. He's a helluva ballplayer. He's 23, and I'm 24, and we're still hanging out together. [Laughs] The other thing is, I got really involved in building these high-end pools. The woman who started this company 23 years ago is my best friend out here. [Check out the web site.] She's done Wayne Gretzky's pool, David Foster's pool. We just finished John Goodman's house. I really get off on it because I love construction and doing stuff with my hands, and it's so creative, building something from the ground up. We're about to do a $9 million house right now with a gigantic lagoon pool with a bridge and all kinds of stuff. It's just spectacular. I enjoy that more than anything, and I'm gonna keep doing that.

Watch a clip of Atkins on Dallas

What do you hope comes out of Confessions of a Teen Idol?

My kids are graduating from college. I'm single again after 20 years of marriage, unfortunately. So now it's time to get back into work again. I'm hoping that the show does well, and I can get some more work and start coming back a bit. I'm actually running with a reality show myself. [He's shopping for a network now.] It has to do with a good friend of mine who has a gold mine on his property in North Carolina. He's got 300,000 gold ounces right under his house and his pool -- all documented, all assayed by giant mining companies -- that's worth over $300 million. But he's a hillbilly. So it's four rednecks and an actor trying to get $300 million in gold. This is absolutely hysterical. We have a terrible beaver problem. The beavers keep eatin' the pipes that feed the tables that separate the gold from the dirt. And we're like, Goddang, beavers! A beaver problem! How do you have a beaver problem? Then, there's a movie that I'm trying to put together financing for. It's based a true story, sort of a Blue Lagoon coming-of-age movie, that will make you cry and make you stand up and cheer.... My thing is, I want to relive the '80s, just this time remember 'em. [Laughs] My mantra -- and I tell my kids this, too --- is, He with the most stories wins. It has nothing to do with toys; it has to do with stories. If you have stories, you've had adventure. And if you've had adventure, you've lived a life. You haven't sat down and let it go by. That's the one thing I'm pretty proud of: I got two amazing children.

Watch the trailer for The Blue Lagoon

More on teen idols:
Adrian Zmed: PopWatch 'Teen Idol' Q&A
Eric Nies: PopWatch 'Teen Idol' Q&A
Jamie Walters: PopWatch 'Teen Idol' Q&A
Pillow Talk with Scott Baio
PopWatch Confessional: The fan letter you wrote when you were young
EW's Ultimate Hotties: Decade-by-decade galleries and polls