The absolute very first time I watched Happy Days was in the mid 70s when I was still at primary school. I really hope that’s true because, pretty soon afterwards, I went straight out and bought a ‘Fonzie’ belt and this needs to have happened before I’d reached puberty otherwise I'll be mortified. It had ‘Fonz is Cool’ written on it so that I could be reminded of this simple fact of life (as if I needed to be) every time I put on my Y-Fronts, pulled up my flared trousers and fastened the plastic strap. I didn’t have a girlfriend at the time. Or any friends to be honest.
Happy Days was on ITV which was forbidden viewing in my household but I told my mum that it was on BBC2 (none of the family watched that channel so I had a chance of getting away with it) and that the “adverts” (not sure if air quotes had been invented by then but I’m sure she got the gist from the tone of my voice) were just part of the show.
Everyone remembers the theme tune and the opening credits, full of 1950s American iconography. You didn't fast forward over the opening credits for any show in those days - they were an integral part of the whole experience. Well, you couldn't anyway because VCRs were yet to be invented but still.
For the youth of Britain in the 70s, Happy Days turned out to be essential viewing to enable us to make any sense out of Grease which was due to hit our cinemas later in the same decade and would share several striking similarities with HD. Luckily not too many though. Did I mention that ONJ was old enough to be John Travolta's mother in Grease? Oh yes, I did.....on at least a couple of occasions (here and here) - I'm obviously obsessed with the age difference. Well, now imagine if Fonzie had gone round to the Cunningham household only to find Mrs C in black leather trousers and high heels, suggesting he should "tell me about it, stud". You'd never look at Grease or Happy Days in the same light again.
Before I leave the Grease connection (sorry, it's my favourite film), it's worth mentioning that Sandy & Danny were nearly played by Marie Osmond and the Fonz himself. I gather Henry Winkler mulled it over before turning it down. Or the producers worked out he couldn't actually sing - one or the other. If the dice had landed differently, we could have had the whole Osmond family as the T-Birds. Little Jimmy, who neither had long hair nor hailed from Liverpool but was indeed little, could've passed as Putzie or Doody but I'm not sure I can quite buy squeaky-clean Donny as Kenickie busting his condom and shagging Rizzo at the Drive-In. A little less puppy love and no doubt a lot more doggy-style.
Apparently Fonzie wasn’t the original star of Happy Days and it was meant to revolve around Richie Cunningham (or Cun-NING-HAM as the Fonz called him), and his friends Potsie (another Grease link - oh damn, I've got that image of a leather-clad Mrs C in my head again) and Ralph Malph. I didn't realise I was a big fan of Ralph's (he was a ginge after all) but I’ve just realised that, when I tell my kids ‘I’ve still got it’ after delivering a crap Dad joke, that’s a direct lift from the Malphmeister himself. All the moments in the show which stay with me, though, involved Arthur Fonzarelli – poised to comb his hair in the mirror until he realises it’s perfect as it is, banging on the jukebox to start the music and not letting 5 minutes go by without a “whoaaa”, “heyyy” or "correctamundo". Just as often, he'd tell people to 'sit on it' but, because it was a family show, they weren't obliged to swivel as well.
Then there were the finger clicks he used to summon the girls. We never see Happy Days re-runs nowadays and I assume this is because it's fallen foul of the stringent social mores of today and joined 95% of anything which was ever vaguely enjoyable in the dustbin of cancel culture. We need to delete ALL pre-2010 entertainment programmes if that's the case....what was that? Oh, we already have.
The show gave the expression ‘jumping the shark’ to the world (and, when I say ‘world’ I obviously mean US TV executives) to signify a moment when a long-running but flagging TV series attempts to use a stunt to re-energise the show but only succeeds in highlighting its irrelevance. Fonzie. On water skis. Jumping over a shark. With his brown leather jacket on (Fonzie not the shark – now that would be truly ridiculous).
More ridiculously still, the show spawned a spin-off series, Mork & Mindy, the story of an alien who taught us all to tweak our ear lobes and chirp Nanu Nanu in the playground. In Happy Days, Robin Williams' Mork first appeared in Richie's dream but I've just watched the Mork & Mindy pilot episode where Fonzie makes a guest appearance and teaches him to kiss before inviting Laverne round to help their visitor from another planet put it into practice. I'm not kidding. "Got a guy [pause] Got a girl [pause] Put their lips together and sort of slide them around" (what, no tongues?). Click here to watch and be amazed. Both episodes came out at a similar time so I'm not sure why 'jumping the shark' was adopted as the death knell of a TV show and not 'pimping the alien'.
Besides a karate-kicking Tom Hanks, the other slightly surprising guest appearance came from Suzi Quattro who played the aptly-named Leather Tuscadero (this was clearly a 70s thing - think of the Bond girls; Pussy Galore, Plenty O'Toole, Xenia Onatopp and, amazingly, Holly Goodhead). Rather more far-fetched than her name though was the fact she fell for Ralph Malph. No way!! I bloomin' loved Suzi Quattro (cf Rik's obsession with Felicity Kendal in the Young Ones) and was furious that she'd have the hots for someone who looked like Ed Sheeran (or how I imagined Ed Sheeran would look 35 years later). On the plus side, it probably gave me a glimmer of hope that I might have a shout with her if ever we bumped into each other.....something which I tested when I turned up at a small bar in Adelaide, Australia where she was playing a gig in the mid-80s. She managed to ignore me until halfway through "Can The Can" before eventually ordering the bouncers to chuck me out. Playing hard to get, the little minx.
I met Henry Winkler too a few years ago. He’d written a series of books about dyslexia and signed them for my son and daughter. He spelled his name correctly (which made me instantly suspicious that this was all just a publicity stunt) but he was a lovely bloke and spent lots of time with my young kids, showing a genuine interest in what they were learning at school and offering them titbits of advice. That said, he declined to give me the thumbs up and say ‘heyyyyyyy’ while I videoed him no matter how many times I asked. He wouldn't even try on the Fonz is Cool belt I'd brought with me. Completely up himself, am I right?
Next: ABSOLUTE VERY FIRST TIME......PLAYED IN A PUNK BAND
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