Top Stupid Things about the 'Happy Days' TV series (1974-1984)

The movie Rock 'n' Roll High School did The Fonz one better: The school's connected person has an entire office (desk, chair and office equipment) in one bathroom stall.

 

I remember Fonzie's conversation with him when Chachi is concerned that he's going to die because that's the tendency at his age. Fonzie basically supports him by telling him that it just one more thing that he can do. I don't remember the exact words but it went something like this: You don't walk into the street in front of moving cars, you don't pick a fight, and you don't forget to take your medication.

 

I was the target audience Marshall was looking for. I really liked the first 2 seasons, but was still even more hooked when it became Really Big.
As the episode premises became more silly, I sadly stopped watching.

I'm not sure of the actual episode timeline, but I do remember thinking the 'Bike Jump' cliffhanger was pretty lame.

Another episode that made me decide to stop watching it was that suddenly they were musicians! At the time (I think about '75-'76) I was learning to play guitar, and practicing took a lot of my time. Music was the most important thing to me. To have these guys in the show suddenly have a band with NO reference made to musical ability among the characters leading up to that episode was rather insulting to this 11 year old!
I remember liking the "Sticks" drummer character but he mysteriously disappeared, along with the "band".

I'll say around January 1977 is when I fully gave up. "Chachi"? Seriously??

 

Wa wa wa!

 

This seemed to be a natural go-to in the 6os-70s with any comedy series that featured teens. A time honored tradition going back to Ozzie & Harriet in the 50s that future producers hoped to replicate but rarely succeeded at. Brady kids anyone?

 

True, and Rick Nelson was a talent! they got lucky with him. It was believable.
Bradys, not so much. Although Barry Williams actually played guitar. No episode ever centered on Greg actually learning- that's what bugged me!

 

Suzi Quatro was a much bigger star in Britain than in the US, and probably wouldn't have been on a sitcom if she had the same status Stateside as over in Blighty.

 

Again, Pop stars of the day appearing on sitcoms goes way back although I'd agree most were artists in the early stages of their fame or more Pop than say, Rock & Roll.

 

Think of Paul Peterson and Shelley Faberes on Donna Reed or Don Grady on My Three Sons (Grady actually went on to a successful music career - composing and appearing in some live shows). And of course, there was The Partridge Family, the TV band where most of the members had the good sense to lip sync.

 

Well, since the other Partridge kids never actually sang on any of their records, they had no choice but to lip sync, no? Peterson, Fabares and Grady are good examples of actors who gained some singing fame through their shows but I'm referring to actual musicians who guest starred in some capacity on a show. Hmmm. I think I'm gonna start a new thread about this as I don't want to derail this one.

 

Suzie Quatros character
Chachi
Less and Less of the original cast, Ralph Malph, Potzie
Too much Fonzie and making him less cool
Older Joanie
Jennie Piccolo

 

Gomer Pyle could sing too

 

I heard her on a radio show and I believe she said they were doing a movie about her life. Does anyone know if it was delayed? Shows on IMDB a July 1st release date. Wow after looking at the trailer, I never knew she had so much influence on the Women's rock scene

 

I had forgotten about this later version of the theme song. Strangely more retro while the visuals were increasingly more contemporary (and unfunny).

 

Remind me to call you if I ever need a room cleared.

 

Fonzie has to sing at a benefit but he can't hold a tune. Someone points out all the girls will be screaming so it doesn't matter if he can sing or not. Come the night the Fonz dresses like Las Vegas Elvis even though it's the 50s.

 

Mr C's cartwheels.

 

Yeah, towards the end of the series, the girls were each making $65K a week, plus they had a cartoon series on that paid another $10K, and they were getting a piece of the syndication money. I think in all, they each made over $5M a year for about ten years, and then maybe about half that for another ten years. Good chunk of change.

No, actually Carol Burnett collapsed in its final season, and they actually had to lose Dick Van Dyke when he joined the show in 1977 and replaced him with Steve Lawrence and Ken Berry. I think there was a paradigm shift for the audience and they didn't want to accept comedy/variety shows anymore. If you check the TV schedules, pretty much every variety series after Carol Burnett crashed and burned pretty hard, including the ones in syndication. Even Burnett tried to revive her show a few times and it didn't go well. The Wikipedia entry is pretty much what I remember:

The Carol Burnett Show - Wikipedia

I don't blame Burnett at all: I honestly think TV itself changed a lot over the 11 years of the show, and audiences ust got tired of the format over time. As an amateur TV historian, it's interesting to me that variety shows, soap operas, daytime game shows. and Westerns have mostly pretty much disappeared from modern television. There was a time when all of them were massively popular and dominated the TV schedule.

 

When he came on they were the #1 show on TV. He was indispensable? They should have just said "get a haircut, you little puke".

 

So last night, while waiting for MASH to come on again I turned on Happy Days on MeTv. And it was the RANCH episode that several people here mentioned. hahaha! Just as before, I had to mute it and wait for MASH.

 

Fonzie was hanging out at Arnold's when he was with The Falcons-There's an episode (I think 5th season) where they flashback to Richie's first time going to Arnold's and he sits in Fonzie and The Falcons' booth. Fonzie challenges Richie to a fight, Richie doesn't punk out and earns Fonzie's respect because he showed up for the fight. If I remember correctly (and I'm foggy on this, so I can't swear to it), that same episode ends with Fonzie leaving the gang after Richie kind of convinces him that fighting for no really good reason is dumb.

In any case, Fonzarelli left on his own accord, he wasn't kicked out. And even in episodes where he runs across or deals with his old gang friends, they still pretty much seem to like him enough, and even kind of bow to him.

And no, he didn't wreck his motorcycle.

 

Agreed, "L&S" was funnier than "HD" a lot of the time. I think the show still holds up pretty well, and I think Laverne and Shirley at their best were a better comedy duo than Lucy and Ethel.

I know I'm in a thread where people are pointing out some of the dumb things about "HD", and I agree with a lot of it. Still, I don't hate the show, and actually own the first six seasons in the plastic packaging/ "binder" type holders that I bought at Walmart.

 

I hear ya-It's not like he was a super-star kid actor before he joined "Happy Days": You'd think they could have used the fact that he was joining the #1 show on TV as leverage to get him to comb his hair into a more contemporary hair-do for the Happy Days era.

They must have wanted him pretty bad to allow him that 70s/early 80 hairstyle he wore to be worn on a show set in the 50s to mid-60s. They either wanted him really badly to play Chachi, or Scott Baio had an excellent agent.

As I said in my earlier post, he could have easily combed that bowl of his into something resembling a late 50s/early 60s hairstyle and then when the show hit 1964 or 1965 in their timeline, he could have combed his hair into that bowl he had, because it would have been more believable that he would wear his hair over his ears in a post Beatles on Ed Sullivan America.