Happy Days

:For the play by Samuel Beckett, see Happy Days (play).

History

Happy Days originated during a period of 1950s nostalgia in film, television, and music. It began as an unsold pilot called "Love and the Happy Days" that was originally presented on the television anthology series Love, American Style, with Harold Gould in the roll of Howard Cunningham, Marion Ross as Marion, Ron Howard as Richie, Anson Williams as Potsie. In 1973, George Lucas released American Graffiti (co-starring Ron Howard and Cindy Williams). The box office success of that film caused series creator Garry Marshall and ABC to reconsider the unsold pilot and turn Happy Days into a series.

Related Topics:
1950s - Nostalgia - Anthology - Love, American Style - 1973 - George Lucas - American Graffiti - Garry Marshall

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The first two seasons of Happy Days are markedly different from the rest of the series, as it was filmed with a laugh track, as opposed to being a three-camera live production.

Related Topics:
Laugh track - Three-camera

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The early Happy Days episodes centered around Richie and his teenage friends, Ralph Malph and Warren "Potsie" Weber, dealing with the troubles of being teenagers in 1950s and early 1960s Milwaukee. During the first season, the character of Arthur "Fonzie" / "the Fonz" Fonzarelli started to become a fan favourite. "The Fonz," as Arthur was usually called by everyone (except for Marion, who called him "Arthur"), was originally meant to be a local high school drop out and only occasionally seen. However, the Fonz proved popular with viewers, and was soon given more and more screen time by the writers, becoming a permanent member of the cast in the second season credits. The "Fonz" quickly became the show's most popular character. When the ABC brass considered changing the name of the show to "Fonzie" the cast including Henry Winkler who played the role of The Fonz protested along with Producer/Creator Garry Marshall and the brass left the show name as is.

Related Topics:
1960s - Arthur "Fonzie" / "the Fonz" Fonzarelli

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Later seasons saw the addition of other characters. Roz Kelly was first brought in as Pinky Tuscadaro slated to be Fonzie's long term girlfriend. Commercials for the subsequent season even began promoting Kelly's new character, but when discord occurred between her and the cast and producers, her character was dropped; it was only mentioned briefly in two subsequent episodes, one where her sister Leather Tuscadro came into town to start a fresh life from Reform School, and when Fonzie was out of town at a demolition derby with Pinky. Another character, Sticks Downey, was also supposed to be added to the cast as a new member of the gang at Arnold's but the character never caught on and only stayed for a few episodes. The actor playing Sticks Downey went on to a career in adult films and later died from complications due to AIDS.

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During the first two seasons a few actresses were brought in as potential long term girlfriends for Richie. Laurette Spang (later of Battlestar Galactica fame) was Richie's girlfriend Arlene in a couple of first season episodes. Later in the second season Linda Purl was brought in as Richie's girlfriend Gloria. Neither caught on storywise and Richie did not have a steady girlfriend until he went to college and met Lori-Beth Allan (Linda Goodfriend), a former classmate from Jefferson High. Coincidentally Linda Purl returned to the Happy Days fold in Season Ten as Fonzi's girlfriend Ashley Fifster.

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The most major character changes occurred after season four with the addition of Scott Baio as Fonzie's cousin, Chachi. Originally the character of Spike, mentioned as Fonzie's nephew was supposed to be the character that morphed into Chachi.

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Al Molinaro was also added as Al Delvelchio the new owner of Arnolds after Pat Morita's character of Arnold moved on (his character got married). Al Molinaro also played Al's twin brother Father Delvelchio.

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Linda Goodfriend joined the cast as a minor character Lori-Beth Allen and became a permenant member of the cast between seasons 8-10. The character would marry Richie.

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Ted McGinley joined the cast as Roger Phillips the new Phys Ed teacher at Jefferson High and nephew to Howard and Marion. He became the counterpoint to Fonzi's character.

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Billy Warlock joined the cast for a couple of seasons as Roger's brother Flip. The character didn't really catch on and Warlock left the show.

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Crystal Bernard joined the cast the same time as Billy Warlock and after Erin Moran and Scott Baio's departure into their own show "Joanie loves Chachi. Bernard's character was K.C. Cunningham, neice to Howard and Marion. When Moran and Baio returned after their series flopped in the ratings, Bernard along with Warlock left the show.

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The show also took more and more liberties with both the time era it took place in (fashions and hairstyles contemporary to the show's 1970s and 1980s production years started to show up on the show's characters) and with the tone of the episodes, as Happy Days latter seasons started to feature more and more outlandish plots. The most famous of these plots, and of the show's entire run, is a storyline involving the Fonz performing a water ski jump over a pool containing a shark. In later years, this has often been cited by critics as the point where it became obvious that the series had already passed its peak of quality and popularity; the phrase jumping the shark was eventually coined to express such criticisms about popular culture phenomena in general.

Related Topics:
1970s - 1980s - Shark - Jumping the shark

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Seasons 1-2 of the series used an edited version of "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley and His Comets as the opening theme song. This edited recording, as of summer 2004, has never been commercially released, although the original 1954 recording returned to the American Billboard charts in 1974 as a result of its use on the show. Eventually, the show's closing theme song, "Happy Days," became a major hit in its own right and replaced "Rock Around the Clock" at the beginning of the show. The song "Happy Days" itself going through some small edits in subsequent seasons.

Related Topics:
Rock Around the Clock - Bill Haley - 1954 - Billboard

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