Everything about Ron Howard totally explained
» For other people named Ron Howard, see Ronald Howard.
Ronald William Howard (born
March 1,
1954) is an award-winning
American actor and
Academy Award-winning
director and
producer. Howard came to prominence in the 1960s as
Andy Griffith's TV son,
Opie Taylor, on
The Andy Griffith Show (credited as Ronny Howard), and later in the 1970s as Howard Cunningham's son and
Arthur Fonzarelli's best friend, Richie Cunningham, on
Happy Days (a role he played from 1974 to 1980). Since retiring from acting, he's directed several successful films including
Apollo 13 and
The Da Vinci Code.
Early life
Howard was born in
Duncan, Oklahoma, the son of
Jean Speegle Howard, an actress, and
Rance Howard, a director, writer, and actor. His younger brother,
Clint Howard, is a well-known character actor. Howard attended the
University of Southern California's
School of Cinematic Arts but didn't graduate.
Career
Early acting roles and The Andy Griffith Show
Howard first earned recognition for playing Winthrop Paroo, the child with the lisp in the film version of
The Music Man with
Robert Preston and
Shirley Jones. Besides appearing in
The Music Man, he appeared in the role of
Opie Taylor in the television series
The Andy Griffith Show, which was the successful spin-off of
The Danny Thomas Show. There he portrayed the son of the local sheriff in the fictional town of
Mayberry,
North Carolina. For eight seasons, he also created a loving relationship with
Andy Griffith, on-screen, and spent a lot of time with him, off-screen, when not filming. The credits referred to him as "Ronny Howard." He also appeared in the 1963 film
The Courtship of Eddie's Father with
Glenn Ford and (billed as "Ronnie Howard") in
Little Boy Lost, a 1966 episode of the TV show
I Spy with
Robert Culp and
Bill Cosby.
Howard made a notable guest-star appearance on the popular television series
M*A*S*H during that show's first season as an
underage American serving in
the Marines during the
Korean War.
Happy Days
Howard is also well known for his role as Richie Cunningham in television's
Happy Days on which, beginning in 1974, he played the likeable "buttoned down" boy, in contrast to
Henry Winkler's
Fonz. He attained film success with his role as Steve Bollander in
George Lucas'
teen movie American Graffiti. In 1977, while still starring on
Happy Days, he directed his first film, a
low-budget comedy/
action film called
Grand Theft Auto.
His last significant on-screen role was when he reprised his famous role as Opie Taylor in the 1986 TV reunion movie
Return to Mayberry reuniting him with
Andy Griffith,
Don Knotts, and most of the old cast.
Directing
Before leaving
Happy Days in 1980, Howard made his directing debut with the 1977 project "
Grand Theft Auto" (after cutting a deal with
Roger Corman to star in "
Eat My Dust" with
Christopher Norris). Howard went on to direct several TV movies. His big theatrical break came in 1982 with
Night Shift featuring soon-to-be stars, such as
Michael Keaton and
Shelley Long, as well as reuniting Howard with "Happy Days" co-star
Henry Winkler.
He has since directed a number of high-visibility films, the most acclaimed of which include
"Splash",
"Parenthood",
"Cocoon",
"Apollo 13" (nominated for nine
Academy Awards and winning two),
"A Beautiful Mind" (for which he won the
Oscar for "Best Director"), and
Cinderella Man. His latest film,
"The Da Vinci Code" has been a box office hit earning more than
$700 million at the box office, but a critical letdown.
Howard casts his younger brother
Clint in a minor role in most of his movies.
Imagine Entertainment
Howard is the co-chairman, with
Brian Grazer, of
Imagine Entertainment, a major film and television production company, which has produced notable projects like
Friday Night Lights,
8 Mile,
Inside Deep Throat, and the television series
24 and
Felicity.
Through his company
Imagine Television, Howard continues to have a presence in television, most recently as the executive producer and uncredited
narrator of the critically acclaimed
FOX sitcom
Arrested Development. The show, despite having won six Emmy awards and near-unanimous praise from critics, didn't enjoy high
ratings and was limited by
Fox Television in 2006. A series finale took place in February 2006, but Howard, on-screen for the first time in the show, suggested a movie version may be in the works.
Personal life
On
June 7,
1975, Howard wed his high-school sweetheart, Cheryl (
née Alley), a writer with a degree in geriatric psychology. They have four children; daughters
Bryce Dallas Howard (b. 1981), Jocelyn Carlyle (twin, b. 1985), Paige Carlyle (twin, b. 1985), and son Reed Cross (b. 1987). Their daughters Bryce Dallas Howard and
Paige Howard are actresses. They live on a 35 acre estate in the exclusive gated community of
Conyers Farm in
Greenwich, Connecticut. In February 2007, Howard became a grandfather when his daughter, Bryce, gave birth to a son.
Ron Howard was the sixth cousin to his
Andy Griffith Show co-star,
Don Knotts, through Howard's ancestor, Lucinda Knotts.
In the June 2006 issue of
Vanity Fair magazine, Ron Howard was asked, "What do you consider your greatest achievement?" He replied, "Forty-eight consecutive years of steady employment in television and film, while preserving a rich family life."
Howard in popular culture
In
The Simpsons episode "
When You Dish Upon a Star",
Homer meets and befriends
Alec Baldwin,
Kim Basinger and Ron Howard. Later in the episode, Ron Howard is injured when trying to jump from a truck to the RV that Homer was driving. In the end, he pitches Homer's movie idea and gets it greenlit. Another episode ("
Hello Gutter, Hello Fadder") Homer and Ron Howard are fighting each other while appearing on
The Springfield Squares. Later, Ron gives Homer the inspiration to spend more time with his kids and gives him some money that Homer refuses but takes anyway. Ron yoinks the money back from Homer and then drives away.
In 1976, when Howard played the part of Gillom Rogers in "The Shootist", John Wayne's last, enigmatic and iconic Western, he was joined by an ensemble cast of All-American character actors and stars who were diverse, talented and significant. Wayne turned in a nuanced,emblematic portrayal of the self-hastened death of a gunfighter stricken with cancer. Howard's performance resonates as a memorably moving portrayal of a gunslinger adulating young man who becomes an adult and turns away from violence after drawing down to terminate John Wayne's back shooting killer. Lauren Bacall, as Bond Rogers, Gillom's mother and the fast fading Wayne's reluctant landlady, Jimmy Stewart as Dr.EW Hostetler, and Scatman Crothers, John Carradine,Harry Morgan, Rich Lentz, Gregg Palmer, and Richard Boone are among the popular actors and actresses spanning several generations who teamed up in this film, one where the paths of the young lion Ron Howard and the actually dying old lion John Wayne unforgettably crossed.
When he hosted
Saturday Night Live in the 1980s,
Eddie Murphy called him "Opie Cunningham". In the
South Park episode, "
Ginger Kids",
Cartman asks a crowd of fellow gingers to name great Americans with the hair color, the first and only name they can think of is "Ron Howard", and when asked to name a second, one responds "Ron Howard" again.
On a
VH1 special about the 100 greatest
child stars, many of the interviewees considered Ron Howard to be the most successful child star of all-time, considering his two major television acting roles and his directing career. In Season 1, Episode 3 of
Stroker and Hoop on
Adult Swim, Stroker and Hoop ran a detective agency whose first client needed them to make Ron Howard stop controlling his mind.
Filmography
Directorial
Films
Television
- M*A*S*H (1973)
- Cotton Candy (1978)
- Skyward (1980)
- Through the Magic Pyramid (1981)
- Littleshots (1983)
- Take Five (1987)
- Arrested Development (2002)
Acting
Film
Frontier Woman (1956)
The Journey (1959)
Door-to-Door Maniac (1961)
The Music Man (1962)
The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1963)
Village of the Giants (1965)
The Wild Country (1970)
American Graffiti (1973)
Happy Mother's Day, Love George (1973)
The Spikes Gang (1974)
The First Nudie Musical (1976)
Eat My Dust (1976)
The Shootist (1976) Golden Globe nomination
Grand Theft Auto (1977)
More American Graffiti (1979)
The Magical World of Chuck Jones (1992) (documentary)
One Vision (1998) (documentary)
The Independent (2000)
Welcome to Hollywood (2000)
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) TV-PG
Osmosis Jones (2001) (voice) TV-PG
A Beautiful Mind (2001) TV-14-L
Tell Them Who You Are (2004) (documentary)
In the Shadow of the Moon (2007) (documentary)
Television
The Twilight Zone Episode: Walking Distance (1959)
The Andy Griffith Show (1960-1968)
A Boy Called Nuthin' (1967)
Gunsmoke Episode: Charlie Noon (1969)
Smoke (1970)
The Smith Family (1971-1972)
M*A*S*H - Sometimes You Hear the Bullet (1973)
The Migrants (1974)
Happy Days (cast member from 1974-1980)
Locusts (1974)
Huckleberry Finn (1975)
I'm a Fool (1976)
Act of Love (1980)
The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang (voice) (1980)
Bitter Harvest (1981)
Fire on the Mountain (1981)
Return to Mayberry (1986)
Arrested Development (Narrator) (2003-2006)
Land Of The Giants (TV series) Episode: Genus At Work (1969)Further Information
Get more info on 'Ron Howard'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://ron_howard.totallyexplained.com">Ron Howard Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
