How would young Danny Bonaduce, the freckle-faced kid from "The Partridge Family," have done on the new reality/talent search series "I Know My Kid's A Star"?

"I would have won," Bonaduce, the creator and host of the series, says without hesitation. The U.S. cable reality show airs Sunday nights in Canada on MuchMoreMusic.

Furthermore, if any of the young contestants on "I Know My Kid's A Star" had been up against him for the part of Danny Partridge, he says, "my mom would have already come to their house and cut their brake lines." At 48, Bonaduce is the ultimate Hollywood survivor. So when it comes to preparing wannabe child stars for the realities of the biz, few are better equipped.

That is, if he can keep his own act together. Bonaduce admits "I Know My Kid's A Star" came about because he needed to rehabilitate his own career after the bracing honesty of "Breaking Bonaduce."

That reality series was an eye-opening record of self destructive behaviour, with Bonaduce emerging as a human car crash. It dealt with his many infidelities (his wife at the time, Gretchen, filed for divorce immediately following the series), alcohol and steroid abuse and suicidal tendencies, including one harrowing scene where Bonaduce downed a full bottle of vodka and then attempted to race across a freeway on his scooter.

"My ex-wife told me I'd never work again," he says. "I said, 'Are you kidding? We live in Sodom and Gomorrah and I'm the worst person here. They'll be fighting to give me money after the show."

Not exactly.

"I didn't hold anything back and what happened is that I started to scare some people that could be possible employers in my future," he says. "So I wrote this show to be part two of 'Breaking Bonaduce,' to show how I can protect children from ending up like this."

"I Know My Kid's A Star," therefore, is not just another talent search series, although it starts off that way. Ten children and their parents compete for a $50,000 prize and shot at stardom. All bunk in the same house throughout the competition as one child and one guardian is eliminated each week, with Bonaduce judge and jury.

Almost immediately, pushy stage moms and dads emerge.

"The object was to find a very talented child," says Bonaduce, "but if she had a Lindsay Lohan mom, and I'm going to find her in all the same clubs dressed up as her daughter, you don't win."

The actor knows all too well the pitfalls of bad parenting. In his autobiography "Random Acts Of Badness," he delves into his sorry childhood, where abuses at home had him living with the family of "Partridge Family" co-star Dave Madden.

By the age of 14 he was declared emancipated from his parents and officially on his own.

He also knows how cruel the business can be to child stars once the freckles fade and childhood ends. Bonaduce says he made a total of $104,000 from his five seasons on "The Partridge Family." After taxes, manager and agent fees were deducted, he was left with $21,000 by the time he got his money at 18.

"There were no residuals back then," he says, adding that he worked maybe 20 weeks over the next 14 years, mainly in guest shots on shows like "CHiPS."

"Life magazine called me one of the 50 most famous faces in America in 1972," he says, "and by 1984 I was living out of my car."

He hopes the winner of "I Know My Kid's A Star" will avoid some of his mistakes.

"Whoever wins this is not only going to be the most talented of the bunch," he says, "they're also going to have "the most sane and lucid parent. I wrote this show so that these kids would not become me."

That said, he's doing just fine now, especially as an L.A.-based radio host.

"Radio is my actual career and bread and butter," he says.

He was featured on the recent CBS reality fiasco "Secret Talents of the Stars" but it was cancelled after one episode, leaving Bonaduce's hidden talent a permanent secret. He also has two other TV series in development and is awaiting word on a second season pickup of "I Know My Kid's A Star."

Not that he can ever stay completely out of trouble. Bonaduce says former "Survivor" finalist Jonny Fairplay is suing him after Bonaduce roughed him up last year at the Fox Reality Channel Reality Awards.

"The DA said he attacked me and I was using appropriate self defence," says Bonaduce, adding,. "He just wants to get his name in the papers."

Well, it worked.

Bonaduce sums up his career in one word - persistence. He was once asked how he went from the bottom of the heap to the top of the pile and Bonaduce said he didn't: "I lowered the pile."

"Somebody would get tired eventually," he reasoned. "Somebody would get hungry eventually. Pretty soon that side of the pile had to go to the bathroom. That side of the pile had to get something to eat and this side of the pile had to go home and take a nap. And all of a sudden there was no pile, there was just me, and I was still ready to work. That's my trick. Always be the last man standing."

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Bill Brioux is a freelance TV columnist based in Brampton, Ont.