Henry Winkler

In the 1970s Henry Winkler created one of the decade’s true pop culture sensations: Arthur Fonzarelli, better known as “Fonzie” or “the Fonz.” With his black leather jacket, blue jeans, and slicked-back “greaser” hairstyle, the eternally cool Fonzie was a breakout character on the massively popular sitcom Happy Days (1974–84). The role not only made Winkler a star but also typecast him and nearly derailed his acting career. In the early 21st century, however, Winkler found his way back to the spotlight as a respected character actor in such series as Arrested Development (2003–05, 2013, 2018–19), Parks and Recreation (2013–15), and, most notably, the HBO black comedy, Barry (2018–23).

Childhood and education

Winkler was the youngest of two children born to Harry and Ilse Winkler, a Jewish couple who had narrowly escaped Nazi Germany when they immigrated to the United States in 1939. Only one day after they fled, Winkler’s uncle was unable to leave Germany; he and most of Winkler’s extended family perished in the Holocaust. Shortly after Winkler was born, his mother was institutionalized after experiencing a mental health crisis. Winkler had a tough childhood, partly because of dyslexia that went undiagnosed until he was an adult. Winkler’s father ran a lumber company, where his mother also worked; they planned for their son to join them in the family business when he grew up. However, he had trouble in school because of the learning disability, which his parents mistook for low intelligence. His parents were verbally and physically abusive at times, nicknaming him dummer Hund (German: “dumb dog”).

When he was in the sixth grade, Winkler saw the Moiseyev Dance Company perform at Madison Square Garden in New York City; when he was 13 years old he saw the film West Side Story (1961). Both experiences helped to generate his interest in acting and provide him with a vision of a way out of his unhappy circumstances at home and in school. After graduating from high school, Winkler attended Emerson College in Boston to study drama. He won the lead role in a production of the play Peer Gynt and graduated with a bachelor’s degree despite nearly flunking out. He then attended the Yale School of Drama, where he studied under Stella Adler and Norma Brustein. Both teachers were harsh critics, which proved to be valuable fodder for Winkler’s later turn as an acting coach in Barry.

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Because of his traumatic childhood and learning disability, Winkler often struggled with confidence at Yale. He told The New York Times Magazine in 2022:

I was like a hummingbird, flapping my wings to stay up. I didn’t mean to be defensive, I tried to stay open. I took notes, but I couldn’t spell, so I couldn’t read back my notes because I couldn’t tell what…it said.

Early acting roles

Yet he was determined to succeed as an actor. In 1970 he appeared with the Yale Repertory Theatre in a stage adaptation of three short stories by Philip Roth in East Hampton on Long Island, New York, playing multiple roles. The New York Times praised his performance as Private Grossbart, noting that “Grossbart’s crusade of self-interest is almost Iago-like in its intensity, but with charm, both sides captured by the boyish Henry Winkler.”

For the next few years his career was sporadic; he appeared in some television commercials, landed a role in a Broadway show that closed after opening night, and had a brief scene in a soap opera, in which he had just one line. His first film role was in Crazy Joe (1974), starring Peter Boyle. That same year he appeared with Sylvester Stallone, Perry King, and Paul Mace in the well-received film The Lords of Flatbush, in which he played a 1950s Brooklyn gang member.

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Happy Days and the Fonz

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In 1973 Winkler moved to West Hollywood, and his luck quickly changed. That year he was cast in cameos on the popular sitcoms The Mary Tyler Moore Show and The Bob Newhart Show. He also auditioned for the pilot of Happy Days, a nostalgic ABC sitcom set in 1950s and ’60s Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The diminutive Winkler, who is about 5-feet, 6-inches tall (1.67 meters), was not what producer Garry Marshall initially had in mind for the part of Fonzie. “I thought I wanted a tall, handsome blond, and in walked a short, dark-haired actor from Emerson College and the Yale School of Drama,” Marshall wrote in his memoir, My Happy Days in Hollywood (2012). “Henry wasn’t Fonzie, but he could ‘act’ like Fonzie.” Ultimately, Winkler beat out Micky Dolenz of the Monkees for the part.

Winkler had just a half dozen lines in the Happy Days pilot, which aired in 1974. But his character was a hit with audiences. Initially a sidekick to Richie Cunningham, the all-American teenage character played by Ron Howard, Fonzie soon stole the show with his cool demeanor, multiple girlfriends, and black leather jacket. The show’s writers gave him more lines and signature phrases: “whoa” and “ayyy,” the latter of which Fonzie usually uttered with a double thumbs-up. The Fonz became a cultural phenomenon, and his likeness appeared on everything from posters to tube socks. Winkler was nominated for an Emmy Award for outstanding lead actor three years in a row (1976–78), and he won a Golden Globe Award in 1977 and in 1978 for best actor in a comedy TV series.

Underneath the hype, however, Winkler had crafted Fonzie as a nuanced character full of humor and pathos. But over time, Fonzie became a caricature, perhaps best illustrated by an absurd episode in 1977 in which he water skis over a shark while wearing tight denim shorts and his signature leather jacket. The scene later became the inspiration for the pop culture phrase “jump the shark,” which describes when a TV show has gone over the top with a ridiculous storyline.

Typecasting and shift to directing and producing

During his run on Happy Days, Winkler had a few roles in films, including Heroes (1977) and The One and Only (1978). These performances met with scorching reviews from critics, though he later scored a Golden Globe nomination for his role in the dark comedy Night Shift (1982). After Happy Days was cancelled in 1984, Winkler found that he had been typecast as Fonzie and could not land roles. “I never resented the Fonz. He put a roof over my head,” Winkler told AARP in 2023. “But after Happy Days, I struggled with being locked out of opportunity.” He shifted to producing and won a Daytime Emmy Award for a children’s after-school special in 1985. He also turned to directing, notably helming the movies Memories of Me (1988), starring Billy Crystal, and Cop and a Half (1993), featuring Burt Reynolds.

Comeback and Barry

In 1994, after Adam Sandler name-dropped Arthur Fonzarelli in the lyrics of “The Chanukah Song” on an episode of Saturday Night Live, Winkler called to thank him. That led to a friendship and a working relationship in which Sandler cast Winkler in several of his comedy films, starting with The Waterboy (1998). Winkler also landed guest roles on various TV shows, including the comedy Battery Park (2000) and the legal drama The Practice (1999–2000), which earned him two more Emmy nominations.

Beginning in 2003, Winkler appeared in a high-profile role on the series Arrested Development, playing the incompetent lawyer Barry Zuckerkorn. In 2013 he was cast in a recurring role on the sitcom Parks and Recreation as Dr. Lu Saperstein, a vindictive OB-GYN who is the father of extremely insufferable and spoiled siblings, Jean-Ralphio (Ben Schwartz) and Mona-Lisa Saperstein (Jenny Slate). By this time, Winkler had at last shed the typecasting of his Fonzie character and emerged as a gifted character actor.

In 2018 Winkler began acting in the HBO show Barry, on which he played fearsome acting coach Gene Cousineau. The show ran for four seasons, with a two-year hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic. He won rave reviews and an Emmy for his performance. In his acceptance speech for the award, Winkler quoted a friend who once told him, “If you stay at the table long enough, the chips come to you.” He added, “Tonight I got to clear the table.”

Children’s books and memoirs

In addition to acting, Winkler has authored (with Lin Oliver) a series of children’s books, featuring the character Hank Zipzer, an unflappable boy with learning differences. In 2013 he published a memoir, I’ve Never Met an Idiot on the River: Reflections on Family, Photography, and Fly-Fishing, in which he discussed his non-acting-related passions. He followed up in 2023 with another memoir, Being Henry: The Fonz…and Beyond.