December 3, 2024 • 56 mins
This week R2R is getting WAY retro as "Happy Days" showrunners Brian Levant & Fred Fox Jr join us for a coversation all about the show and their recent book "50 Years of Happy Days: A Visual History of an American Television Classic".
Hear why Levant and Fox decided to create this book, the process of making it and personal stories of their time working on the show.
There's no doubt that after hearing this episode it'll make you say "Ayyyy!"
You can purchase the book now wherever books are sold or click here for a direct link!
Hear why Levant and Fox decided to create this book, the process of making it and personal stories of their time working on the show.
There's no doubt that after hearing this episode it'll make you say "Ayyyy!"
You can purchase the book now wherever books are sold or click here for a direct link!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Ladies and gentlemen, the time has come. Turn your devices
to the maximum volume, sit back, relax, and let's get
Ready to Retro.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Hey everybody, welcome to episode two four of the Ready
to Retro podcast. I am your host, Max, and today
I have two amazing guests. First, returning to Ready to
Retro is director of many of your favorite childhood movies,
just to name a few, like the Flintstones Jingle All
the Way. He's also a producer and a huge toy collector.
(01:04):
Welcome back, Brian Levance. Brian, thanks for being with us.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Oh, probably all right.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
And our second guest making his first appearance here on
Ready to Retro. He's an acclaimed writer and producer. We
have Fred Fox Junior. Fred, welcome to Ready to Retro.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Thank you so much, great to be here. Thank you
for including me.
Speaker 5 (01:24):
Awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Well let's start with you, Fred, Fred what brings you here?
We're specifically going to be talking about the fifty years
of Happy Days, but can you share your experience and
your relationship with Happy Days?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Well?
Speaker 6 (01:39):
Well, first of all, just so fortunate and lucky to
be on that show for seven years. My father was
in the business. One thing I did it is dad
was very successful writer, a great man, and growing up
I thought it was so cool he as a writer.
For some reason never entered my mind until Cindy Williams
(02:01):
called me.
Speaker 4 (02:01):
But the show just meant, as I said, meant everything.
Speaker 6 (02:05):
It introduced me to a plethora of talented people, wonderful people.
We often hear show as a family, but it really
was a genuine family. We've stayed friends through all these years.
And Brian called one day and said, hey, we realized
there's never been a book on Happy Days.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
It'd been mentioned a lot of books, and.
Speaker 6 (02:27):
Brian said, hey, let's do it, and it was fortunate
to include me and it was just a wonderful journey
that brought us back to the show.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Yeah awesome, Well thank you for sharing that. What about
for you, Brian, What is your relationship with Happy Days
and what was the impetus for the book?
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Sure? You know, I think working on Happy Days was
probably the most impactful thing that ever happened to me, probably,
And I had my first story meeting on Happy Days
when I was still twenty three years old and they
were the number one show in television, and I messed
(03:08):
up my first script and instead of you know, casting
me aside. They brought me in to observe the week
that show was filmed, and I absorbed so much. It
was such an amazing experience to see something that ran
(03:29):
with that kind of vigor, with that kind of of X.
That's incredible execution, and what it took to get there,
and how every word was considered within within every scene,
within every aspect of the story. And I was able
(03:52):
to observe so much. At the following year, I wrote
another script, and this time instead of saying, well take
it from here, they put me on staff. And it
was just such a such it was, I said recently,
and it's very true that Gary Marshall ran the equivalent
of a teaching hospital for young comedy writers. There were
(04:13):
so many of us on the lot, and so many
people who who would go on to do so much.
It's amazing the enduring strength of Happy Days as performers,
as directors, as artists, as writers. How dominant the alumni
(04:37):
of the show have become. And it was it was
time after fifty years from actually fifty almost fifty four
years since the original nineteen seventy one pilot, which most
people don't even know about and was only resuscitated after
Ron Howard starred in American Graffiti, and it was a
(05:02):
billion dollar youth driven film and it really opened up
the cinema. People weren't making movies about teenagers that fifty
years ago, you know what I mean, Gary Cooper and
John Wayne were still making and it kind of changed
the industry, and that gave you the rise of John
(05:22):
Hughes and stuff. But TV took notice of this fact
and theirs ABC was scrambling to find a graffiti show
and Gary Marsa, you made this show with the kid
who was in the movie, and thus they were given
a second chance and flourished in their first season. And
we've you know, both Fred having begun on staff and
(05:45):
fourth season and my coming aboard in a very minor
capacity in that season. There was a lot that went
on before we ever got there. And the funnest part
I think Fred my degree was was playing Woodward in
Bernstein and reconstructing the original pilot casting process and the
(06:08):
day of the screen tests and how Henry took over
the room and his reading, and how executive producer Tom
Millert rave that he he was something different, that he
was a pacchino, a dustin Hoffman and I took over
the room and and you know, and how Ron really
(06:29):
kind of was kind of thrilled to work beside Henry
starting with the with the nineteen seventy four pilot. You
know that that I don't think he'd ever met anyone
like Henry whose acting came from such a different creative place.
And I think that, you know, Ron who was already
(06:51):
you know, I remember Fred that the day he opened
up an envelope right before run through and he picked
up his twenty years pension. I think he was twenty four.
Speaker 7 (07:02):
That's crazy, but so so you know, there was so
much that we wanted to learn and so much that
they all wanted to tell us about those days.
Speaker 6 (07:16):
And yet I'm sorry, Yeah, it was an incredible manners, right,
he just started so many people's careers, just very humble.
He felt that again it was it was a family.
And then he started a softball team that Brian I
were so lucky to be a part of when we
ran it, and it just brought us and they cast
(07:38):
much closer together to experience them off the set, and
it just it.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
Just yeah, no, n Ron Ron Howard said of it
looking back now, he said, happy days was a coming
of age experience and an extraordinary one. And uh and
it really was. And his to you know, Gary Marshall
was a musician, He was an athlete, a writer, a producer.
(08:06):
He became a director, but but you know, sports always
came first with him and Anson Williams Anson read for him.
It's like ten hours until somebody's got a report to
wardrobe for the part of Patzi Weber. And Gary listens
to antson reading says to him, so can you play softball?
(08:29):
And answer goes, yeah, yeah, I'm good, and yeah, how good?
I'm really good? He go, okay, you got the job,
said obviously that was more important to him than the acting. Yeah.
And so Gary entered a team in the Entertainment League
(08:50):
and that was great. And Ron and Donnie Anson, you know,
guys on the crew, all young, strong, athletic guys. And
there was one problem. Only one person on the team
had never played baseball or owned a myth. Can you
guess who.
Speaker 8 (09:09):
Was it?
Speaker 5 (09:09):
Henry That's right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Good water skier never played baseball, right, So Ron got
him a my for his twenty eighth birthday and and
turned him over to Donny Most and Walter von hun
who was part of the Arnolds Gang later the dialogue
coach uh and also pitched at Liola Marrimunt and and
(09:40):
uh oh. Yeah. The team was terrific, and Henry became
a dominating pitcher. He his discipline was such a he
could put a little something on the ball. This isn't windmill,
and it isn't big art. It's just kind of put
it over the plate. And if you can put a
little something on it, extra, go for it, you know.
And Henry kept them low and inside, and it was
(10:02):
very hard for people to get around on it, you know,
and but God forbid somebody popped up. Henry would sometimes
run for the ball hearing other people would collide with him.
But the squad was just an amazing group effort. And
(10:23):
his friend said it brought everyone so much closer together.
And then, you know, a bunch of us all had
kids at the same time. So the experience was rooted
so much deeper than just the relationship between people on
a show. And you know, the happy days social calendar.
You know, if Marian, if Marian had a play in
(10:47):
San Diego that she was doing, everybody, everybody trapes down
there to see her, you know, and she.
Speaker 6 (10:54):
Also I'm sorry, Brian. She also called her house the
Happy Days Farm Court and just incredible sweet lady.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
No, yes, So you know that's the thing about Happy Days.
There was no grumpy person, There was no animosity between them.
There was the usual friction on occasion between writers and
actors especially, you know, there was there were some different
times in the show where the show was struggling, and
(11:26):
there were other challenges. You know, after the second season,
they had to change the whole show from a single
camera show to a multi camera show in front of
an audience, which unleashed the comedic energy that had been
kind of tapped down in the calm single camera you know,
(11:47):
moody teenage years of Happy Days. But the show came
alive then. And then, you know, after season seven, Ron
left the show to pursue his directing career, his dream,
and and the show had to totally reformulate again and
do everything different and fight for survival and ended up
(12:10):
you know, at the end of the eighth season, the
first season without run, the show was rewarded with a
two year pickup with unheard of in the industry in
those days. So just a measure of how this show
when it was challenged to survive several times, had the
wherewithal and the personnel to do so. And you know,
(12:35):
and and the cast, you know, we can't say enough
about them as people. Marion is just beyond There's a
reason that she's so beloved. There's a reason that Barbara
Billings is so beloved and stuff. Sometimes television really shows
more than anything, who you are. And I think people
(12:56):
see who these women are and there they just you know,
they are the moms that people wish they had. And
you know, and Maryan is so incredibly sweet and we're
so lucky that, you know, here she is ninety six
years old and posting about the book on Instagram her birthday.
Speaker 6 (13:20):
Ault what Brian said about mary and a mother. I
think a lot of the reason the popularity of the
show was people have said to me it was a
family they would have loved to be a part of.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
And really, through Phonsie, that was your experience as an
audience as you got to join them at the dinner table.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
Yea.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
You got to live over the garage, you know, and
be a part of a family, which is something he
badly needed and I think really all of us need.
And you look a lot in the seventies. And you know,
it was a turbulent time in the mid seventies when
the show premiered. It you had terrible watergate gas prices
(14:06):
through the roof, you know, next Vietnam War, the Vietnam War,
you know, people are getting bayoneted on campus. Uh, you know,
and the country kind of needed a nice escape valve
and and and I believe that Happy Days served that purpose.
But then when the national psyche started to improve with
(14:28):
the by centennial and and uh that the fact that
Happy Days more came alive and ignited like fireworks in
the sky every week on Tuesday night, that it helped,
you know, it helped ease the transition and then celebrated.
(14:48):
And you know, I think the fact that there was
this calm uh and in television and in people's lives
on Tuesday nights for a decade, I think that, you know,
that's the kind of thing that goes more than creating
a bond between an audience and a show.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
When I was talking to my dad, he actually was
the class of nineteen seventy six, as you were talking about,
so he kind of grew up around this time. And
you know, I was bringing up this book in this
interview to him, and he was saying, yeah, there was
something about the seventies where everybody was just reminiscing about
the fifties and the fifties were like cool for those
(15:32):
who weren't around for that time, like myself. Can you
just explain what was it about that time that people
were just feeling nostalgic over the fifties during that time?
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Well, I think that you have to look at it
as the period that really when Happy They started was
post World War Two and post the Korean War. You
had almost a generation of peace there and and that
is the era that Happy Days was born in. It
(16:04):
was a great time of national prosperity for the first time,
you know, everybody had a TV, and people were starting
to get second cars and second TVs and kids lines
and you know, and rock and roll. Rock and roll
took took this burgeoning youth culture and exploded it. And
(16:27):
this isn't to say that there wasn't rampant Jim Crow
laws and civil rights abuses, uh that that would horrify
today's audiences, and and many problems in the world with Russia,
right and and Vietnam beginning but it was a time
(16:51):
of peace, it was a time of prosperity, it was
a time of great music, and it was a time
that the youth culture exploded, so that naturally, twenty years later,
people who were sixteen to twenty four and that you know,
in the in the initial Elvis period between when he
came around and when he went into the army, right that,
(17:12):
you know, that was the good life there.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
I just think it's so there's some parallels to it
because it reminds me of people my generation, my age,
who are looking at the nineties as kind of that
as well. It was before nine to eleven, It was
before you know, the internet. It was this like simpler time.
So as you guys were just sharing about that time
in the seventies, it just makes me think, I think
(17:37):
that's how people look at the nineties right now.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Well, you know, it's interesting. I've been teaching for like
seven eight years and it's gotten to the point where
my students who were not were all born after nine
eleven and they don't know nothing else. So I think
you're lucky if you do remember a different world at
this point. But you know, I think you know that
(18:02):
seventies show was made in the nineties, was it not?
Speaker 5 (18:06):
Yeah? It was like.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Which was you know which I loved? It wasn't as
and it wasn't as nostalgic as as Happy Days, was right, right?
But I thought that was another brilliant another brilliant ABC
Coming of age show, like they should be making more of.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
Yeah, Fred, for you in writing this book, why was
it important for you and Brian to be the ones
to write this out of anybody that could have done it? Why?
Speaker 5 (18:37):
Why? You guys?
Speaker 4 (18:40):
Well, I think that.
Speaker 6 (18:45):
A lot of books have been written by you know,
entertainment shows, pop culture, written by people that were kind
of on the outside of it, you know, maybe professors, whatever.
And we felt that, as they said, when we heard
that never been a book about Happy Days, we realized
that we thought, first of all, it would it was
(19:06):
time to do. It would bring us back to those
incredible days. Brian and I have been working together off
and on for forty seven years, and we worked together
on Beaver and we created a show called My Secret Identity.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
It was shot when Emmy.
Speaker 6 (19:23):
Award winning series and Brian I just we've worked together
forty seven years. We've never had an argument and I
always enjoyed working with them, and it was just a
perfect opportunity for so many reasons to go back and
relive those days. And in the book, as you'll see,
we discovered so many things through the cast interviews which
(19:44):
were just incredible, and it was just wanted a chronicle
the history of the show, kind of a labor of love,
and just so glad we did it.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Yeah. No, you know, I think that one Paramount never
wanted anybody to do this for some reason, and they
let us because we are insiders, and because yeah, not
to we come to praise Caesar, not Bury, but which
(20:17):
isn't to say we did not look critically at episodes
and seasons and choices that were made. And you know,
you're gonna do two hundred and fifty five shows, They're
not all going to be amazing, incredible start to finish
like Friends did somehow, But we were honest. And I
(20:40):
think that besides Paramount not wanting somebody to do a
hatchet job or anything, and to protect what was the
most financially successful television series of the twentieth century, that's crazy, right,
And then I don't think the cast would have participated
(21:03):
or with the same frankness and vigor that they did
with us, as well as the you know Lowell Gans
who who produced season three and then would come back
and be supervising producer on seven, eight, nine and consulting
on ten and eleven, and William S. Bickley, who produced
(21:26):
the original producer wrote most of the first season scripts
and produced the second season and then came back in
the fourth and then back again in seven, eight, nine,
eleven and another capacity. But you know, there's a lot
of a lot of hands that crafted the material, and
(21:48):
I think that we were able to get a lot
from them, from their perspectives, from their experiences, from their
their working much closer beside Gary Marshall than we did.
By the time I got on the show, Gary was
starting to step away from the day to day running
(22:13):
shows to launch his movie career. And and plus you know,
I mean, what year was that, Fred that he had
four of the five top shows, Mark and Mindy, Happy Days, Angie.
And then if it weren't for Three's Company, he.
Speaker 9 (22:33):
Would have had a flush, I think, yeah, And it
was time to chronicle it while everybody's memory is still functional, And.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
It's amazing, Yeah, it's amazing how many still original cast
members are still with us.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
And Henry is a vigorous, vigorous seventy nine, now do
you believe?
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (23:02):
And you know Ron Howard, when most of us have
hung up our our hiking boots and not trudging around
forrest making movies and shit, he's still out there every
day giving it all he's got. He's amazed, absolutely. And
you know Gary Marshall worked h you know, he was
making movies in his eighties.
Speaker 6 (23:24):
Also, Gary was we were still playing softball. Gary was
playing up until about a month before he passed away. Wow,
passion for softball. He has a Gary Marshall theater. He
was doing a new play called Everybody Say Cheese.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Oh Really.
Speaker 6 (23:42):
At the act break, he came to me and said, Fred, Fred,
come here quick, And I thought he was going to
say what do you think of the first act? He
rushes me out to the lobby to the trophy case,
and he had won the softball championship and it seemed
to me more than any any of his exploits in
the entertainment industry.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
I love that, I love that he and I should
just give a little context. So this past Friday I
went to a book signing that you two were at
just in my backyard and Vrom.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
We weren't just there, I mean were the headliner, right, Okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Thank you for the correction. You were presenting you know
you were doing you were doing what you're doing now.
Uh yeah, you weren't just in attendance. You were the
main attraction, all right, now that I got that straight.
But uh, I didn't know about the softball elements, and
so like hearing that, I think it's brilliant because Gary
Marshall was doing so much. I mean, he's like the
(24:42):
top leader, but he's bringing everybody for a purpose. That camaraderie,
that team execution, it's fun and it's outside of the context.
Speaker 5 (24:53):
That you guys are normally in. So I just thought
that was brilliant.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
And uh yeah, I mean, what are some fun just
memories from that time playing softball or some of the
stories that you've heard that are even in the book.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
Well We've gone fresh.
Speaker 6 (25:09):
Well, we played in about seventeen Major League ballparks in
front of sometimes we over a million, yeah, forty nine
thousand people went place. We played two us O tours,
played the American troops in Okinawa and Germany, and it
(25:30):
was an incredible experience. First of all, they thought, oh,
this is like a Highwood team, they'll be terrible. We
played the Marines, the Army and others. We won most
of the games. And another part of it, outside of
the softball part, we went to the East German border
at the time, which was a little scary. Yeah, so
we flew in black Hawk helicopters and I think my
(25:51):
stomach's still up there somewhere. Just crazy. And then also
what I have a memor memory of that when we're
in Germany, the Happy Day's cast went to a hospital
and the US troops were there and I'll never forget
the expressions on their face when.
Speaker 4 (26:11):
They gas walked in.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
Yeah, just an incredible memory.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
Well, it just shows that you know, these people were
grateful for their success and they wanted to return that
in some way and going out to ballparks and being
out with the fans and shaking hands, signing autographs and
going to hospitals, eating with troops. Fine, in these they
don't not sound proof army helicopters. I got news terrible noise.
(26:43):
But you know, the level of competition that we were
capable of playing at was quite quite high and there
were numerous incidents where you know, we didn't know who
you're playing. You walked into veteran Stadium in Philadelia, and
every single person on that team except for the mayor
(27:04):
later governor, was a current or former professional athlete, including
two guys from the Phillies who were in the Hall
of Fame. And and we beat them two to one.
Speaker 5 (27:18):
There you go.
Speaker 3 (27:19):
He went into Milwaukee and we took on a team
of Wisconsin sports legends, Packers, Packer, Bob Yucker, former Brewers,
a couple of broadcasters, and and and we tied them
two to two. We couldn't finish it up because the
Rangers and the Brewers needed the field. But you know,
(27:42):
and I think, you know, we thank god. I believe
we only lost five games in the in the six
years I was involved with the team. Uh and and
it would have been six except we got rained out
in Miami playing the Dolphin and who are killing us?
(28:03):
This is? This is this isn't just like the Dolphins
like today a four and five team ware undefeated, you know.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Dolphins. Wow, that's crazy, that's crazy. I love how competitive.
I love how competitive you are. Brian. That's amazing.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
Well, well, we we we played the Lakers twice, a
little charity game Lakers Kings, and so we're playing against
you know, our shortstop is is Scott Bao. There's his
magic Johnson.
Speaker 5 (28:36):
That's that's crazy.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
It would be hard to get uh uh, you know,
get a hit over him, you know, I.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
Mean, oh no, he actually he actually climbed the ladder once.
I think he got a line drive that he he
snow coned in the in the tip of his web.
Speaker 5 (28:54):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Uh, they jumped probably I would say that met he
probably won eleven and a half feet to get it.
Speaker 5 (29:01):
And now he's part owner of the Dodgers.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
So full circle, Fred, for you to go back to
the book, So if we haven't mentioned, it's fifty years
of Happy Days, a visual history of an American television classic.
So that's the title of the book. It's available now
wherever you get books.
Speaker 5 (29:18):
Fred.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
From beginning concept to the books being printed in stores,
how long was that process?
Speaker 6 (29:25):
It was a two year process. A lot of times
we wouldn't get notes right away, you know, from the publisher,
so that kind of increased the time. You know, very
supportive and stuff, but it was and then here we
went through you know, different revisions and always part is
(29:48):
you know what to include not to include, But fortunately
we included I think everything possible. We're just very lucky to,
as Brian said, talk to the people were there the
first three seasons.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
M and we did encounter some censorship on the part
of Paramount, some sensitivity about drug use. Not on happy
Days there really wasn't any too bad, some said, uh.
But on on other related shows there there was there
was problems. Uh, And they didn't want us to talk
(30:23):
about that, so we didn't. Uh. You know, we're used
to taking notes and we understand the sensitivity and and
that they would have done the same for anyone else.
But they never would have let anybody else that far
in any case. But you know, it's I think by
(30:45):
by making the book, you know, I think one of
our insistencies was that that I designed the book and uh,
and so that was something they weren't used to uh
and uh. And it took a while for us to
agree on format and style. But you know, making books
(31:13):
is I may. I really think it's quite a bit
like like editing a film. Take all these different pieces
and in this case, all these different images, hundreds of photos,
most of them have never before seen and try and
tell the story visually that you're writing about, and and
(31:34):
instill it with a flow and and and so you
can actually see things unfolding as they're written about. And
and you know, in that way, it's more of an
illustrated history than just a visual history. To be visuals,
you're just going to throw it in. We're we are storytellers,
(31:55):
you know, That's how that's how we've always uh supported ours.
Speaker 6 (32:01):
Also, i'd like to add that right, Brian did an
incredible job on the design of a lot of the
feedback on the book has just been incredible, and so
many point out that just the design, the quality the
photographs are just outstanding.
Speaker 4 (32:16):
Which you know, we all feel the same way.
Speaker 3 (32:20):
And we're lucky to have the photos. Paramount Photo Library,
well no one, no no one knew where anything was.
There's thousands of thousands and thousands of shots. They had
a couple hundred and so we're very fortunate that the
cast and other members of the crew stepped forward and
donated the photos that they had been given from Paramount
(32:44):
and know these are yours, nobody else. You're a union shop.
You had one photographer there, maybe six seven nights all year,
you know, so, and we're very fortunate. We haven't talked
a lot about Happy Days producer and director Jared Paris,
who was an amazing man with so talented, so fragile, uh,
(33:08):
but also also had a huge ego and therefore saved
so many pictures from the series because he was in
so many of them. And because of that, we have
hundreds of photos in the book.
Speaker 6 (33:24):
Right, Julie Paris, his daughter were just was just wonderful.
Let us use the photographs and.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
Now sitting sitting in her dining room standing all hours
of the day and night, you know.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
Well, I do want to mention that the book is phenomenal.
I mean, you guys have already mentioned it, but as
as a reader, you know, it just pops the colors
yet and what I was kind of, I guess surprised
about is how dense it is as far as writing.
And I don't mean that as in a bad way.
I mean that as a good way, like there is
there's good content there and for me I was learning
(34:02):
a lot. And what I wanted to comment on is
after I went to the book signing in which you
were showcased and you were leading it my wife and I,
you know, we're like, let's let's watch Happy Days and
we went on you know, streaming, and we only saw
season two was streaming, but that was like, how can
(34:23):
this be? And then I went on to see if
there was like a complete series package, and to my surprise,
only seasons one through six have been released on DVD.
Speaker 5 (34:36):
And for me, I just do not understand that.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
As we've mentioned before that Happy Days is one of
the most successful TVs shows of all time, yet there's
not a full series release. I don't know if you
could speak to that or what the deal, because.
Speaker 5 (34:50):
I was shocked.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
We demanded access to season seven through eleven on a
three quarter inch on a two inch Master and they
just would not co operate with this and say things
like it didn't exist from the digital transfer for it.
I'm disappointed because a both of us wrote a tremendous
number of episodes during the period, and you know, and
(35:15):
residuals are a very nice thing, but but you know,
why don't they do it? Are they just cheap? And
it's just such a mystery, And because we weren't able
to do what we've done in so many of the
other seasons. Is is bring sequences to life by by
(35:37):
using frame grabs. The cast was very gracious in allowing
us to use their images take directly from from the DVDs.
You'd grab those and upresm uh and and to not
have that for a third of the series was very
disappointing to us.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Yeah, there's really no explanation. It's just they just are
holding their game v.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I don't know. I don't know why. I don't know why.
You know, I think eventually they will do something like that.
There's no reason that Paramount Plus shouldn't have more than
the second season. I don't know if it's because of
other licensing deals with me TV where it plays regularly still,
(36:26):
or other syndicators or Sky TV overseas. Who knows what
these people, Let's let's look at it this way. They're
not the smartest studio or else they wouldn't be burning
through owners here.
Speaker 5 (36:36):
Right, that's true.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Well, I was gonna say for your book, it has
even more importance because you go through season by season,
and for those who weren't around or uh, you know,
those seasons aren't out there to consume to watch here, you.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
Have a chronological.
Speaker 4 (36:59):
His.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
You guys are like the historians of Happy Days, and
I think that it gives the book even more importance
because it completes the story of the show.
Speaker 3 (37:08):
Right. But you know, we didn't want to do a
quote episode guide, right, right, people people have done episode guides,
and some of them we used to refresh oursel, our
memories and things here and there. But but you know,
that's that to us is kind of dry and impersonal.
(37:32):
And even though you know, for instance, our friend Richard German,
who was unmarried with children for like seven or eight
of the eleven years of that, wrote the book on it,
married with children versus the world, and and his book
is written in the first person, and everything is I,
and we did this, and we did that, and I
(37:55):
think we are we step back, you know, to try
and be more more observers than participants in it. And
I think that that allowed us to call balls and
strikes better and really say, well, this might not have
(38:15):
been the best decision, although when you look at the
things on Happy Days that were in my experience, were
the worst decisions. Let's do a put a space man
on Happy Days and let's jump the Shark turn out
to be the biggest, most successful shows of the series.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Fred for you, because going back to season eleven being
the final season, what did it mean for you and
Brian to create something and to end something that was
so renowned, that was so important for people for over
a decade. Can you just talk about the process of
like kind of wrapping it up? And I know there
(38:57):
was intentions for a season twelve, but in that moment,
you know, having that, I mean you were you were
in the driver's seat for for the last moments of
Happy Days.
Speaker 4 (39:06):
Yeah, it was. It was incredible.
Speaker 6 (39:08):
One thing I was going to add to the not
having UH seasons seven through eleven for many reasons, it's
too bad. But I think we did some of our
best best shows. And when we wrote the final the
very end ending episode, we did two part are called
(39:29):
Passages that Bryan k I wrote.
Speaker 4 (39:31):
And then Bickley and Warren.
Speaker 6 (39:34):
And it was well just both I think Brian and
I will just will never forget that episode.
Speaker 4 (39:40):
You know, we finds the adopted a little boy, Johnie
and Jack.
Speaker 6 (39:45):
She got married, you know, Ron came back and it
was just when that moment where Tom Osley turns to
the camera and thanks.
Speaker 4 (39:53):
The audience for watching Happy.
Speaker 6 (39:55):
Days, and then Elvis's Memories plays and we we show
clips from all the seasons just just we'll just.
Speaker 4 (40:04):
Never forget that moment.
Speaker 3 (40:05):
It was.
Speaker 6 (40:05):
It was just so emotional, and you know, for my
father being in the business, you know, the things don't
go on forever. But and then just to show you
the family part, we shoot the show, there's a rap party.
Speaker 4 (40:21):
The next morning.
Speaker 6 (40:22):
The cast and some of the other people myself hopped
on the plane flew to Okinawa to play the American Troops.
So it was just such an incredible and then we
got the day we got back, ran home sharred and
(40:43):
Gary Marshall was getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard.
Speaker 4 (40:47):
It's just and.
Speaker 6 (40:49):
Every day, Brian and I say, every time we watched
that that episode, it's just so emotional.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Still it is incredible.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
The thing about what you just said about, you know, well,
there were there this incredibly emotional finale and the final
rap party. Rap parties were I'm not saying they were
inebriated back and all, but there was a lot of laughs,
a lot a lot of a lot of joking about
(41:19):
each other and with each other, and and and and
very fun. In the last rap party was more of
a wake. Uh. And but but then the next morning
you're off and you're playing with your team, and and
everybody rushed home and and rushed back to Hollywood literally
(41:40):
from the airport UH to Gary's thing on Hollywood Boulevard.
It just showed that the show might have ended, but
the relationships weren't going to end with the stories. And
you know, I mean, for example, Don Most and Anson
Williams and Henry Winkler and Ron Howard have a very
(42:00):
very active text chain that's been going on that they
started during the pandemic. UH. And and you know, everybody
goes to see Marion, uh, comes up to the Happy
Days Farm, makes a pilgrimage and and and leaves with
a big smile on their face and uh, you know.
(42:23):
And and it was great just talking to people about
Happy Days again and working on Happy Days again after
forty years, because it was so unique, and we walked,
we we were we laid in the hammock that was
stretched between UH their their initial success and revitalization and
(42:49):
on the other side where we finally you know, brought
it to arrest all the all those years later. But
within there was this cocoon of safety that you weren't
concerned about, you know, about losing your job. Your show
isn't going to be canceled. You know, the executive producer
(43:10):
has no idea who I am, none of those things?
Whoever true? There? You know, there was comfort and loyalty
almost unheard of. And and that came from the leader,
That came from the top, that came from Garyauge, that.
Speaker 6 (43:27):
Came from no, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (43:31):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
I was just going to say, and to dovetail on that.
There's a whole chapter in your book where it talks
about the Camp Marshall Mount and the tagline was life
is more important than show business. And as you're talking it,
really I'm catching that. I'm seeing that, and you know,
(43:55):
and you were mentioning it at the Romans book signing
that you know, Gary Marshall was just an incredible man
and with someone like that he was, he was a
you know, a good family man. He was a good husband,
and that kind of trickled down into the show.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
So I think it it it did it matter?
Speaker 3 (44:13):
It did and and for so many of us young
men and a couple of women, not many women writers,
and it wasn't a staff writer, female staff writer on
Happy Days until the sixth season. I'm sorry to say, uh,
but you know, you you you had a good Yeah,
(44:35):
you had a good you know, dresses are made from patterns.
You saw good patterns on Happy Days and started, you know,
starting your life as a young parent, trying to find
a balance with the career and all the responsibilities. And
there were people who who were willing to show you
(44:58):
how to do balance things, to be everything that you
wanted to be. On within the show and beyond, you know,
Fred's father's funeral, Gary Marshall spoke and he said that
Fred's father told him, don't just be one thing. Don't
(45:19):
just be a writer, be a director, be a producer,
be an actor, do whatever you want, you know, and
and and Gary followed that and and passed that along.
And that's why so many people from the show have
created this, this tapestry of successful films and TV shows
(45:45):
and you know, huge TV shows and huge movies and
for decades and I think rather unique.
Speaker 5 (45:55):
And it's still going on.
Speaker 2 (45:56):
I mean right now, Part two of Cobra Kai just
came out, and I don't know if you guys seen this.
Pat Morita actually his Ai likeness makes an appearance in it,
so it's still continuing and you know it. It was
crazy that, Yeah, the footprint that that Happy Days has
is still contuning.
Speaker 3 (46:16):
Instead, we just took it another step for me with
with the AI mister me.
Speaker 5 (46:23):
Yeah, I don't know. Did you guys see that?
Speaker 3 (46:25):
Do you know?
Speaker 4 (46:26):
I haven't?
Speaker 2 (46:27):
No, Okay, maybe after after this call I'll show to
you because I was like, what, it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (46:35):
They can just use the same audio wash the car.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Well, as we bring this conversation to an end, uh,
I'll start with you, Brian, just if you had to
take away one thing from your time working on this book,
what would you take away? What's something that you learn
or something that you know you're taking away to move forward.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
I think that it really reframed the experience for me
in that it was so much easier now to recognize
where the strong work habits, where the solid decision making
(47:27):
was learned, where the craft of writing was explored so tightly.
And I just jump off for a second. It's like,
you know the movies I made. I remember I was
at Revolution and they were putting out the DVD of
the thirteen to thirty or whatever it was with Jennifer
Gardner and they're eighteen deleted scenes on the DVD, and
(47:51):
there's a eight who doesn't know they don't need eighteen scenes.
But we knew what you needed and what you didn't
because we didn't have time. We had to shoot a
show every week. You're not gonna do things that you
don't need, that aren't important to the story and thus
(48:12):
important to the audience. You know, there was just a
you learned focus and structure and character, a lot about character,
and a lot about directing and what it took to
two inspire people to do their best?
Speaker 5 (48:31):
Yeah like that? What about for you, Fred?
Speaker 2 (48:34):
What's one thing that you're taking away as you're reflecting
on the process of this.
Speaker 4 (48:39):
Brian covered a lot of it.
Speaker 6 (48:40):
But just what I learned is they said that was
a very successful writer, and I always thought how cool
that was. And we didn't talk about writing that much,
which was interesting. And I think, as I said the
book sign, Brian was born to be in this business.
His first word requite on the set and our experience
(49:00):
is so different.
Speaker 4 (49:01):
And I think Brian knew he wanted to do.
Speaker 6 (49:02):
This at four years old, and I start on Happy
Days at twenty nine, and I look back and think gosh,
I should have, you know, talk to dad. But again
it was just the learning. I learned so much really quick.
At the first I was Cindy Williams assistant. When she
left for the day, i'd go to the writer's room,
(49:23):
and when I started, the new person couldn't just go
pitch a joke, so.
Speaker 3 (49:29):
I would.
Speaker 4 (49:31):
Would.
Speaker 6 (49:31):
The new guy would write a joke on a piece
of paper, hand it to a real writer here. She
would pitch it. If it bombed, they wouldn't say, oh,
it's a stupid new kid, But if it got.
Speaker 4 (49:42):
A big left, they said, hey, that was Fred's.
Speaker 6 (49:45):
So actually, when I started, Cindy got me a meeting
with Gary Marshall.
Speaker 4 (49:50):
I walked in the door. He said, so you're Freddie
Fox's a kid.
Speaker 6 (49:53):
He said, I know you want to write, and I
went I almost went really, but he said, right now,
I need someone to pick up if Sydney's her dry
cleaning picked up or a car washed, you know, do
that and then go to the you know, the writer's room.
When she left for the day and just just on
the job training. Because I had no idea what was
(50:15):
going on.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I got.
Speaker 6 (50:19):
Thank you, I got a script that Vernon shorty episode
to write where Ron Howard and that's the wayam guest
starred and it fortune turned out very well. And then
Gary asked me to go to Family Matters. Excuse me,
Happy Days.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
I'm trying. You just jumped a decade and a half.
I hope I don't yet.
Speaker 6 (50:40):
But it was just, you know, just so lucky and
again what what I learned and just incredible. Always felt
so fortunate and lucky to be a part of it.
Speaker 4 (50:52):
I mean every every day I kind.
Speaker 6 (50:54):
Of think of that, and I'm just so since dad
was a business, you know, the ups and downs, and
I just it was so lucky.
Speaker 3 (51:01):
Well, that's the thing about you know, Happy Days is
we started, we started on the hundredth floor.
Speaker 5 (51:10):
That's true. That's true. Were you fans before?
Speaker 3 (51:14):
Oh yeah, very quickly. I was going out on January fifteenth,
nineteen seventy four. I was going out. I believe it
was the fourth date with a girl who now I've
been married to for since seventy eight. And my mom
stops me and she says, wait, there's a new show
(51:36):
coming on. You might like it. It's set in the
fifties and it's from Gary Marshall. You know, from The
Dick Van Dyke Show. And yes, twelve years old I
knew Gary Marshall and Jerry Pelson were story editors on
The Dick Van Dyke Show, and so.
Speaker 5 (51:50):
Did you were born for this episode?
Speaker 8 (51:53):
Did?
Speaker 3 (51:53):
My mother and I watched it, and indeed it was.
It was a really good show. And when I got
out of college, I certainly targeted and succeeded in getting through.
But had I hadn't been any other group of people.
When you're given an opportunity and you don't come through
(52:16):
as I didn't, they you know, you're gone your history.
Not with these people. They saw potential and nurtured it
and did the show? Did this for so many people
and allowed them to really fulfill their their talents, you know,
(52:38):
an opportunity and and what great vehicles you were writing for.
Speaker 4 (52:46):
Yeah, they gave us a career end of life as some.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
People we'll put I think we'll end on that. So, Fred,
is there anything that you want to promote besides the book?
Is there any way that book can follow you or
anything you're working on right now?
Speaker 5 (53:03):
What would you like to buy?
Speaker 3 (53:03):
Thanks?
Speaker 6 (53:05):
Years ago, I was lucky enough to work on a
children's book with Ray Bradberry unfortunately passed away before we
could get it going. So I really I'm upset with myself.
I haven't pursued that because it's a children's book about
self esteem.
Speaker 3 (53:21):
And now he's promising he's right here on your show.
Speaker 4 (53:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (53:27):
And then I co wrote a musical that the Sherman
Brothers did that was set to go and then COVID
hit and that'd be nice to get going again.
Speaker 4 (53:39):
And then also working on a memoir so.
Speaker 3 (53:42):
Awesome, and might I just made the All Star team
in the Over fifty five League for the sixth year
in a row.
Speaker 4 (53:53):
Oh, thank you, very lucky.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
What about for you, Brian?
Speaker 3 (53:58):
Oh yeah, no, I've got a new book. It's just
going out to publishers shortly. And a couple more on
the on the landing strip, there, the runway, whatever you
want to call it. Yeah, No, this is I'm gonna
keep teaching some and gonna do more books and books
(54:19):
about collecting and books about I don't know. I might
even surprise people and write one sometime. Hey.
Speaker 5 (54:27):
Hey, that's awesome. All right?
Speaker 2 (54:29):
Well again it is the fifty Years of Happy Days,
a visual history of an American television classic, out officially
now wherever books are sold to go uh. There will
be a link in the description of this episode. So
thank you so much, Fred, Thank you so much, Brian,
and next week we'll see you listeners. We're Ready to Retro.
Speaker 3 (54:53):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (54:57):
Thank you for listening to episode two the Ready to
Retro Podcast. A big thank you and shout out goes
to Brian Levance and Fred Fox Junior for joining us
this week. Be sure to pick up fifty years of
Happy Days wherever you get books. If you are new
here on Ready to Retro, you can listen to our
whole library of episodes that covers a variety of topics
(55:19):
about the eighties, nineties, and early two thousands.
Speaker 8 (55:22):
Follow us on Instagram or TikTok at Ready to Retro,
and if you'd like this episode, let.
Speaker 5 (55:26):
Us know and give us a review on Apple.
Speaker 8 (55:29):
Podcasts or send us an email at Ready to Retro
at gmail dot com. Don't forget to subscribe to our
YouTube channel. Also check out Ready to Retro dot com
for all things relate to this podcast. Ready to Retro
as an official speaker podcast. Our intro music was created
by Aaron Carino.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Our outro song that you are hearing right now is
called Sweet Moon by mk Con. We'll see you next
week as Joey from Ninja Toytles and the Duchess of Horror,
Chelsea join us as we talk about pome Alone two. Yes,
it is finally the holiday season and we're going to
talk about a nineties classic.
Speaker 5 (56:04):
We'll see you then. We're ready to retro, are you,
Ladies and gentlemen, the time has come. Turn your devices
to the maximum volume, sit back, relax, and let's get
Ready to Retro.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Hey everybody, welcome to episode two four of the Ready
to Retro podcast. I am your host, Max, and today
I have two amazing guests. First, returning to Ready to
Retro is director of many of your favorite childhood movies,
just to name a few, like the Flintstones Jingle All
the Way. He's also a producer and a huge toy collector.
(01:04):
Welcome back, Brian Levance. Brian, thanks for being with us.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Oh, probably all right.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
And our second guest making his first appearance here on
Ready to Retro. He's an acclaimed writer and producer. We
have Fred Fox Junior. Fred, welcome to Ready to Retro.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Thank you so much, great to be here. Thank you
for including me.
Speaker 5 (01:24):
Awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Well let's start with you, Fred, Fred what brings you here?
We're specifically going to be talking about the fifty years
of Happy Days, but can you share your experience and
your relationship with Happy Days?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Well?
Speaker 6 (01:39):
Well, first of all, just so fortunate and lucky to
be on that show for seven years. My father was
in the business. One thing I did it is dad
was very successful writer, a great man, and growing up
I thought it was so cool he as a writer.
For some reason never entered my mind until Cindy Williams
(02:01):
called me.
Speaker 4 (02:01):
But the show just meant, as I said, meant everything.
Speaker 6 (02:05):
It introduced me to a plethora of talented people, wonderful people.
We often hear show as a family, but it really
was a genuine family. We've stayed friends through all these years.
And Brian called one day and said, hey, we realized
there's never been a book on Happy Days.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
It'd been mentioned a lot of books, and.
Speaker 6 (02:27):
Brian said, hey, let's do it, and it was fortunate
to include me and it was just a wonderful journey
that brought us back to the show.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Yeah awesome, Well thank you for sharing that. What about
for you, Brian, What is your relationship with Happy Days
and what was the impetus for the book?
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Sure? You know, I think working on Happy Days was
probably the most impactful thing that ever happened to me, probably,
And I had my first story meeting on Happy Days
when I was still twenty three years old and they
were the number one show in television, and I messed
(03:08):
up my first script and instead of you know, casting
me aside. They brought me in to observe the week
that show was filmed, and I absorbed so much. It
was such an amazing experience to see something that ran
(03:29):
with that kind of vigor, with that kind of of X.
That's incredible execution, and what it took to get there,
and how every word was considered within within every scene,
within every aspect of the story. And I was able
(03:52):
to observe so much. At the following year, I wrote
another script, and this time instead of saying, well take
it from here, they put me on staff. And it
was just such a such it was, I said recently,
and it's very true that Gary Marshall ran the equivalent
of a teaching hospital for young comedy writers. There were
(04:13):
so many of us on the lot, and so many
people who who would go on to do so much.
It's amazing the enduring strength of Happy Days as performers,
as directors, as artists, as writers. How dominant the alumni
(04:37):
of the show have become. And it was it was
time after fifty years from actually fifty almost fifty four
years since the original nineteen seventy one pilot, which most
people don't even know about and was only resuscitated after
Ron Howard starred in American Graffiti, and it was a
(05:02):
billion dollar youth driven film and it really opened up
the cinema. People weren't making movies about teenagers that fifty
years ago, you know what I mean, Gary Cooper and
John Wayne were still making and it kind of changed
the industry, and that gave you the rise of John
(05:22):
Hughes and stuff. But TV took notice of this fact
and theirs ABC was scrambling to find a graffiti show
and Gary Marsa, you made this show with the kid
who was in the movie, and thus they were given
a second chance and flourished in their first season. And
we've you know, both Fred having begun on staff and
(05:45):
fourth season and my coming aboard in a very minor
capacity in that season. There was a lot that went
on before we ever got there. And the funnest part
I think Fred my degree was was playing Woodward in
Bernstein and reconstructing the original pilot casting process and the
(06:08):
day of the screen tests and how Henry took over
the room and his reading, and how executive producer Tom
Millert rave that he he was something different, that he
was a pacchino, a dustin Hoffman and I took over
the room and and you know, and how Ron really
(06:29):
kind of was kind of thrilled to work beside Henry
starting with the with the nineteen seventy four pilot. You
know that that I don't think he'd ever met anyone
like Henry whose acting came from such a different creative place.
And I think that, you know, Ron who was already
(06:51):
you know, I remember Fred that the day he opened
up an envelope right before run through and he picked
up his twenty years pension. I think he was twenty four.
Speaker 7 (07:02):
That's crazy, but so so you know, there was so
much that we wanted to learn and so much that
they all wanted to tell us about those days.
Speaker 6 (07:16):
And yet I'm sorry, Yeah, it was an incredible manners, right,
he just started so many people's careers, just very humble.
He felt that again it was it was a family.
And then he started a softball team that Brian I
were so lucky to be a part of when we
ran it, and it just brought us and they cast
(07:38):
much closer together to experience them off the set, and
it just it.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
Just yeah, no, n Ron Ron Howard said of it
looking back now, he said, happy days was a coming
of age experience and an extraordinary one. And uh and
it really was. And his to you know, Gary Marshall
was a musician, He was an athlete, a writer, a producer.
(08:06):
He became a director, but but you know, sports always
came first with him and Anson Williams Anson read for him.
It's like ten hours until somebody's got a report to
wardrobe for the part of Patzi Weber. And Gary listens
to antson reading says to him, so can you play softball?
(08:29):
And answer goes, yeah, yeah, I'm good, and yeah, how good?
I'm really good? He go, okay, you got the job,
said obviously that was more important to him than the acting. Yeah.
And so Gary entered a team in the Entertainment League
(08:50):
and that was great. And Ron and Donnie Anson, you know,
guys on the crew, all young, strong, athletic guys. And
there was one problem. Only one person on the team
had never played baseball or owned a myth. Can you
guess who.
Speaker 8 (09:09):
Was it?
Speaker 5 (09:09):
Henry That's right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Good water skier never played baseball, right, So Ron got
him a my for his twenty eighth birthday and and
turned him over to Donny Most and Walter von hun
who was part of the Arnolds Gang later the dialogue
coach uh and also pitched at Liola Marrimunt and and
(09:40):
uh oh. Yeah. The team was terrific, and Henry became
a dominating pitcher. He his discipline was such a he
could put a little something on the ball. This isn't windmill,
and it isn't big art. It's just kind of put
it over the plate. And if you can put a
little something on it, extra, go for it, you know.
And Henry kept them low and inside, and it was
(10:02):
very hard for people to get around on it, you know,
and but God forbid somebody popped up. Henry would sometimes
run for the ball hearing other people would collide with him.
But the squad was just an amazing group effort. And
(10:23):
his friend said it brought everyone so much closer together.
And then, you know, a bunch of us all had
kids at the same time. So the experience was rooted
so much deeper than just the relationship between people on
a show. And you know, the happy days social calendar.
You know, if Marian, if Marian had a play in
(10:47):
San Diego that she was doing, everybody, everybody trapes down
there to see her, you know, and she.
Speaker 6 (10:54):
Also I'm sorry, Brian. She also called her house the
Happy Days Farm Court and just incredible sweet lady.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
No, yes, So you know that's the thing about Happy Days.
There was no grumpy person, There was no animosity between them.
There was the usual friction on occasion between writers and
actors especially, you know, there was there were some different
times in the show where the show was struggling, and
(11:26):
there were other challenges. You know, after the second season,
they had to change the whole show from a single
camera show to a multi camera show in front of
an audience, which unleashed the comedic energy that had been
kind of tapped down in the calm single camera you know,
(11:47):
moody teenage years of Happy Days. But the show came
alive then. And then, you know, after season seven, Ron
left the show to pursue his directing career, his dream,
and and the show had to totally reformulate again and
do everything different and fight for survival and ended up
(12:10):
you know, at the end of the eighth season, the
first season without run, the show was rewarded with a
two year pickup with unheard of in the industry in
those days. So just a measure of how this show
when it was challenged to survive several times, had the
wherewithal and the personnel to do so. And you know,
(12:35):
and and the cast, you know, we can't say enough
about them as people. Marion is just beyond There's a
reason that she's so beloved. There's a reason that Barbara
Billings is so beloved and stuff. Sometimes television really shows
more than anything, who you are. And I think people
(12:56):
see who these women are and there they just you know,
they are the moms that people wish they had. And
you know, and Maryan is so incredibly sweet and we're
so lucky that, you know, here she is ninety six
years old and posting about the book on Instagram her birthday.
Speaker 6 (13:20):
Ault what Brian said about mary and a mother. I
think a lot of the reason the popularity of the
show was people have said to me it was a
family they would have loved to be a part of.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
And really, through Phonsie, that was your experience as an
audience as you got to join them at the dinner table.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
Yea.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
You got to live over the garage, you know, and
be a part of a family, which is something he
badly needed and I think really all of us need.
And you look a lot in the seventies. And you know,
it was a turbulent time in the mid seventies when
the show premiered. It you had terrible watergate gas prices
(14:06):
through the roof, you know, next Vietnam War, the Vietnam War,
you know, people are getting bayoneted on campus. Uh, you know,
and the country kind of needed a nice escape valve
and and and I believe that Happy Days served that purpose.
But then when the national psyche started to improve with
(14:28):
the by centennial and and uh that the fact that
Happy Days more came alive and ignited like fireworks in
the sky every week on Tuesday night, that it helped,
you know, it helped ease the transition and then celebrated.
(14:48):
And you know, I think the fact that there was
this calm uh and in television and in people's lives
on Tuesday nights for a decade, I think that, you know,
that's the kind of thing that goes more than creating
a bond between an audience and a show.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
When I was talking to my dad, he actually was
the class of nineteen seventy six, as you were talking about,
so he kind of grew up around this time. And
you know, I was bringing up this book in this
interview to him, and he was saying, yeah, there was
something about the seventies where everybody was just reminiscing about
the fifties and the fifties were like cool for those
(15:32):
who weren't around for that time, like myself. Can you
just explain what was it about that time that people
were just feeling nostalgic over the fifties during that time?
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Well, I think that you have to look at it
as the period that really when Happy They started was
post World War Two and post the Korean War. You
had almost a generation of peace there and and that
is the era that Happy Days was born in. It
(16:04):
was a great time of national prosperity for the first time,
you know, everybody had a TV, and people were starting
to get second cars and second TVs and kids lines
and you know, and rock and roll. Rock and roll
took took this burgeoning youth culture and exploded it. And
(16:27):
this isn't to say that there wasn't rampant Jim Crow
laws and civil rights abuses, uh that that would horrify
today's audiences, and and many problems in the world with Russia,
right and and Vietnam beginning but it was a time
(16:51):
of peace, it was a time of prosperity, it was
a time of great music, and it was a time
that the youth culture exploded, so that naturally, twenty years later,
people who were sixteen to twenty four and that you know,
in the in the initial Elvis period between when he
came around and when he went into the army, right that,
(17:12):
you know, that was the good life there.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
I just think it's so there's some parallels to it
because it reminds me of people my generation, my age,
who are looking at the nineties as kind of that
as well. It was before nine to eleven, It was
before you know, the internet. It was this like simpler time.
So as you guys were just sharing about that time
in the seventies, it just makes me think, I think
(17:37):
that's how people look at the nineties right now.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Well, you know, it's interesting. I've been teaching for like
seven eight years and it's gotten to the point where
my students who were not were all born after nine
eleven and they don't know nothing else. So I think
you're lucky if you do remember a different world at
this point. But you know, I think you know that
(18:02):
seventies show was made in the nineties, was it not?
Speaker 5 (18:06):
Yeah? It was like.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Which was you know which I loved? It wasn't as
and it wasn't as nostalgic as as Happy Days, was right, right?
But I thought that was another brilliant another brilliant ABC
Coming of age show, like they should be making more of.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
Yeah, Fred, for you in writing this book, why was
it important for you and Brian to be the ones
to write this out of anybody that could have done it? Why?
Speaker 5 (18:37):
Why? You guys?
Speaker 4 (18:40):
Well, I think that.
Speaker 6 (18:45):
A lot of books have been written by you know,
entertainment shows, pop culture, written by people that were kind
of on the outside of it, you know, maybe professors, whatever.
And we felt that, as they said, when we heard
that never been a book about Happy Days, we realized
that we thought, first of all, it would it was
(19:06):
time to do. It would bring us back to those
incredible days. Brian and I have been working together off
and on for forty seven years, and we worked together
on Beaver and we created a show called My Secret Identity.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
It was shot when Emmy.
Speaker 6 (19:23):
Award winning series and Brian I just we've worked together
forty seven years. We've never had an argument and I
always enjoyed working with them, and it was just a
perfect opportunity for so many reasons to go back and
relive those days. And in the book, as you'll see,
we discovered so many things through the cast interviews which
(19:44):
were just incredible, and it was just wanted a chronicle
the history of the show, kind of a labor of love,
and just so glad we did it.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Yeah. No, you know, I think that one Paramount never
wanted anybody to do this for some reason, and they
let us because we are insiders, and because yeah, not
to we come to praise Caesar, not Bury, but which
(20:17):
isn't to say we did not look critically at episodes
and seasons and choices that were made. And you know,
you're gonna do two hundred and fifty five shows, They're
not all going to be amazing, incredible start to finish
like Friends did somehow, But we were honest. And I
(20:40):
think that besides Paramount not wanting somebody to do a
hatchet job or anything, and to protect what was the
most financially successful television series of the twentieth century, that's crazy, right,
And then I don't think the cast would have participated
(21:03):
or with the same frankness and vigor that they did
with us, as well as the you know Lowell Gans
who who produced season three and then would come back
and be supervising producer on seven, eight, nine and consulting
on ten and eleven, and William S. Bickley, who produced
(21:26):
the original producer wrote most of the first season scripts
and produced the second season and then came back in
the fourth and then back again in seven, eight, nine,
eleven and another capacity. But you know, there's a lot
of a lot of hands that crafted the material, and
(21:48):
I think that we were able to get a lot
from them, from their perspectives, from their experiences, from their
their working much closer beside Gary Marshall than we did.
By the time I got on the show, Gary was
starting to step away from the day to day running
(22:13):
shows to launch his movie career. And and plus you know,
I mean, what year was that, Fred that he had
four of the five top shows, Mark and Mindy, Happy Days, Angie.
And then if it weren't for Three's Company, he.
Speaker 9 (22:33):
Would have had a flush, I think, yeah, And it
was time to chronicle it while everybody's memory is still functional, And.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
It's amazing, Yeah, it's amazing how many still original cast
members are still with us.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
And Henry is a vigorous, vigorous seventy nine, now do
you believe?
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (23:02):
And you know Ron Howard, when most of us have
hung up our our hiking boots and not trudging around
forrest making movies and shit, he's still out there every
day giving it all he's got. He's amazed, absolutely. And
you know Gary Marshall worked h you know, he was
making movies in his eighties.
Speaker 6 (23:24):
Also, Gary was we were still playing softball. Gary was
playing up until about a month before he passed away. Wow,
passion for softball. He has a Gary Marshall theater. He
was doing a new play called Everybody Say Cheese.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Oh Really.
Speaker 6 (23:42):
At the act break, he came to me and said, Fred, Fred,
come here quick, And I thought he was going to
say what do you think of the first act? He
rushes me out to the lobby to the trophy case,
and he had won the softball championship and it seemed
to me more than any any of his exploits in
the entertainment industry.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
I love that, I love that he and I should
just give a little context. So this past Friday I
went to a book signing that you two were at
just in my backyard and Vrom.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
We weren't just there, I mean were the headliner, right, Okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Thank you for the correction. You were presenting you know
you were doing you were doing what you're doing now.
Uh yeah, you weren't just in attendance. You were the
main attraction, all right, now that I got that straight.
But uh, I didn't know about the softball elements, and
so like hearing that, I think it's brilliant because Gary
Marshall was doing so much. I mean, he's like the
(24:42):
top leader, but he's bringing everybody for a purpose. That camaraderie,
that team execution, it's fun and it's outside of the context.
Speaker 5 (24:53):
That you guys are normally in. So I just thought
that was brilliant.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
And uh yeah, I mean, what are some fun just
memories from that time playing softball or some of the
stories that you've heard that are even in the book.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
Well We've gone fresh.
Speaker 6 (25:09):
Well, we played in about seventeen Major League ballparks in
front of sometimes we over a million, yeah, forty nine
thousand people went place. We played two us O tours,
played the American troops in Okinawa and Germany, and it
(25:30):
was an incredible experience. First of all, they thought, oh,
this is like a Highwood team, they'll be terrible. We
played the Marines, the Army and others. We won most
of the games. And another part of it, outside of
the softball part, we went to the East German border
at the time, which was a little scary. Yeah, so
we flew in black Hawk helicopters and I think my
(25:51):
stomach's still up there somewhere. Just crazy. And then also
what I have a memor memory of that when we're
in Germany, the Happy Day's cast went to a hospital
and the US troops were there and I'll never forget
the expressions on their face when.
Speaker 4 (26:11):
They gas walked in.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
Yeah, just an incredible memory.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
Well, it just shows that you know, these people were
grateful for their success and they wanted to return that
in some way and going out to ballparks and being
out with the fans and shaking hands, signing autographs and
going to hospitals, eating with troops. Fine, in these they
don't not sound proof army helicopters. I got news terrible noise.
(26:43):
But you know, the level of competition that we were
capable of playing at was quite quite high and there
were numerous incidents where you know, we didn't know who
you're playing. You walked into veteran Stadium in Philadelia, and
every single person on that team except for the mayor
(27:04):
later governor, was a current or former professional athlete, including
two guys from the Phillies who were in the Hall
of Fame. And and we beat them two to one.
Speaker 5 (27:18):
There you go.
Speaker 3 (27:19):
He went into Milwaukee and we took on a team
of Wisconsin sports legends, Packers, Packer, Bob Yucker, former Brewers,
a couple of broadcasters, and and and we tied them
two to two. We couldn't finish it up because the
Rangers and the Brewers needed the field. But you know,
(27:42):
and I think, you know, we thank god. I believe
we only lost five games in the in the six
years I was involved with the team. Uh and and
it would have been six except we got rained out
in Miami playing the Dolphin and who are killing us?
(28:03):
This is? This is this isn't just like the Dolphins
like today a four and five team ware undefeated, you know.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Dolphins. Wow, that's crazy, that's crazy. I love how competitive.
I love how competitive you are. Brian. That's amazing.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
Well, well, we we we played the Lakers twice, a
little charity game Lakers Kings, and so we're playing against
you know, our shortstop is is Scott Bao. There's his
magic Johnson.
Speaker 5 (28:36):
That's that's crazy.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
It would be hard to get uh uh, you know,
get a hit over him, you know, I.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
Mean, oh no, he actually he actually climbed the ladder once.
I think he got a line drive that he he
snow coned in the in the tip of his web.
Speaker 5 (28:54):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Uh, they jumped probably I would say that met he
probably won eleven and a half feet to get it.
Speaker 5 (29:01):
And now he's part owner of the Dodgers.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
So full circle, Fred, for you to go back to
the book, So if we haven't mentioned, it's fifty years
of Happy Days, a visual history of an American television classic.
So that's the title of the book. It's available now
wherever you get books.
Speaker 5 (29:18):
Fred.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
From beginning concept to the books being printed in stores,
how long was that process?
Speaker 6 (29:25):
It was a two year process. A lot of times
we wouldn't get notes right away, you know, from the publisher,
so that kind of increased the time. You know, very
supportive and stuff, but it was and then here we
went through you know, different revisions and always part is
(29:48):
you know what to include not to include, But fortunately
we included I think everything possible. We're just very lucky to,
as Brian said, talk to the people were there the
first three seasons.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
M and we did encounter some censorship on the part
of Paramount, some sensitivity about drug use. Not on happy
Days there really wasn't any too bad, some said, uh.
But on on other related shows there there was there
was problems. Uh, And they didn't want us to talk
(30:23):
about that, so we didn't. Uh. You know, we're used
to taking notes and we understand the sensitivity and and
that they would have done the same for anyone else.
But they never would have let anybody else that far
in any case. But you know, it's I think by
(30:45):
by making the book, you know, I think one of
our insistencies was that that I designed the book and uh,
and so that was something they weren't used to uh
and uh. And it took a while for us to
agree on format and style. But you know, making books
(31:13):
is I may. I really think it's quite a bit
like like editing a film. Take all these different pieces
and in this case, all these different images, hundreds of photos,
most of them have never before seen and try and
tell the story visually that you're writing about, and and
(31:34):
instill it with a flow and and and so you
can actually see things unfolding as they're written about. And
and you know, in that way, it's more of an
illustrated history than just a visual history. To be visuals,
you're just going to throw it in. We're we are storytellers,
(31:55):
you know, That's how that's how we've always uh supported ours.
Speaker 6 (32:01):
Also, i'd like to add that right, Brian did an
incredible job on the design of a lot of the
feedback on the book has just been incredible, and so
many point out that just the design, the quality the
photographs are just outstanding.
Speaker 4 (32:16):
Which you know, we all feel the same way.
Speaker 3 (32:20):
And we're lucky to have the photos. Paramount Photo Library,
well no one, no no one knew where anything was.
There's thousands of thousands and thousands of shots. They had
a couple hundred and so we're very fortunate that the
cast and other members of the crew stepped forward and
donated the photos that they had been given from Paramount
(32:44):
and know these are yours, nobody else. You're a union shop.
You had one photographer there, maybe six seven nights all year,
you know, so, and we're very fortunate. We haven't talked
a lot about Happy Days producer and director Jared Paris,
who was an amazing man with so talented, so fragile, uh,
(33:08):
but also also had a huge ego and therefore saved
so many pictures from the series because he was in
so many of them. And because of that, we have
hundreds of photos in the book.
Speaker 6 (33:24):
Right, Julie Paris, his daughter were just was just wonderful.
Let us use the photographs and.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
Now sitting sitting in her dining room standing all hours
of the day and night, you know.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
Well, I do want to mention that the book is phenomenal.
I mean, you guys have already mentioned it, but as
as a reader, you know, it just pops the colors
yet and what I was kind of, I guess surprised
about is how dense it is as far as writing.
And I don't mean that as in a bad way.
I mean that as a good way, like there is
there's good content there and for me I was learning
(34:02):
a lot. And what I wanted to comment on is
after I went to the book signing in which you
were showcased and you were leading it my wife and I,
you know, we're like, let's let's watch Happy Days and
we went on you know, streaming, and we only saw
season two was streaming, but that was like, how can
(34:23):
this be? And then I went on to see if
there was like a complete series package, and to my surprise,
only seasons one through six have been released on DVD.
Speaker 5 (34:36):
And for me, I just do not understand that.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
As we've mentioned before that Happy Days is one of
the most successful TVs shows of all time, yet there's
not a full series release. I don't know if you
could speak to that or what the deal, because.
Speaker 5 (34:50):
I was shocked.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
We demanded access to season seven through eleven on a
three quarter inch on a two inch Master and they
just would not co operate with this and say things
like it didn't exist from the digital transfer for it.
I'm disappointed because a both of us wrote a tremendous
number of episodes during the period, and you know, and
(35:15):
residuals are a very nice thing, but but you know,
why don't they do it? Are they just cheap? And
it's just such a mystery, And because we weren't able
to do what we've done in so many of the
other seasons. Is is bring sequences to life by by
(35:37):
using frame grabs. The cast was very gracious in allowing
us to use their images take directly from from the DVDs.
You'd grab those and upresm uh and and to not
have that for a third of the series was very
disappointing to us.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Yeah, there's really no explanation. It's just they just are
holding their game v.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I don't know. I don't know why. I don't know why.
You know, I think eventually they will do something like that.
There's no reason that Paramount Plus shouldn't have more than
the second season. I don't know if it's because of
other licensing deals with me TV where it plays regularly still,
(36:26):
or other syndicators or Sky TV overseas. Who knows what
these people, Let's let's look at it this way. They're
not the smartest studio or else they wouldn't be burning
through owners here.
Speaker 5 (36:36):
Right, that's true.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Well, I was gonna say for your book, it has
even more importance because you go through season by season,
and for those who weren't around or uh, you know,
those seasons aren't out there to consume to watch here, you.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
Have a chronological.
Speaker 4 (36:59):
His.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
You guys are like the historians of Happy Days, and
I think that it gives the book even more importance
because it completes the story of the show.
Speaker 3 (37:08):
Right. But you know, we didn't want to do a
quote episode guide, right, right, people people have done episode guides,
and some of them we used to refresh oursel, our
memories and things here and there. But but you know,
that's that to us is kind of dry and impersonal.
(37:32):
And even though you know, for instance, our friend Richard German,
who was unmarried with children for like seven or eight
of the eleven years of that, wrote the book on it,
married with children versus the world, and and his book
is written in the first person, and everything is I,
and we did this, and we did that, and I
(37:55):
think we are we step back, you know, to try
and be more more observers than participants in it. And
I think that that allowed us to call balls and
strikes better and really say, well, this might not have
(38:15):
been the best decision, although when you look at the
things on Happy Days that were in my experience, were
the worst decisions. Let's do a put a space man
on Happy Days and let's jump the Shark turn out
to be the biggest, most successful shows of the series.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Fred for you, because going back to season eleven being
the final season, what did it mean for you and
Brian to create something and to end something that was
so renowned, that was so important for people for over
a decade. Can you just talk about the process of
like kind of wrapping it up? And I know there
(38:57):
was intentions for a season twelve, but in that moment,
you know, having that, I mean you were you were
in the driver's seat for for the last moments of
Happy Days.
Speaker 4 (39:06):
Yeah, it was. It was incredible.
Speaker 6 (39:08):
One thing I was going to add to the not
having UH seasons seven through eleven for many reasons, it's
too bad. But I think we did some of our
best best shows. And when we wrote the final the
very end ending episode, we did two part are called
(39:29):
Passages that Bryan k I wrote.
Speaker 4 (39:31):
And then Bickley and Warren.
Speaker 6 (39:34):
And it was well just both I think Brian and
I will just will never forget that episode.
Speaker 4 (39:40):
You know, we finds the adopted a little boy, Johnie
and Jack.
Speaker 6 (39:45):
She got married, you know, Ron came back and it
was just when that moment where Tom Osley turns to
the camera and thanks.
Speaker 4 (39:53):
The audience for watching Happy.
Speaker 6 (39:55):
Days, and then Elvis's Memories plays and we we show
clips from all the seasons just just we'll just.
Speaker 4 (40:04):
Never forget that moment.
Speaker 3 (40:05):
It was.
Speaker 6 (40:05):
It was just so emotional, and you know, for my
father being in the business, you know, the things don't
go on forever. But and then just to show you
the family part, we shoot the show, there's a rap party.
Speaker 4 (40:21):
The next morning.
Speaker 6 (40:22):
The cast and some of the other people myself hopped
on the plane flew to Okinawa to play the American Troops.
So it was just such an incredible and then we
got the day we got back, ran home sharred and
(40:43):
Gary Marshall was getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard.
Speaker 4 (40:47):
It's just and.
Speaker 6 (40:49):
Every day, Brian and I say, every time we watched
that that episode, it's just so emotional.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Still it is incredible.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
The thing about what you just said about, you know, well,
there were there this incredibly emotional finale and the final
rap party. Rap parties were I'm not saying they were
inebriated back and all, but there was a lot of laughs,
a lot a lot of a lot of joking about
(41:19):
each other and with each other, and and and and
very fun. In the last rap party was more of
a wake. Uh. And but but then the next morning
you're off and you're playing with your team, and and
everybody rushed home and and rushed back to Hollywood literally
(41:40):
from the airport UH to Gary's thing on Hollywood Boulevard.
It just showed that the show might have ended, but
the relationships weren't going to end with the stories. And
you know, I mean, for example, Don Most and Anson
Williams and Henry Winkler and Ron Howard have a very
(42:00):
very active text chain that's been going on that they
started during the pandemic. UH. And and you know, everybody
goes to see Marion, uh, comes up to the Happy
Days Farm, makes a pilgrimage and and and leaves with
a big smile on their face and uh, you know.
(42:23):
And and it was great just talking to people about
Happy Days again and working on Happy Days again after
forty years, because it was so unique, and we walked,
we we were we laid in the hammock that was
stretched between UH their their initial success and revitalization and
(42:49):
on the other side where we finally you know, brought
it to arrest all the all those years later. But
within there was this cocoon of safety that you weren't
concerned about, you know, about losing your job. Your show
isn't going to be canceled. You know, the executive producer
(43:10):
has no idea who I am, none of those things?
Whoever true? There? You know, there was comfort and loyalty
almost unheard of. And and that came from the leader,
That came from the top, that came from Garyauge, that.
Speaker 6 (43:27):
Came from no, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (43:31):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
I was just going to say, and to dovetail on that.
There's a whole chapter in your book where it talks
about the Camp Marshall Mount and the tagline was life
is more important than show business. And as you're talking it,
really I'm catching that. I'm seeing that, and you know,
(43:55):
and you were mentioning it at the Romans book signing
that you know, Gary Marshall was just an incredible man
and with someone like that he was, he was a
you know, a good family man. He was a good husband,
and that kind of trickled down into the show.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
So I think it it it did it matter?
Speaker 3 (44:13):
It did and and for so many of us young
men and a couple of women, not many women writers,
and it wasn't a staff writer, female staff writer on
Happy Days until the sixth season. I'm sorry to say, uh,
but you know, you you you had a good Yeah,
(44:35):
you had a good you know, dresses are made from patterns.
You saw good patterns on Happy Days and started, you know,
starting your life as a young parent, trying to find
a balance with the career and all the responsibilities. And
there were people who who were willing to show you
(44:58):
how to do balance things, to be everything that you
wanted to be. On within the show and beyond, you know,
Fred's father's funeral, Gary Marshall spoke and he said that
Fred's father told him, don't just be one thing. Don't
(45:19):
just be a writer, be a director, be a producer,
be an actor, do whatever you want, you know, and
and and Gary followed that and and passed that along.
And that's why so many people from the show have
created this, this tapestry of successful films and TV shows
(45:45):
and you know, huge TV shows and huge movies and
for decades and I think rather unique.
Speaker 5 (45:55):
And it's still going on.
Speaker 2 (45:56):
I mean right now, Part two of Cobra Kai just
came out, and I don't know if you guys seen this.
Pat Morita actually his Ai likeness makes an appearance in it,
so it's still continuing and you know it. It was
crazy that, Yeah, the footprint that that Happy Days has
is still contuning.
Speaker 3 (46:16):
Instead, we just took it another step for me with
with the AI mister me.
Speaker 5 (46:23):
Yeah, I don't know. Did you guys see that?
Speaker 3 (46:25):
Do you know?
Speaker 4 (46:26):
I haven't?
Speaker 2 (46:27):
No, Okay, maybe after after this call I'll show to
you because I was like, what, it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (46:35):
They can just use the same audio wash the car.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Well, as we bring this conversation to an end, uh,
I'll start with you, Brian, just if you had to
take away one thing from your time working on this book,
what would you take away? What's something that you learn
or something that you know you're taking away to move forward.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
I think that it really reframed the experience for me
in that it was so much easier now to recognize
where the strong work habits, where the solid decision making
(47:27):
was learned, where the craft of writing was explored so tightly.
And I just jump off for a second. It's like,
you know the movies I made. I remember I was
at Revolution and they were putting out the DVD of
the thirteen to thirty or whatever it was with Jennifer
Gardner and they're eighteen deleted scenes on the DVD, and
(47:51):
there's a eight who doesn't know they don't need eighteen scenes.
But we knew what you needed and what you didn't
because we didn't have time. We had to shoot a
show every week. You're not gonna do things that you
don't need, that aren't important to the story and thus
(48:12):
important to the audience. You know, there was just a
you learned focus and structure and character, a lot about character,
and a lot about directing and what it took to
two inspire people to do their best?
Speaker 5 (48:31):
Yeah like that? What about for you, Fred?
Speaker 2 (48:34):
What's one thing that you're taking away as you're reflecting
on the process of this.
Speaker 4 (48:39):
Brian covered a lot of it.
Speaker 6 (48:40):
But just what I learned is they said that was
a very successful writer, and I always thought how cool
that was. And we didn't talk about writing that much,
which was interesting. And I think, as I said the
book sign, Brian was born to be in this business.
His first word requite on the set and our experience
(49:00):
is so different.
Speaker 4 (49:01):
And I think Brian knew he wanted to do.
Speaker 6 (49:02):
This at four years old, and I start on Happy
Days at twenty nine, and I look back and think gosh,
I should have, you know, talk to dad. But again
it was just the learning. I learned so much really quick.
At the first I was Cindy Williams assistant. When she
left for the day, i'd go to the writer's room,
(49:23):
and when I started, the new person couldn't just go
pitch a joke, so.
Speaker 3 (49:29):
I would.
Speaker 4 (49:31):
Would.
Speaker 6 (49:31):
The new guy would write a joke on a piece
of paper, hand it to a real writer here. She
would pitch it. If it bombed, they wouldn't say, oh,
it's a stupid new kid, But if it got.
Speaker 4 (49:42):
A big left, they said, hey, that was Fred's.
Speaker 6 (49:45):
So actually, when I started, Cindy got me a meeting
with Gary Marshall.
Speaker 4 (49:50):
I walked in the door. He said, so you're Freddie
Fox's a kid.
Speaker 6 (49:53):
He said, I know you want to write, and I
went I almost went really, but he said, right now,
I need someone to pick up if Sydney's her dry
cleaning picked up or a car washed, you know, do
that and then go to the you know, the writer's room.
When she left for the day and just just on
the job training. Because I had no idea what was
(50:15):
going on.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I got.
Speaker 6 (50:19):
Thank you, I got a script that Vernon shorty episode
to write where Ron Howard and that's the wayam guest
starred and it fortune turned out very well. And then
Gary asked me to go to Family Matters. Excuse me,
Happy Days.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
I'm trying. You just jumped a decade and a half.
I hope I don't yet.
Speaker 6 (50:40):
But it was just, you know, just so lucky and
again what what I learned and just incredible. Always felt
so fortunate and lucky to be a part of it.
Speaker 4 (50:52):
I mean every every day I kind.
Speaker 6 (50:54):
Of think of that, and I'm just so since dad
was a business, you know, the ups and downs, and
I just it was so lucky.
Speaker 3 (51:01):
Well, that's the thing about you know, Happy Days is
we started, we started on the hundredth floor.
Speaker 5 (51:10):
That's true. That's true. Were you fans before?
Speaker 3 (51:14):
Oh yeah, very quickly. I was going out on January fifteenth,
nineteen seventy four. I was going out. I believe it
was the fourth date with a girl who now I've
been married to for since seventy eight. And my mom
stops me and she says, wait, there's a new show
(51:36):
coming on. You might like it. It's set in the
fifties and it's from Gary Marshall. You know, from The
Dick Van Dyke Show. And yes, twelve years old I
knew Gary Marshall and Jerry Pelson were story editors on
The Dick Van Dyke Show, and so.
Speaker 5 (51:50):
Did you were born for this episode?
Speaker 8 (51:53):
Did?
Speaker 3 (51:53):
My mother and I watched it, and indeed it was.
It was a really good show. And when I got
out of college, I certainly targeted and succeeded in getting through.
But had I hadn't been any other group of people.
When you're given an opportunity and you don't come through
(52:16):
as I didn't, they you know, you're gone your history.
Not with these people. They saw potential and nurtured it
and did the show? Did this for so many people
and allowed them to really fulfill their their talents, you know,
(52:38):
an opportunity and and what great vehicles you were writing for.
Speaker 4 (52:46):
Yeah, they gave us a career end of life as some.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
People we'll put I think we'll end on that. So, Fred,
is there anything that you want to promote besides the book?
Is there any way that book can follow you or
anything you're working on right now?
Speaker 5 (53:03):
What would you like to buy?
Speaker 3 (53:03):
Thanks?
Speaker 6 (53:05):
Years ago, I was lucky enough to work on a
children's book with Ray Bradberry unfortunately passed away before we
could get it going. So I really I'm upset with myself.
I haven't pursued that because it's a children's book about
self esteem.
Speaker 3 (53:21):
And now he's promising he's right here on your show.
Speaker 4 (53:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (53:27):
And then I co wrote a musical that the Sherman
Brothers did that was set to go and then COVID
hit and that'd be nice to get going again.
Speaker 4 (53:39):
And then also working on a memoir so.
Speaker 3 (53:42):
Awesome, and might I just made the All Star team
in the Over fifty five League for the sixth year
in a row.
Speaker 4 (53:53):
Oh, thank you, very lucky.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
What about for you, Brian?
Speaker 3 (53:58):
Oh yeah, no, I've got a new book. It's just
going out to publishers shortly. And a couple more on
the on the landing strip, there, the runway, whatever you
want to call it. Yeah, No, this is I'm gonna
keep teaching some and gonna do more books and books
(54:19):
about collecting and books about I don't know. I might
even surprise people and write one sometime. Hey.
Speaker 5 (54:27):
Hey, that's awesome. All right?
Speaker 2 (54:29):
Well again it is the fifty Years of Happy Days,
a visual history of an American television classic, out officially
now wherever books are sold to go uh. There will
be a link in the description of this episode. So
thank you so much, Fred, Thank you so much, Brian,
and next week we'll see you listeners. We're Ready to Retro.
Speaker 3 (54:53):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (54:57):
Thank you for listening to episode two the Ready to
Retro Podcast. A big thank you and shout out goes
to Brian Levance and Fred Fox Junior for joining us
this week. Be sure to pick up fifty years of
Happy Days wherever you get books. If you are new
here on Ready to Retro, you can listen to our
whole library of episodes that covers a variety of topics
(55:19):
about the eighties, nineties, and early two thousands.
Speaker 8 (55:22):
Follow us on Instagram or TikTok at Ready to Retro,
and if you'd like this episode, let.
Speaker 5 (55:26):
Us know and give us a review on Apple.
Speaker 8 (55:29):
Podcasts or send us an email at Ready to Retro
at gmail dot com. Don't forget to subscribe to our
YouTube channel. Also check out Ready to Retro dot com
for all things relate to this podcast. Ready to Retro
as an official speaker podcast. Our intro music was created
by Aaron Carino.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Our outro song that you are hearing right now is
called Sweet Moon by mk Con. We'll see you next
week as Joey from Ninja Toytles and the Duchess of Horror,
Chelsea join us as we talk about pome Alone two. Yes,
it is finally the holiday season and we're going to
talk about a nineties classic.
Speaker 5 (56:04):
We'll see you then. We're ready to retro, are you,
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