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Sure, he may be an Academy Award winning director now (for A
Beautiful Mind, 2001), but to many TV viewers, Ron Howard will
always be all-American boy Richie Cunningham from the series Happy
Days. The show, which kicked off its ten year run on ABC in 1974,
launched Richie and pals Ralph Malph, Potsie and, of course, "the Fonz"
into the annals of pop culture. Ron Howard was already a familiar face
before Happy Days' success, getting his start in movies like
The Journey (1959), The Music Man and The Courtship of
Eddie's Father (both 1962). And of course, no one can forget Ronny
Howard (as he was then billed) as Opie, the freckled-faced son of
Sheriff Taylor on The Andy Griffith Show.
Unlike many child actors, Ron Howard continued to get good roles as a
teenager and young adult, including the pilot for a "1950's revival
sitcom" which the network initially turned down. The show was packaged
into a popular skit called Love and the Happy Days for the show
Love, American Style. At the time, Howard's star was on the rise
in films too, playing another high school teen in George Lucas'
American Graffiti (1973). The success of these two ventures
convinced the network to take a chance on Ron Howard and Happy
Days. And they never looked back. Happy Days place in the Top
20 TV shows for eight years of its run and landed at number one for the
1976-77 season. Howard left the show in 1980, after six years, to pursue
his dream of becoming a director. But Richie Cunningham, that clean cut
personification of 50's Americana lives on, still hanging out at
Arnold's in reruns.
Howard made his directing and screenwriting debut at age 23, in the
latter arena with Grand Theft Auto (1977), a cheapie produced by
Roger Corman. After further honing his filmmaking skills on several TV
projects, Howard made his mark as a director with his second venture,
Night Shif (1982), a wacky comedy about two morgue attendants who
double as pimps. While Happy Days co-star Henry Winkler starred
in the movie, it also marked Howard's initial collaboration with several
individuals. He and producer Brian Grazer would go on to form a
production company while former Happy Days screenwriters Lowell
Ganz and Babaloo Mandel would team with him on Splash (1984),
Gung Ho (1986) and Parenthood (1989) and actor Michael
Keaton would star in both Gung Ho and The Paper (1994).
With his third feature, Splash, Howard garnered a great deal of
attention. A major hit for Disney's then new Touchstone division, this
romantic fantasy about a man and a mermaid (Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah)
proved to be the studio's most successful live-action feature up to that
time. Howard enjoyed another hit and directed veteran actor Don Ameche
to a Best Supporting Actor Oscar® with Cocoon (1985), a
Spielbergian sci-fi fantasy about old folks who rediscover youthful
vigor thanks to alien intervention. On the other hand, Willow
(1988), a lavish George Lucas-produced fantasy peopled with elves,
trolls and a gallant hero, did not find its expected audience. By this
point, though, the tone and style of a Howard-directed film was already
in place: much as his success as a child actor helped extend the cozy,
sweet aura of mainstream film and TV, his features essentially rework
old genre formulas, offering plenty of feel-good optimism and playful
whimsy to soften the grimmer, more violent edge of contemporary
mainstream cinema.
Howard reached new heights at the helm of Apollo 13 (1995), the
based-on-fact drama about a NASA moon mission that encountered
difficulties and the efforts of the crew and ground support to avert
potential tragedy. Eschewing archival footage, Howard and his team
recreated everything in perfect detail, from the interior of the capsule
to the command center in Houston to the 1970s decor of the astronaut's
homes. With a strong cast that included Tom Hanks, Gary Sinise, Kevin
Bacon, Ed Harris and Kathleen Quinlan, Apollo 13 earned critical
kudos and a healthy box office. Indeed, Academy members were suitably
impressed and rewarded the film with nine Oscar nominations including
Best Picture. Surprisingly, though, Howard was omitted from the Best
Director category, an oversight that the Directors Guild of America
rectified in part by awarding him its award as Director of the Year.
In 2000, he turned his attention to the biopic, a genre in which he had
not previously worked, opting to tell the story of mathematician John
Forbes Nash Jr. who overcame schizophrenia and won a Nobel Prize. A
Beautiful Mind (2001) garnered as much controversy as acclaim,
though, as many objected to the liberties it took with the facts. Howard
and screenwriter Akiva Goldsman conceded that they made a fictionalized
account of the man's life. It also marked another rarity in the
director's canon: the film had a single leading role whereas most of his
work has been of an ensemble nature. Having received eight Academy Award
nominations, one of which was Howard's first as Best Director, it took
home four statues, including Best Picture and Best Director.
His current project, which is due to open this December, is
Frost/Nixon, in which Frank Langella will reprise his
Tony-winning performance as President Richard M. Nixon and Michael Sheen
will play famed interviewer David Frost.
 
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31 Days of Oscar Highlights for Feb. 27
Kate Winslet & Leonardo DiCaprio star in the TCM premiere of Titanic (1997), winner of 11 Oscars®. Other honored films being shown are Gold Diggers of 1935, Tom Jones (1963) and From Here to Eternity (1953).
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