Henry Winkler - The Fonz, Getting Fired and Listening To Your Gut

0:01This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Checking off the boxes on your to-do list is a great feeling. And when it comes to checking off coverage, a State Farm agent can help you choose an option that's right for you. Whether you prefer talking in person, on the phone or using the award winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Just a note before we start, we recorded with the delightful Henry Winkler remotely. And it meant that I got a bird's eye view of his fabulous Beverly Hills backdrop. but it also meant that we have some audio of his dogs.

0:39So just to let you know, if you hear any barking, it's not me, it's Henry's dogs.

0:56Hello and welcome to How to Fail with me, author and broadcaster Elizabeth Day. This is the podcast where we flip the traditional interview format on its head celebrating failure rather than success. Because what we learn from the former is often far more important than anything that comes from the latter. It's how we respond to failure that defines our character and helps us grow. Every episode, I ask a very special guest to discuss three failures and how they emerged on the other side to be the person we see today. Before we begin, I just wanted to remind you about my subscriber series, failing with friends.

1:34And today I am looking at your wonderful failures and questions on my own. We'll be covering perfectionism, the pressure to do things to a timeline dictated by society or not, and whether trusting too much really is a failure. And I would love to hear from you. Just follow the link in the podcast notes.

1:59Henry Winkler was born in 1945, a few months after the end of World War II, and in many ways, the story of his life is the story of the second half of the 20th century itself. The H in his first name is a reference to his uncle Helmut, who was killed in the Holocaust. His middle name, Franklin, is a nod to FDR, the president of the country his parents managed to escape to after fleeing Nazi Germany in 1939. Despite an extremely challenging childhood, Winkler went on to become one of the most famous actors in America when, age 27, he was cast as the Fonz in the TV series Happy Days. Winkler's portrayal of the cool dude in the leather jacket made him into a cultural phenomenon.

2:50It was, perhaps, a mark of his gratitude that even at the height of his fame, he read every single fan letter. After ten years of happy days, Winkler made the jump into producing and directing. Later in his career, he appeared in iconic TV shows such as Arrested Development and Parks and Recreation, as well as hit films like The Waterboy and The French Dispatch. but it was his riveting performance as Gene, the acting coach in Barry, the dark HBO comedy, that brought him even wider acclaim and won him one of his three Emmys. He also has two Golden Globes and two Critics' Choice Awards to his name.

3:29Now 78, Winkler published a moving memoir last year and is about to embark on a multi-city tour of the UK after a series of sell-out shows in Australia. I live by two words, Winkler states, tenacity and gratitude. Henry Winkler, welcome to How to Fail. Thank you. And I wanted to ask you how important gratitude is to you in your life. Gratitude lets you journey through life, emptying your vessel of anger. I am so grateful to be on the earth. And I am a people person. I meet all of these people everywhere I go in the world. And it just, it makes me happy. So people say, oh, you're the nicest guy in Hollywood.

4:25And that is, I don't know if that is true. You know, I have my dark thoughts like everybody else, but I am, I am the most grateful guy in Hollywood. And is part of that gratitude, do you think, because you're only too aware of how differently it could have turned out? You had a very challenging childhood, didn't you? I did. You know, people told me that I would not be here in front of this screen talking to you. That is the metaphor for the way I grew up. But what I realized was the individual is very powerful. Now it takes time. Everybody learns their own power in their own time, but you cannot be knocked off your journey by another person's opinion.

5:18You know what you want without ambivalence and you keep marching toward that dream. You cannot have doubt about what it is you really want, as long as it's not hurtful to anybody else. I am living proof. You wind up on kind of at your destination. Could you tell me a little bit about your childhood? I mentioned in the introduction what your parents went through in order to get to America and escape from Nazi Germany. and they were very strict with you. How long do you think it took you to understand? It's not a matter of strict, because I think I was a strict parent. I had boundaries. I had, you know, a sense of how to be in the house, how to be out of the house, just in order to flourish as a human being.

6:25they did not see me my parents did not acknowledge who I was as a human being and that is so detrimental to a human being um a living a um a full life why do you think they were like that one they went through a trauma I understand that they came to another land learned a new language started another business I respect that as human beings I don't know if it was their German-ness I don't know if it was their um generation but they literally saw me as an extension to making them grander. I had to do well. If I didn't do well, I embarrassed them. That is a tragedy. It is one of the no-nos of being a parent.

7:33You have to see the child in front of you. You have to hear the child in front of you. And whether or not you understand what, If you see that your child is having a problem, it is your job to make sure that you don't let that child's self-image plummet to the bottom of the ocean. You write so movingly in your book, Being Henry, about being called Duma Hund, dumb dog by your parents, about the fact that your father would ground you wanting you to work harder and he would punish you when he came back if he felt the top of the TV, if he felt the warmth of the top of the TV because it showed that you'd been watching it.

8:18I was not allowed to watch television. They thought when they went out on a Saturday night, if I sat at my desk, I was going to get it. So I had to watch television carefully and turn it off at the right time because they would feel it. And if it was warm, because there were tubes at that time, it was not all transistorized. It was not all, you know, these modern, thin, on-the-wall televisions. Yeah, it was. What I never understood is I would leave my bedroom joyful. I would wake up happy. I would walk into a maelstrom of I don't even know why they were yelling or what they were yelling about and I used music to bring my brain back to normal so that I wasn't shaking I I mean literally I uh I as I say it now to you in 2024 I so deeply resent it you also write in the book about how you struggled at school.

9:33You had undiagnosed dyslexia, undiagnosed until you were 31. But the comedy, making people laugh, that was a refuge of sorts as well, wasn't it? Not just a refuge. It was an island on which to exist. I was so embarrassed by the fact that I could not handle any of this education. I couldn't read. I can't spell. I still can't do math, that I used humor to cover the shame of it. I read The Tale of Two Cities. I read the cover. That was basically it. I never quite got to the first page. It's extraordinary and such a testament to your strength of purpose and character that you have become the person that you have.

10:26and we're going to get more into detail on your terrific career in a minute. But age 27, you get this role as the Fonz on Happy Days, which is a huge cultural phenomenon. I mean, people are so excited that I'm talking to you today because of that role. Oh, wow. And I wonder how wonderful that was on one hand, but how difficult after a decade of being in people's living rooms every Tuesday night, how difficult it was to do something else, do something new. Was it also tricky not being typecast? Well, I was typecast. I thought I could beat the system. I thought I could do, I did everything I possibly could do not to be typecast.

11:14But you cannot beat that system. I was So in everybody's living room internationally, as this character, the Fonz, that when it was over, I could not get hired as an actor. I don't even know how to explain, and I have been trying to explain it since 1982. I had a pain in my psyche that was debilitating. of I had a plan A and I lived that plan A, but I had no plan B. And I was stuck in an ocean of molasses, of thick honey, where I could not move forward. And then finally, my lawyer, Skip Brittenham, he said, you know, I'm going to start a production company for you. And like everything else, I went, well, I can't do that.

12:16I don't know about business. That's crazy. He said, you'll learn. And I did not think that he was right. I didn't think I could. And that was another lesson I learned in my life. You have no idea what you can accomplish until you just put one foot in front of the other, which is part of my presentation when I come to the British Isles. My final question before we get onto your failures is that you dedicate your book, Being Henry, to your wife, Stacey. What do you think you've been like as a husband? It is so complicated. I was non-present emotionally. I understood about being present for the children.

13:06And not only that, but I worked nine to five, five days a week. And then I was home. I was home most nights for dinner. I was non-present as a human being. It came to me just like a few months ago. The bottom of my brain was soldered shut like an oil can, you know, like those oil, big oil cans. And when you pour cream into your coffee and it swirls and it makes a color and then it becomes this, instead of a black coffee, now it's beige. Now you've changed the color. None of my thoughts or emotions got through the metal bottom of my brain and swirled. There was no swirling going on at all. And I had no idea that is the way I was as a human being, let alone a husband.

14:10I could explode with creativity as a professional. And I thought I was being present as a human being socially, and I was not. When did that change? I would say that changed nine years ago when I met my present therapist. And I no longer wanted to be that way. And so I started therapy. And this doctor, I mean, I say in the book, if I were to give her a gift, it would have to be the size of a skyscraper.

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15:48Let's get on to your failures. Your first failure is leaving Yale rep. Yep. So tell us, Henry, what happened there and how you got to Yale in the first place? Well, how I got to Yale was what we talked about before. I knew that I did not want to be a flash in the pan as an actor. So if that's true, I had to train. And I applied to the Yale School of drama. They take 25 students, 11 finished in my class, three were asked into the professional repertory company. I was one of those three. I couldn't believe it. You know, my first week at Yale, the dean's wife was teaching drama. And I don't know how I presented myself.

16:40you know I was thoughtlessly trying to be funny and she said to me you are undermining my class and I thought I'm undermining your class I don't even know who I am I don't even know what that means I'm going to be kicked out of my school here and I haven't been here for a week that kind of fear, that kind of amazement in the middle of horror was how I lived. So interesting. So it's as if you had no sense of self unless someone responded to you. And even if they responded to you in a critical or negative way, there was something reassuring about that. Like, oh, I exist. I have this impact. You know, people say, you know, you learn from your failure.

17:30That might be true. And I might have. But while I was going through it, I hated it. I did not see anything positive about it. I was convinced that it was black and white, the end. Every time I came up against something, I never looked to see why that failure was happening. I only saw this is it. My life is over. So when did you leave the Yale Repertory Company? I was offered a movie by a movie star at that time, Cliff Robertson. He called me backstage when we were rehearsing at the Yale Repertory Theater and offered me a job in the movies. And I couldn't go because I had no understudy. And my sense of loyalty wouldn't let me just walk out.

18:27Finally, a year and a half later, after I was hired, I went to New York City. And so this is a crazy thought. Other actors in my class went to New York and they were all getting jobs. I thought there will be nothing left for me. And then what I, I haven't said this in a long time, but what I would tell young actors when I spoke to them, there is a place for you because you are individual. And if your talent, you know, is able to come out, somebody is going to see it. And then, you know, you'll squeeze in between those other actors and you'll have your place. But I was convinced that I would be left out.

19:16So I had to go. But I was under the myth, the pressure, the guilt of the school. You cannot do anything but theater. We're trained for the theater. And I, thank God, kept moving forward. And I made a living. I did commercials. And then I was able to do plays for free in the basement of churches that no one came to see. But I was in the theatre. But during the day, I sold instant coffee and I could pay my rent. So why did you choose this as a failure? Because it actually sounds like you were following your path. I left the Yale Repertory Theatre and I went to another Repertory Theatre in Washington, D.C.

20:11I got a$10 raise. We're doing a new play called Moon Children, which eventually went to Broadway. I had my snow tires in the back of my car. I drove down to Washington, D.C. in case it got wintry. About a week before we opened, I went to the director and I said, I finally solved the monologue in the third act. And he said, you're fired. My brain turned to cream cheese. What happened was I was hired to fill time and space until another actor that he really liked finished a movie and was able to come back to Washington and walk into the role. I drove back to New York City with my snow tires in the back seat, crying I thought this is it wow who is ever going to hire an actor who has been fired well it turns out that not only were you hired but you were hired in quite spectacular style when you got the role of the Fonz and became a household name but it's very interesting that being fired is a running theme because it takes us to your second failure which is being fired from directing Turner and Hooch.

21:37And I never knew this until I read your book and you told me about it. So you felt at the time that your career was over. Why were you fired, do you think? I thought I could direct. I had won an Emmy for after-school specials, you know, directing. I'm walking through a clothing store, a famous clothing store at the time in New York City, and a guard in a gray uniform comes up to me and says, there's a phone call for you. I wait, wait a minute. How can there be a phone call for me in the aisles of this gigantic clothing store? It is the president of Disney Studios. He says, I want you to direct this movie.

22:25I said, you know, I really want to direct Bette Midler in Stella. I understand the emotion of being on the outside looking in. I really believe I can do that movie. He said, no, I want you to do Turner and Hooch. I said, well, I'm not sure I'm the right guy. But your ego gets involved. The head of Disney, you want to direct a feature film. Oh my God. I said, yes. Another lesson I learned. When your instinct knows to turn around and go the other way, Do not second guess yourself. Your instinct knows everything and your head knows a little bit. But my ego got involved. I did 11 weeks of preparation.

23:15I knew this dog, you know, this bull mastiff, this slobbery dog, and I became friends. The star did not become my friend. Do you mean Tom Hanks, the star Tom Hanks? I probably do. I probably do. Okay, just checking. We were in Carmel, this little seaside, wonderful town on the coast of California, looking for a location. And a woman comes running, honest to God, comes running out of a shop and says, Henry Fonz, oh my God. And I said, and of course, you know Tom Hanks. and the director of photography when I was fired 13 days into filming said I knew that this was going to happen on that day in Carmel when you get fired from something like that and you've talked about how your ego got involved was it triggering for you in the sense that I imagine there's a lot of misplaced humiliation, but did it take you back to those childhood experiences of feeling like you weren't good enough, you were unseen?

24:34Oh my gosh, but that never left me. That was not just in my youth. That was not just growing up. That was with me like a little friend for my whole life until about 10 minutes ago. I thought, oh my Lord, my agent at the time said, we're going to lunch right now at a high-powered restaurant in Los Angeles, in Hollywood. I said, why? You need to be seen. Well, I enjoyed the pasta, but my directing career. You know, I make the joke, like, you know, before the lawnmower became electric, you had to pull it, you know, to start the motor. Okay. And it never turned over. That was my directing career. I was a stalled lawnmower.

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26:38That lesson that you learned about instinct, about how you really have to dig into your gut rather than your ego. It also informs your third failure, which is the TV show Monty. Will you tell us what happened with this show? Oh, my. Now, this is really that lesson. It was 30 years ago, maybe more. 1986, when I don't know what that is. I'm sent a script by a young writer who works for Michael J. Fox's show, Family Ties. Really up and coming young writer. I read it. Six in the morning at my desk by myself. Laugh out loud. Oh my God, it's funny. It's written so well. It's too controversial. I know it.

27:32I'm nervous. I need to do the next thing, you know, to replace the Fonz. I'm for Schimmelt anyway. I don't know what's going on. I said, I call him up. I said, it is so funny. I can't do it. He said, do me a favor, read it again. I said, okay. I read it again a week later. It is still unbelievably funny. I go, Oh my God, I can't do it. I'm sorry, I can't do it. I read it a third time. I say, this is crazy. I'm not, this script is so good. How can you say no? I'm playing a conservative talk show host, Rush Limbaugh, let's say, with a daughter who comes back from college with her lover. She is now gay or she has come out.

28:26This is crazy, this situation. NBC says, okay, I get two tickets to fly to New York City for the upfronts. The Upfronts, every network goes to New York, presents all of their new shows to the advertisers to see who's going to buy time on that show, you know, during the week. Toothpaste, an airline, a car company, whatever. GE, the major company that owns NBC, must have now gotten hold of the script and went, are you kidding? we cannot do a gay daughter on our network they take my tickets I'm sent home it's over my ego and there is the head of Disney again now it is at Disney and he says we're gonna sell it we sell it to another network and they of course want to bastardize it they of course take it from the right-wing talk show host with a gay daughter to a right-wing talk show host with a son who wanted to be a lawyer and now he wants to be a chef.

29:53It took the heart out of the writer. He understood it because he had a gay sister. He knew exactly what the emotion was. And it was like pablum. It was like mush compared to this funny, pointed, relevant sitcom. It has now become pudding. And it was canceled after six episodes. Now, At the time, we bought a Cavalier puppy, a little puppy, and we named it Monty, which was the name of the show. The show is cancelled. Now I have to call the dog Monty for the rest of our lives together. And I am resenting this puppy. That poor puppy. Did you carry on resenting it? Well, I tried very hard to love him.

30:48But, you know, he wouldn't play ball. He just kind of, he was a lap dog. I didn't need a lap dog. God, that, oh, Monty. So I want to ask you then about gut instinct. Do you always listen to it now? Do you know what? I try. I try within an inch of my life. I was just offered, I have a dream on my bucket list. I want to go and do a Broadway play. The first one I did opened and closed in one night The second one I did ran with John Ritter Rest His Soul for nine months The third one I did closed in seven nights And I wanted to make it right I want to go and I was offered a Broadway play by an unbelievable playwright An unbelievable director The other parts took the audience on a journey and my part seemed to go just laterally, just I existed in the play.

31:59And I thought about it and I had to say no because. That's very, very brave. I just knew that if I did it, I would go to work. I would be in this great ensemble. I would have lunch on matinee days. I would take a nap and I would be unhappy. You're such an amazing storyteller, Henry. And I'm so delighted that more people are going to be able to hear these stories in person because you're about to come on tour in the UK, aren't you. What is it, Henry, that you enjoy about connecting with audiences? Do you know what? If I do it correctly, you stand on the stage, you feel the audience. You can feel they're leaning forward because they want to be there, Or you can feel they had too much dinner and they already had their interval during dinner.

33:14And then you have to, you can feel the energy and what it will take to get them into a cohesive, undulating, wonderful bunch of human beings that we are together. I just enjoy meeting them. I don't need to be, you know, in a hallway that's dark. I want to see all those wonderful people, you know, and hopefully I tell my story as truthfully as I can. It connects with somebody somewhere in that hall. I'm also looking forward to fish and chips. Oh, excellent. Glad to hear that. How beautiful it is, Henry, that we started this conversation with a child who was unseen, and we're ending it with that same child on stage, not only being seen, but seeing others.

34:16And I wonder if I could ask you what you think you would say now, age 78, to that child who felt very unloved. The first thing that comes to my mind is this is not your lot in life. That we as individuals are powerful enough to take our life by our own horns and ride that bull and stay on it. I love that. There is a meadow where the sound of music was filmed in the mountains that is waiting for you to run through it. Henry Winkler, thank you so, so much for coming on How to Fail. And we are so excited to see you on these shores very, very soon. Thank you. And remember, I'll answer your failures over on my subscriber series, Failing With Friends.