With a remarkable career which includes more than 600 radio shows, 27 Broadway plays, 35 feature films, and 7 television series, Van Patten is still perhaps best known for his popular starring role as Tom Bradford in the long-running hit series, Eight Is Enough. In recent years, audience interest prompted him to reprise that role in the top-rated television specials, Eight Is Enough: A Family Reunion and An Eight Is Enough Wedding, both for NBC.

A one-time child actor billed as Dickie Van Patten, he has appeared in a continuous stream of Broadway shows starting at the age of seven. They include three Pulitzer Prize winners: On Borrowed Time, The Skin of Our Teeth (starring Taullah Bankhead and Frederick March). And Mister Roberts, playing Ensign Pulver opposite Henry Fonda.

Van Patten has worked with many of the great directors in American theater including Max Reinhardt, Josh Logan, Moss Hart, Guthrie McClintock, Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, George Kaufman, George Abbot, Alfred Lunt, Elia Kazan, Martin Ritt and Elaine May.

Van Patten is most proud of his association with Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne with whom he worked for four years in Terrance Rattigan