The exact moment Ron Howard fell out of love with acting: “I knew where my heart lay”
Even though he’d always dreamed of being a director and saw acting as a means to an end that would allow him to achieve that goal, it’s not like Ron Howard made his feature-length debut and completely abandoned performing.
Roger Corman gave Howard the platform to lay the groundwork for his new career path when he handed the former child star the reins on 1977’s Grand Theft Auto, but the ambitious upstart continued appearing in front of the cameras for years before he washed his hands of thespianism.
Howard racked up acting credits between his first filmmaking effort and his sophomore outing, 1982’s Night Shift. He reprised the role of Steve Bolander in More American Graffiti, played the title character in the made-for-TV movie Huckleberry Finn, and guested in several TV shows.
Of course, Happy Days was the most prominent by far. The ratings sensation hit the airwaves in 1974, with Howard shooting Grand Theft Auto while on hiatus between the third and fourth seasons. Directing the television films Cotton Candy and Skyward kept him relatively content when he had the platform to sharpen his skills when he wasn’t required to be Richie Cunningham, but he eventually reached a breaking point.
When the time came for his contract to be renewed following the conclusion of Happy Days‘ seventh season in May 1980, Howard requested that his deal be sweetened by contractually obliging him to direct a couple of TV films and maybe even a feature for ABC’s parent company, Paramount.
Unfortunately, the studio bigwigs turned him down. However, he had an offer on the table from NBC, which would allow him to produce and direct three made-for-TV pictures, a pilot episode for a series, and provide partial funding for a movie. Needless to say, his find was made up, even if it was for significantly less money than he’d be making to remain on board as Happy Days‘ Richie.
“I knew where my heart lay,” he recalled in his memoir, The Boys. “My negotiations with the networks went right down to the wire. It wasn’t until the day that the Happy Days cast reconvened for its eighth season, in the fall of 1980, that the NBC deal went through officially, sealing my future.”
Howard’s first call was to his friend and co-star, Henry Winkler: “I’m not coming back,” he told him. “I’m going to direct full-time.” Just like that, he’d washed his hands of being a full-time actor after realising that the people paying him were only going to hold him back from accomplishing his goals to make it as a director.
Since that moment, the two-time Academy Award winner has never played a major role in a movie, and he’s only played two fictional characters on TV, other than a brief return to Happy Days in its 11th and final season. Howard had been one of the most prolific and recognisable young actors in the business until that point, and all it took was one conversation with ABC’s top brass to make him turn his back on acting for good.
