Another Plumb role: painter

CHATHAM -- Any ``Brady Bunch" fanatic worthy of his poly-blend slacks can tell you that this particular afternoon on Cape Cod is eerily reminiscent of ``Brady" episode number 107, ``Try, Try Again."

The story, for the ``Brady"-impaired, is that identity-crisis prone middle child Jan Brady has been unceremoniously dumped from her ballet recital. Feeling like 1973's biggest loser, she throws herself into learning tap dancing, then ping-pong, all before auditioning for the school play. Because this is Jan Brady, she fails miserably at all of these suburban activities.

``I have confidence," she tells mom Carol, with a defiant flick of her blond mane. ``I'm confident that I'm a no-talent loser."

In the end, Jan's art teacher sees promise in her ability to paint. Jan is happy. The sun shines over the casa de Brady again. Cue the closing credits.

In true Brady fashion, Jan's artistic abilities, much like Alice's cousin, Emma, are never mentioned on the show again. But 33 years later, Jan . . . well, Eve Plumb, actually, is still painting. The actress who embodied Jan is now enjoying her own show of ``non-confrontational" still-life oil paintings at the Wynne/Falconer Gallery on an idyllic thoroughfare in Chatham.

So, Eve, isn't this just like episode number 107? Isn't this exactly where Jan Brady would be if life were just like ``The Brady Bunch"?

``I don't even remember that one," confesses Plumb, at a busy eatery across the street from the gallery. She stops eating her chicken salad on pumpernickel rye for a moment and leans forward to ask, ``You're a fan, aren't you? It's OK ." She sees this reporter blushing and adds, ``It's really OK."

Since ``The Brady Bunch" debuted on ABC in 1969 and was later reincarnated in multiple reunions, Jan, as played by Plumb, has become perhaps the world's most notorious Brady. She was the troubled middle daughter who uttered those three words that she refuses to say ever again. Everybody now: ``Marcia, Marcia, Marcia!"

In real life, Plumb is not high-maintenance, but rather a bit of an earth-mother type who spends her time painting, gardening, and performing in plays, indie films, and television roles. The painting, she explains, began nearly 20 years ago and has grown to become a career of its own. She studies light and shadow falling on inanimate objects and replicates scenes in a precise fashion. Her paintings are realist, with an emotional perspective.

The Chatham exhibit, which runs through Aug. 24, came about after Kenny Wynne, owner of the Wynne/Falconer Gallery, spotted Plumb's paintings in a Laguna Beach show. At the opening reception last week, 11 paintings were sold. One group of Bradyholics drove from Staten Island with a stack of memorabilia for Plumb to sign. She requested a glass of wine from the gallery owner, and then autographed the entire stack.

``I have this reputation," she says, ``as being a total bitch about not wanting to talk about the `Brady Bunch.' But it's totally not true. I just don't want to talk about it all the time. It would be like if someone said to you `So, how about that amazing touchdown you made in high school?' "

It's impossible to sit with Plumb and not feel a stirring to ask about such things as the three-part Brady Hawaii trip or the time Jan threw a fit when Clark Tyson started flirting with Marcia. Plumb is surprisingly understanding of these urges.

``Are you sure you've asked all your Brady questions? I don't want you to wake up in the middle of the night kicking yourself that you didn't ask about the episode with the beans in the flashlight," she says, laughing. The truth is, I want to tell her that the red-and-white polka-dot dress she's wearing is exactly like the one she wore in episode 107. Instead, I keep quiet and let Plumb tell me how she got started in the business.

The daughter of a musician and a ballet dancer, Plumb was spotted by a neighbor/talent agent and landed her first gig, a commercial for fabric softener, at age 6. She was the little blond girl who could cry on cue. Because of her ability to sail through dramatic scenes and cry on camera, she was given the emotional story lines on ``The Brady Bunch," and that's how she became the country's most famous difficult middle child.

Jennifer Elise Cox, who played the role of Jan Brady in two 1990s ``Brady" spoof movies and now stars on ``Lovespring International," says filling Plumb's platform shoes was a challenge. ``I met [``Brady Bunch" creator] Sherwood Schwartz on the set," she says by phone. ``And one of the things that he told me was that Eve was the best actress of the bunch. He said he gave her those dramatic story lines because he knew she could handle them."

After the original run of ``The Brady Bunch" ended in 1974, Plumb started landing more roles, the most famous of which was innocent teenage runaway-turned-hooker in 1976's ``Dawn: Portrait of a Teenage Runaway." Because of ``Dawn," Plumb was able to sidestep the tacky disaster ``The Brady Bunch Variety Hour." But she has since appeared in every other ``Brady" reunion.

She turned up the following year in a TV movie version of ``Little Women " (costarring with Susan Dey and Meredith Baxter-Birney). The popularity of the show landed her in a ``Little Women" TV series in 1979. But the rest of the country, including Plumb, was tuning into ``Mork & Mindy" instead. Like Beth March, the show died prematurely.

She met with George Lucas to talk about a part in ``Star Wars" and met with Steven Spielberg to chat about ``Raiders of the Lost Ark." Neither meeting led to an audition. Meanwhile, she began the rounds on ``Love Boat," ``Fantasy Island," and ``Murder She Wrote." By the 1990s, ``The Brady Bunch" had blossomed into a camp phenomenon, and Plumb's character was the butt of many of the jokes.

``The Jan role was never seen as crazy until the `Saturday Night Live' sketch," she says. ``When I first saw the imitation of me on `Saturday Night Live' it felt like being made fun of at school as a kid. I was watching, thinking `Oh my God, am I really that crazy?' "

Despite the indignities, the typecasting, and the unending string of fans asking for autographs, Plumb says she'd drop her painting -- at least temporarily -- if another ``Brady" project came along. And there seems to be little doubt in her mind that it will.

``It will never die," she says. ``Are you ready for `A Very Brady Arbor Day ' ?"

Christopher Muther can be reached at muther@globe.com.