“I thought it was terrible”: how a “depressing” movie became the making of Ron Howard
Most people have had at least one job they hated with every fibre of their being, but persevered because the bills needed to be paid. Still, it’s hard to feel much sympathy for Ron Howard when he’d grown accustomed to making vast sums of cash for appearing in movies and TV shows.
In what must have been truly devastating, the guy who’d been a fixture onscreen since childhood, earned more money than most of his peers, and was locked into an increasingly lucrative contract as a main cast member on one of the most-watched shows on television, didn’t want to be an actor anymore.
Almost the very definition of a first-world problem, Howard was growing increasingly miserable being paid handsomely for his work as Richie Cunningham on Happy Days because he wanted to be a director. Unfortunately, nobody was willing to give him a shot, and as he entered his 20s, the former child star was placed at a crossroads.
On one hand, there was the guaranteed paycheque of Happy Days. On the other hand, he felt he needed to get his foot in the directorial door sooner rather than later before the opportunity slipped through his grasp. Ironically, a combination of a dire screenplay and an existential crisis lit the touchpaper on his ascension towards his current status as one of Hollywood’s most well-known hands.
“One day during the third season of Happy Days, I was sitting in the Paramount commissary, reading a script over lunch,” he wrote in his memoir, The Boys. “My agent had sent it to me. I thought it was terrible: a broad, zany, car-chase comedy with weak jokes and cardboard characters.”
“Its title, which will tell you everything about my reflexive revulsion, was East My Dust!” he continued. “It was depressing: this was the level of the film projects that were coming my way.” As much as he hated the script, there was one name attached to the production that caught his eye: Roger Corman.
Sensing an opportunity in the air, Howard concocted a daring plan. He knew that the prolific producer was renowned for giving first-time directors a star so long as they worked as quickly as he did and remained under budget, so he basically decided to blackmail his way into the job he’d always wanted.
Howard agreed to star in Eat My Dust! on the provision that he be allowed to helm a Corman-packed picture as soon as possible. Admiring the youngster’s boldness, never mind the fact that he was always on the hunt for a director he could hire for a cheap price, the B-movie icon acquiesced to the demands and let him follow an acting-only gig with Grand Theft Auto, his feature-length debut from behind the camera.
As he’d expected, Eat My Dust! was terrible. It was also a highly profitable film, which put Howard in Corman’s good books, set the stage for Grand Theft Auto, and served as the catalyst for the directorial career that followed.
