Review: HENRY WINKLER at Mershon Auditorium

During an hour and a half question and answer forum Nov. 8 at the Ohio State University’s Mershon Auditorium, Henry Winkler shared many stories of his varied and distinguished career. What the 78-year-old actor didn’t mention was adding a phrase to the American lexicon: jumping the shark.

When something or someone has “jumped the shark,” it has extinguished what it set out to do and is introducing ideas vastly different to its original concept. The phrase comes from a 1977 episode of HAPPY DAYS when Winkler’s character Arthur Fonzarelli waterskies over a shark tank on a dare.

After decades of reinventing himself, Winkler is finally getting comfortable with who he is.

“I’m so happy to be on this earth,” Winkler told over 900 people at the Thurber House-sponsored event. “I enjoy myself and out of that comes a joyful message.”

The former HAPPY DAYS star has an eclectic career arc. As an actor, Winkler:

* was one of the most iconic characters of the 1970s (“Fonzie” on HAPPY DAYS),

*played a collection of misfits (Barry Zuckerkorn on ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT, Coach Klein in WATERBOY, and Chuck Lumley in NIGHT SHIFT),

* won an Emmy as a dramatic actor in the role of Gene Cousineau on the darkly comic BARRY (2018-23).

As an author, Winkler has written over 50 books, including the HANK ZIPZER young adult series and his current offering, BEING HENRY: THE FONZ AND BEYOND, is currently third in The New York Times Bestseller’s List.

Yet his biography tells of his battles with self-doubt and his crippling anxiety, even at the top of his fame.

When an audience member asked him if he had ever been through a period of self-doubt, Winkler laughed.

“Yes, from 1945 until tonight,” he said. “I was the king of negative thinking.

“What I’ve learned is when you have a negative thought, you say, ‘I’m sorry but I have no time for you now.’ Don’t put a period at the end of a negative thought because it will grow into a thesis.”

LIFE AMONG FERAL PARENTS

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Connie Schultz, who served as the evening’s moderator, said Winkler is “the nicest celebrity in Hollywood.” She said generally nice people grew up with kind parents. “Having read your book, I see that’s not the case,” she added.

“They were feral,” Winkler said. “I had a wonderful life and we lived above our means. What I can’t let go of is the fact I didn’t make them proud because I didn’t do well in school. I made a promise I wouldn’t be the same parent.”

Anna and Harry Irving Winkler were German Jews landed in America with a thud in 1939. Harry Winkler took all his wife and his mother’s jewels, coated them with chocolate and hid them in a candy box when he was leaving Germany on a work visa.

“When he was stopped by the Nazis and asked if he was carrying anything of value, my dad, who was holding the box of chocolates under his arms, said ‘No, just check my baggage,’” Winkler said.

Upon arrival, Harry Winkler pawned the jewels and used the money to start a lumber business with the idea his son would take over the business.

“I hate wood,” he said. “I can’t even carve.”

When he told his parents he wanted to pursue acting, they rolled their eyes.

“People are born to do something; I was born to be an actor,” Winkler said. “(My father) would say to me, ‘Why do you think I brought this business over from Germany?’ I would say, ‘You mean besides being chased by the Nazis, Dad?’

“(As parents, you) need to see what’s in front of you.  You see the problem and figure out how to make it a little easier so your kids can fly and meet their destiny. I had to learn how to fly on my own.”

Undiagnosed dyslexia nearly clipped Winkler’s wings. Winkler did poorly as a student. His parents referred him as ‘dummer hund,’ (German for ‘dumb dog’) and his teachers often berated him for doing so poorly in school. 

Later in life, Winkler helped pen, HANK ZIPZER: THE WORLD’S GREATEST UNDERACHIEVER. The series based in part about Winkler’s experiences growing up with dyslexia. “How you learn has nothing to do with how brilliant you are,” Winkler said. 

IT STARTED WITH SIX WORDS

After college, Winkler scrambled to survive as an actor in New York City and found himself at a crossroads. One of his agents told him, ‘if you want to be known in New York, stay here. If you want to be known everywhere, move to Los Angeles.’ He decided to head west to compete for roles with “guys named Chad with gigantic belt buckles and flowing blonde hair.”

His first break was landing a spot on Mary Tyler Moore. Winkler was to play an uninvited dinner date for Rhoda (Valerie Harper), Moore’s best friend. He had one line.

“The producer hadn’t written that scene yet but told me, ‘I have you saying, could you please pass the salt’ from a table by yourself.”

Winkler stretched his line from that into a scene where ‘he was clinking a glass and announcing to the dinner guests, ‘if you don’t mind, when you get a second, could you please pass the salt?’”

Soon Paramount called Winkler to audition for a sitcom set in the 1950s. The Fonz was a far cry from his dweeby character on MARY Taylor Moore. Winkler drew from a character he played in the 1974 movie, LORDS OF FLATBUSH. While producer Garry Marshall looked on, Winkler decided to go rogue with Pascal, who was running lines with him.

“I don’t know what came into my mind, but I looked at Pascal and I said (dropping into the suave Fonzie accent), ‘You don’t even want to look at me that way. In fact, why don’t you avert your eyes?’ I did my six lines, threw my script up in the air and sauntered out of the room.”

Winkler recalls getting an Oct. 30 phone call to say he had gotten the role. “They called me on my birthday, and my money had just run out,” he said with a laugh.

Over the next decade, Winkler became one of the most recognizable faces in America. His mug was slapped on sweatshirts, blankets, and lunch boxes. Mojo TV lists Fonzie as eighth on the 100 Greatest TV characters. Even in the 1994 film, PULP FICTION, Samuel L. Jackson tells a would-be robber to be “Be cool like Fonzie.”

One of Winkler’s best stories was his encounter with Paul McCartney. “I was walking down the street and he was coming the other direction,” Winkler said. “He says to me (dropping into a Liverpool accent), ‘Fonzie,’” Winkler said. “I responded (in his Fonz voice), ‘Paul.’

“McCartney says we should hang out together and gives me his number. I called it … for 24 straight hours. He never called me back.

“If any of you know Paul, please tell him to call me. I’m better now.”

His encounter with McCartney was just a symptom of Winkler’s larger problem: imposter syndrome.

“There’s an emotional component to my learning challenge,” he said. “I believed it when adults said, ‘You’re stupid, you’re lazy, you’re not living up to your potential.’ I thought it had to be true because all these adults were saying it.

“So, when people said to me, ‘Oh you walk on water,’ I couldn’t believe they were talking to me.

“Being a star is like walking on cotton. It’s so wonderful, but I knew it’s going to rain. Those cotton balls are going to get soggy, and they are not going to support anything.”

After the sun set on HAPPY DAYS, Winkler found himself walking on waterlogged cotton balls. His Fonzie fame was gone. Most of the stuff he was asked to do sounded too much HAPPY DAYS rehash.

“I’m sitting at my desk at Paramount, having a crisis. I’ve lived my dream. I don’t have a Plan B. I feel the made the transition to being a producer, creating the hit series MACGYVER (1985-92). He also produced BETTER OFF DEAD (1985) and directed MEMORIES OF ME (1988) and COP AND A HALF (1993).

Winkler continued turning supporting roles on ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT, SCREAM, and ROYAL PAINS among many others.

In 2018, Winkler landed an image-transforming role as Gene Cousineau on HBO’s BARRY.

Cousineau, a volatile acting coach, is the polar opposite of “the nicest guy in Hollywood.” The actor said he couldn’t have done the role without therapy.

“The more you know about yourself, the more you know about everybody,” he said. “(Before the role I thought) ‘Will I still be liked? They know me this way and now I’m going to change that?’

“I don’t know if I’ll play anything as powerful as this role. Sarah Goldberg (who plays Sally Reed) and I were doing this scene where I was doing all these obnoxious things. At one point, I slammed the desk and the head of HBO jumped. He later said, ‘I had no idea that was in Henry.’”

According to Winkler, one never knows what he or she is capable of unless that person is willing to take chances.

“You don’t know what you can accomplish until you put one foot in front of the other,” Winkler said. “You can tell yourself: ‘My time has passed me by. I’m too old. I have kids. I’m still in school. I don’t have the time.’ The time is at this moment. Try it and you will be amazed where you end up.”

Winkler may have swum with the sharks of Hollywood. He just never jumped over them.

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