Anson Williams Talks About Friendship with Happy Days’ Ron Howard, Henry Winkler

Anson Williams learned how to be part of a team thanks to Happy Days — on set and on the softball field.

On the Jan. 30 episode of 9021OMG, Williams, who played Potsie Weber on Happy Days, reflected on his friendships with his costars Henry Winkler, who played Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli, and Ron Howard, who played Richie Cunningham, and how creator Garry Marshall helped forge their connection. 

“We have been close friends for decades,” Williams, 75, said, noting that Winkler, Howard and Don Most (who played Ralph Malph) are “literally a text away.” 

“It’s just been a wonderful friendship. And just to have that kind of friendship that many years? It’s pretty unique,” he said. “But that has a lot to do with Garry Marshall, our mentor.”

Marshall, who died in 2016 at age 81, “really cared about us,” Williams said, “not just as a showrunner, but as young people because we didn’t know much.” He encouraged all of them to learn as much as possible on set by shadowing directors and writers and treating the set like “school,” and Williams said he thinks that’s why they’re all “still involved” in entertainment. 

“Early on, Garry, he sat us down. I’ll never forget it,” Williams remembered. “He said, ‘You guys are gonna be famous. You don’t deserve it. But you’re gonna be famous. There’s gonna be a light on you. Your responsibility is, you take the light and put it on someone that does deserve it.’ ” 

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The “other thing” that Williams remembered as the best part of his experience on Happy Days was the show’s softball team. Marshall was a “sports fanatic” and had the idea for it. Williams remembered that all his castmates, except Winkler, 79, were ex-athletes, but Howard, 70, and his brother Clint taught him to pitch and he “ended up being really, really good.”

The team toured the country, played in major stadiums before games and “hardly ever lost.” They also ended up playing on USO tours. Marshall told them, “I put it together because you always have the back of your teammate. I think it’s gonna come back to the set. I think it’s gonna stop a lot of evil.” And it did. 

Post-Happy Days, Williams became a director and has helmed episodes of Melrose Place, Beverly Hills, 90210, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Lizzie McGuire and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. He told hosts Jennie Garth and Tori Spelling that fans still call him Potsie when they see him.

Williams said that when Happy Days became a hit after its premiere in 1974, it was Howard who told him “Anson, you gotta earn your name … How do you think I feel? I have two: Opie and Richie,” referencing his The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days character names. “You’ve got one. Shut up.”

“We have to earn our names. Take this and do something bigger with it,” Williams said. Still, Williams joked, “Ron had won the Oscar, and they’re calling him Richie.”

Williams stayed with Happy Days throughout its run until 1984.