Hasselhoff is a major pop star in Germany. Think of him as a 41-year-old New Kid on der Block, selling millions of slickly produced kinderpop albums to prepubescent fans. Now he’s got his baby-blues set on the adult-contemporary market in the United States, i.e., the people rumored to buy Michael Bolton albums. Why? It’s not the money – he makes a mint off “Baywatch,” which airs in 116 countries. Says David: “I want to do music that’s more organically me.”
Enter Marla Maples Trump. Hasselhoff brought her onstage two weeks ago for a duet in Atlantic City, part of a pay-per-view special presaging his planned assault on America.
Thirty thousand people paid about 15 bucks to watch Hasselhoff run through a dozen tunes, including “If I Were a Carpenter,” with Trump. Also featured were numbers by fellow Baywatchers and an “acting” contest, with two winners earning bit parts on the series.
Marla lent a patina of something to the proceedings, but Dave’s plans to retool his image go beyond duets with rich guys’ wives. London theater producer Robert Mackintosh has been working on sets, with touches like 3-D glasses so the audience can revel in the ample topography of a giant “Baywatch” cast photo. “We’re trying to find a new David, a more sophisticated David,” Mackintosh says. Also, Hasselhoff ditched his longtime producer, Jack White, in favor of Bruce Swedien, who has worked with Michael Jackson. “I was afraid to break with Jack, but I had to if I’m going to break America,” says Hasselhoff. “I’ve got this one [White] song, “Limbo Dance,’ where if you played it in America, I’d just get laughed at.” And you thought he was clueless.
