The ‘Happy Days’ Cast Made This Joke When They Forgot Their Lines
Actors are bound to forget their lines. But the cast of Happy Days had a funny way to deal with that. They would joke about a character that was written out of the show. It’s fitting they had a catchphrase for this given the show was full of catchphrases thanks to The Fonz (Henry Winkler).
‘Happy Days’ had catchphrases
The Fonz became very popular with his leather jacket, styled hair, and catchphrases. Winkler had a surprising source of inspiration for them.
“Everyone who’s ever played a Fonz- like cool character has always done the same things: combed their hair, stuck cigarette packets up the sleeve of their T-shirt. I swore I wouldn’t do any of that,” Winkler told the Guardian.
“I got the ‘Heeeey’ and the ‘Whoaaa’ from my favorite sport at the time: horse-riding,” he revealed. Fonzie was also known for saying “Correct-amundo.”
The cast had their own phrases just for themselves. They would use one of them when they would mess up in a scene.
The cast would joke about Chuck when they forgot their lines
Producer Garry Marshall talked about the making of Happy Days. The show started off with a third Cunningham child named Chuck played by Gavan O’Herlihy.
Marshall said O’Herlihy later came to him wanting to quit. The producer claimed the actor wanted to go back to school and become a poet. They replaced him with another actor, but then got the idea to write off the character completely.
“You gotta pay attention to what’s happening,” Marshall said. “It soon became obvious because we heard the audience loved Fonzie. It soon became obvious that Fonzie was like the older brother and that was the relationship that was working.”
He then wrote the character off by sending him to college. Marshall waited to see if many fans would say something about Chuck’s disappearance but they never did.
“Whenever they would forget a line or get mixed up they’d say ‘Was that Chuck? Who is that?'” the producer revealed. So the character stuck around on set in that unique way.
The show also created new phrases for the television industry
The 1974 show has been viewed as the pioneer for many things. Happy Days got rid of Chuck Cunningham, but he isn’t the last sitcom kid to disappear from a show.
The “Chuck Cunningham Syndrome” is the name for this TV move. Boy Meets Word, Family Matters, Party of Five, and more have gotten rid of one of its children without addressing it to the audience.
The more popular phrase to come from Happy Days is “Jumping the Shark”. This comes from the episode where The Fonz literally jumped over a shark in water-skis. It was a stunt with the goal of getting more publicity, and shows that later made an unexpected move with the same goal would be accused of jumping the shark.
Happy Days had a huge affect on culture and created a few popular phrases. The cast also had fun with their own jokes on set.
