Costco Connection - December 2006

ew people get a chance to launch a career as a child, much less to sustain that career for more than 50 years. Child-actor-turned-fea-ture-film-director Ron Howard has accomplished just that in an industry that seldom sees such longevity and range.

The prolific and diverse acting résumé that constitutes the first half of Howard’s career has as a nucleus two long-term TV roles, both of which attained pop-cul-ture-icon status (Opie Taylor on The Andy Griffith Show, Richie Cunningham on Happy Days). Part two of his career shifted to directing, first TV movies but quickly graduating to an array of multi-genre feature films notable for strong casting, high production standards and solid storytelling.

Howard was born into a family of actors on March 1, 1954. His parents literally adopted the “living out of a trunk” lifestyle after leaving the University of Oklahoma in the early ’50s for acting opportunities in the hub of show business, New York.

Constant exposure to acting, including an uncredited appearance as a crying infant in the low-budget movie Frontier Woman (1956), soon led Howard into developing routines with his actor/director dad, Rance, that they used to entertain family and friends. When his father stumbled upon a film role for a child actor, Howard auditioned and won his first credited movie part (The Journey, 1959). Returning from that production in Europe, the family relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of television work, which had jumped coasts in the late ’50s.

In L.A., Howard found himself represented by his father’s agent. He learned to apply himself to the craft with effective coaching from his father, and started landing gigs on live television shows, leading to parts in episodes of Dennis the Menace and The Twilight Zone.

Ron Howard behind his desk (left) and on location in Europe (below) filming The Da Vinci Code with crew and producer Brian Grazer (second from right).

Then came a big break with The Andy Griffith Show, which ran from 1960 to 1968. The show, set in the fictional town of Mayberry, North Carolina, was one of the most popular comedies of that decade, and Howard found his Opie Taylor character surrounded by the brilliant acting of Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor and five-time Emmy winner Don Knotts as bumbling Deputy Barney Fife. The show was produced at a studio buzzing with creativity, and the young actor inadvertently networked with several mighty show-business figures, including Bill Cosby.

A few major film roles came along during the Griffith years, including The Music Man (1962) and The Courtship of Eddie’s Father (1963). An abundance of TV roles also presented themselves during and after Mayberry, and Howard made appearances on such classic TV series as I Spy, Dr. Kildare, Route 66, The Fugitive, The Big Valley, Gunsmoke, The F.B.I., Daniel Boone, Bonanza, M*A*S*H and The Waltons.

The desire to work behind the camera eventually led Howard to film school at the University of Southern California (USC) in the ’70s. Although interrupted by acting gigs, including a long run as Richie Cunningham on another hit TV series, Happy Days (1973 to 1980), he persisted with his studies and ultimately directed his first feature at the age of 23 (Grand Theft Auto, 1977).

A symbiotic pairing with producer Brian Grazer, starting with the production of Night Shift (1982) and followed by Splash (1984), yielded a long-term partnership. Since 1985, their Imagine Entertainment has given Howard the platform for directing a series of notable features, including A Beautiful Mind, winner of 2001 Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Film.

Howard, 52, spoke with The Connection from his East Coast home office as his most recent film, The Da Vinci Code, was nearing release on DVD.

Costco Connection: You had firmly made up your mind to be a director when you were 15 years old. What prompted that decision?

Ron Howard: I always thought about it and talked about it. I’d watched my dad direct plays, and many of the directors on The Andy Griffith Show had been actors who had turned to directing careers.