Although the thought of having a real-life Brady here thrills many students, almost no one is as excited as Charles Cino.

Cino, 24, is a graduate student working toward his master's thesis in media studies. The appearance tonight by Barry Williams, who played Greg Brady, is especially groovy for Cino, because the subject of his thesis is "The Brady Bunch."

An only child until the age of 7, Cino constantly watched the multitudinous Bradys on television, wishing he had three brothers and three sisters, too. Cino said his parents were unbelievably normal, to the point where his father would announce, "Honey, I'm home," when he walked through the door. They even had a housekeeper, whom Cino always thought of as, of course, Alice.

"I lived vicariously through the Bradys," Cino said.

But his fascination with the Brady clan wasn't love at first sight. Cino's first real memory of the show is an upsetting one --after seeing a patented Brady pie fight, he vowed never to watch the Bradys again.

"The violence was very upsetting to me," Cino joked. "Of course, I was back on them the next week."

Cino's friends have been aware of his Brady fixation for years, calling him "The Seventh Brady." After an episode of the short-lived sitcom "Day by Day," in which the son dreams himself onto "The Brady Bunch," Cino's friends told him, "That's you."

One of Cino's friends, Matt Bonen (junior-chemical engineering) laughed about a framed group shot of the Bradys Cino keeps on his bookcase.

"When people first walk in, they think it's his family," Bonen said. "Then they think he's really sick."

So, having kicked the idea around for awhile, Cino decided to use the Bradys for his master's thesis after seeing the huge reception they got on a recent '70s revival special.

"I decided that someone, somewhere, should develop this huge phenomenon," Cino said. "They're the single most-recognized piece of pop culture we have."

As evidence, Cino pointed to the countless follow-ups the show has spawned since its premiere almost 25 years ago. These include a cartoon series, two TV movies (the first was "The Brady Girls Get Married"), three series revivals (including the mid-'70s "Brady Bunch Hour"), an off-Broadway play and an upcoming feature film.

Cino -- who has sometimes had three videocassette recorders taping the same Brady special (in case of mechanical failure) -- said the show lets him be a kid again.

"When I watch them . . . I can relive my childhood," he said.

With "The Brady Bunch" bigger than ever, Cino definitely thinks it's cool to like the Bradys again. He proved his point by mentioning how fast the tickets for Barry Williams' show disappeared.

"He's like the long-lost older brother we haven't seen in a long time," Cino said. "He is Greg Brady."

The Bradys were popular because kids could relate to the characters, Cino said. High school kids identified with Greg and Marcia, middle schoolers thought Peter and Jan were groovy and elementary kids wanted to be like Bobby and Cindy.

And who were Cino's favorite characters? The Brady parents, Mike and Carol.

"They had a kind of sexual innuendo; they were playful, not stiff," he said. "You knew something was going on in that bedroom."

Cino plans to have his thesis finished by fall, with a January 1995 graduation in mind. Afterward, he hopes to carry out a dream he has had since he was 5 and glued to the screen -- to become a TV producer.

Just like "Brady Bunch" creator Sherwood Schwartz.