Playboy Interview:Ron Howard

a candid conversation with the child-star-turned-director about surviving mayberry, losing hair, outwitting hollywood and explaining away a dildo

There are certain things Ron Howard likes to get off of his chest immediately. "I am not Opie," he announces in a firm voice. "And I am not Richie Cunningham."

Howard can be forgiven for being a bit defensive. Few actors have been as indelibly linked to two such saccharine juvenile roles and lived to tell about it. Howard actually grew up as these characters, spending his childhood as Opie Taylor on "The Andy Griffith Show" and his teenage years as Richie Cunningham on "Happy Days." And that was back before cable and home video gave viewers a multitude of choices. Millions more people regularly watched Howard's shows than see today's top-rated sitcoms, and it's easy to forget how intensely famous he was for 21 years.

It's not that Howard hates his former roles as the son of Mayberry's widower sheriff or the clean-cut Richie Cunningham, who was continuously coming of age in a fictional Milwaukee suburb. It's just that they tend to overshadow his proudest achievement--ascending to the top rank of film directors with such hits as "Backdraft," "Parenthood," "Splash" and "Cocoon."

Thanks to syndication--"Happy Days" and "The Andy Griffith Show" are still seen daily in most of the country--Howard may have the most familiar face among Hollywood directors. And despite a hairline that long ago betrayed him, he's constantly recognized, sometimes as Opie, sometimes as Richie, and he's polite to his fans. But Howard's face lights up when someone approaches him with a comment about one of his films. He's delighted as he relates how a nearby fire briefly shut down a Manhattan location shoot for his new movie "The Paper." While the blaze was being brought under control, a firefighter walked over to him and said, "We'll be out of here in a few minutes. This ain't no 'Backdraft,' Ron."

Howard has cemented his Hollywood reputation as a director the old-fashioned way: His movies sell tickets. "Parenthood," a treatment of modern family life with Steve Martin leading a multigenerational cast, did $135 million worth of business worldwide. "Backdraft," Howard's saga of the men who fight Chicago's fires, grossed an impressive $150 million.

He can also take credit for launching the career of Michael Keaton, who starred in Howard's "Night Shift" and "Gung Ho" and also has the lead in "The Paper." And he gave Tom Hanks his first major film role in the 1984 fantasy-comedy "Splash."

Howard remains faithful to the basics of Hollywood moviemaking: bankable stars, glossy production values and straightforward scripts. He's upfront about his goal as a director: "I want to make sure the story is as engrossing and entertaining as it possibly can be." Critics haven't always agreed on whether he's achieved success. Adjectives such as syrupy and cornball have appeared in reviews of Howard's movies. But he insists that notices for "Cocoon" and "Parenthood" were as favorable as anything he could have written himself. Others, particularly the megabudgeted "Far and Away," starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, and the fanciful "Willow," fared less well.

His tenth feature, "The Paper," which stars Keaton, Robert Duvall, Glenn Close and Marisa Tomei, is a return to the kind of ensemble film he does best. The story revolves around a day in the lives of reporters, editors and publishers on a scrappy Manhattan tabloid.

Howard was born in Oklahoma, but his feet are planted in show business in southern California. The son of an actor father, Ron made his first screen appearance before his second birthday. By the age of six, when he signed on to portray Opie Taylor, Howard had compiled a résumé of credits ranging from "Playhouse 90" to "General Electric Theater." During breaks from "The Andy Griffith Show," Howard acted in feature films such as "The Music Man" with Robert Preston. "Happy Days," one of the top-rated Seventies sitcoms, catapulted him, along with Henry "The Fonz" Winkler, into the category of celebrities who could draw teen crowds to shopping-mall publicity events.

But by the time he began working on "Happy Days," Howard's ambition was focused on landing in the director's chair. He approached Roger Corman, the B-movie impresario known for spotting talented newcomers--Francis Coppola, Martin Scorsese and Jonathan Demme among them--and negotiated a quid pro quo in which Corman agreed to let Howard direct a film titled "Grand Theft Auto" if he would also star in it. Appearing with his father, Rance, brother Clint, and a herd of expendable autos, Howard did a credible job of choreographing chases and crashes. He even included an appearance by Cheryl, his wife of two years. If the 1977 feature didn't break new artistic ground, it proved that Howard could earn money for a film's backers. "Grand Theft Auto" cost about $600,000 to make and brought in $15 million at the box office. Howard recalls being disappointed at the time: He still hadn't directed a major studio feature--and he was 23 years old.

He would have to pay his dues for a few years, directing television movies that included "Skyward," a well-received 1980 film with Bette Davis. He finally scored in 1982, when he and his producing partner, Brian Grazer, managed to persuade Henry Winkler and an unknown named Michael Keaton to appear in "Night Shift," a movie based on a true story about a prostitution ring run out of a New York City morgue. Why Winkler and Keaton? Because Belushi and Aykroyd said no.

Playboy dispatched Contributing Editor Warren Kalbacker to meet with the 40-year-old who has spent 38 years in show business. Kalbacker reports:

"The adjective nice has been used so often to describe Howard that I was worried. He played nice characters when he was an actor. As a director, his movies are nice, among other things. He even married his high school sweetheart in 1975--and has stayed married to her. I called on my most vicious, cynical sources in Hollywood, and they all said the same thing. Ron is nice. I began to panic. Nice guys can be boring.

"I shouldn't have worried. Ron is indeed a nice guy, and when I called to schedule our first session, he quickly invited me to join him for lunch. And yes, the clean-cut, all-American Howard does have a taste for white bread--crusty Italian loaves that he breaks into small pieces and dips into olive oil laced with black pepper. He said he'd picked up the taste while traveling in Italy.

"It's important to keep in mind that he's been successful in an environment where the shark is by no means an endangered species. And like many successful men--particularly those who have been dealing with the press since toddlerhood--Howard is both candid and articulate. Much of his freshly scrubbed image is true, but there seemed to be much more to Ron Howard, especially when the subject turned, as it quickly did, to sex."

[Q] Playboy: A fan just stopped you on the street and praised Backdraft. How does that compare with being recognized as Opie Taylor or Richie Cunningham?

[A] Howard: What's happened to me is perfect. I'm not current in a pop sense. When people recognize me there's a warmth that I really appreciate. Once in a while I'd rather not hear it. During my first-ever meeting with Robert De Niro, we were in a Manhattan restaurant and I was excited, trying to talk to him about a film. Over at another table were a bunch of people calling out, "Hey Opie! Hey Cunningham!" I was praying that they'd leave, but in the middle of our conversation they came over and wanted autographs. They were standing in such a way that they didn't see they were talking over Robert De Niro's shoulder. I thought, Boy, these people are really missing the boat here. But it worked out OK. De Niro seemed to be all right with it. And bald guys are tickled to death that I've lost my hair. They'll point at my bald head, "Hey, Ron! I like the haircut." They just love the fact that we've both lost our hair.

[Q] Playboy: You certainly haven't lost your clean-cut image over the years. How much of it is truly you and how much is smart PR?

[A] Howard: I've had a couple of near misses, reminders to not fuck around. I honestly can't remember when I was anonymous. I learned to write so I could give autographs. I didn't want to have any secrets from the press, because I didn't feel I'd ever be able to keep them. I always felt there would be a price to pay for any outlandish behavior, like going down to Tijuana to spend a weekend in a bordello. From the time I was a kid in school, there was always some wiseass waiting for me to make an ass out of myself, to do something that they perceived as arrogant. To buy a Porsche. To get in trouble. I never had any interest in living out that cliché for any of those people. I think it probably became a kind of commitment to be different. I also fell madly in love my junior year of high school. Even while Happy Days was going crazy and we in the cast were treated like rock stars, I really was committed to Cheryl. The foil-wrapped condom in my wallet--I wouldn't say it absolutely stayed wrapped--didn't get unwrapped on the road. Not for groupies. I was in love with my girlfriend, who was soon to be my wife. We got married at 21.

[Q] Playboy: Has your image limited you as a director? Do people expect you to make only wholesome movies?

[A] Howard: Yeah. I'm interested in seeing sex when I go to a movie. But I know that when I direct a PG-13 movie, audiences ignore the 13 and say, "Here's one for the whole family." That was my experience with Parenthood, which has dildos and Mary Steenburgen giving Steve Martin a blow job. But we didn't really describe the dildo in terms of what it was, and most kids didn't know what it was. Later I had parents tell me, "My kid turned to me in the theater and asked, 'What's that, Dad?'" Once, I had to explain one away in real life as "something to massage the neck."

[Q] Playboy: Besides the dildo, how much of Parenthood was actually based on real-life experiences?

[A] Howard: There's a sequence where the Martha Plimpton and Keanu Reeves characters have taken pictures of themselves making love, and her mom inadvertently picks them up at the photo store. My partner, [producer] Brian Grazer, had that happen to him.

[Q] Playboy: What about your personal experiences?

[A] Howard: I probably could help you out on the blow jobs, but I won't. Sorry. That's just what my 12-1/2-year-old daughter needs. One of her buddies from school reads the Playboy Interview and she comes back home talking about blow jobs. Vibrators would be another area where I'd have to say, "No comment."

[Q] Playboy: You and your wife named your children after the places where they were conceived. Is that some sort of Howard family kink?

[A] Howard: We didn't want to get into a family-name hassle. All our children's middle names are based on points of conception. We were able to figure them out. We have a Dallas. We have twin Carlyles, after the hotel. One son has a street name for a middle name, but that's just because Volvo isn't a very good middle name.

[Q] Playboy: Did some event in your family history inspire you to cover Tom Cruise's penis widi a bowl in Far and Away?

[A] Howard: That was me. No one's ever put a bowl over their dick that I know of. We just thought it was a mischievous thing--a sheltered girl seeing a naked guy lying there would probably lift the bowl, take a look and, instead of being shocked at what a penis looks like, she'd kind of like it. I thought it was an interesting and funny choice. It was one of my favorite moments in the movie. And it always got a huge reaction from the audience. It was unexpected that Nicole Kidman's character would do that.

[Q] Playboy: Did Cruise request an extra-large bowl for the scene?

[A] Howard: No. We just found one that was a pretty good fit. A comfortable fit.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel compelled to feature nudity in your films just to confound the skeptics?

[A] Howard: Yeah, especially early in my career. If I'd left nudity out of Night Shift, not only would it have been wrong for the movie, it would have become an issue. People would have rolled their eyes and said, "Oh, Ron Howard won't show tits in his movie. That's predictable." Night Shift wasn't a thinking person's movie. It was a party movie. A comedy about hookers without nudity wouldn't have been hot or fun to watch. There was a bordello scene with this topless girl in a hot tub. We shot that scene for three days. She was very comfortable, very at ease with the whole thing. Made the crew very happy for three days, I'll tell you. I had a much more erotic and graphic lovemaking scene in Backdraft between Bill Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh. They were great. We came up with some good erotic stuff. But when I started showing it to audiences, I got the sense they felt it was tacked on for commercial purposes, that it was gratuitous. I trimmed it down. But it was fascinating to do.

[Q] Playboy: Which part of it intrigued you the most?

[A] Howard: I was intrigued by the way they handled it as actors. And it was my first exploration into what was actually erotic. I was just beginning to learn about it. People who knew me saw that sequence and were a bit surprised. And I think it was effective. It made me think that someday, in a story where it really was appropriate, that kind of eroticism would be interesting to work with again.

[Q] Playboy: You sound tentative.

[A] Howard: People aren't interested in fucking shots anymore. It's a huge challenge now to make a sequence that isn't the sort of lovemaking montage you've seen about a zillion times: tight shots going up the leg. Explicit images can be very powerful, but not just out of the blue. It's difficult to shock anyone. Sexuality is not a novelty in films anymore. What's sensational will not make a movie a commercial hit. At the same time, we've been liberated. When something is appropriate, we can deal with it openly and graphically. That's a great place to be. But all these things are pretty subjective, so I wouldn't be able--particularly in this publication--to say that I know something about sexuality that hasn't been explored by other filmmakers. But, God, sex is an important part of my life and everyone else's.

[Q] Playboy: You have the distinction of going through puberty in Mayberry. Did it warp you in a serious way?

[A] Howard: Puberty under any kind of a spotlight has its nightmarish moments. Going through puberty, you want to feel good about yourself and you don't mind in some small way being viewed as important. But you don't want to be noticed all the time. You've got zits on your face, for Christ's sake. A ninth-grade girl wanted me to sign her thigh. It was just when miniskirts were coming in. Now, that's one I wish I had back. I didn't sign her thigh.

[Q] Playboy: How did your other classmates react to you?

[A] Howard: Among my peers I was embarrassed to be an actor. It was something not to be talked about. The Andy Griffith Show was the number one show in the country, so I always knew there was something I could do that was unusual and that I could function in an adult environment. But I was the butt of a lot of jokes. My character's name, Opie, rhymes with dopey. A few years later they called me Opium. I'd have to get into fights with people. Fortunately, I could sort of hang in.

[Q] Playboy: Do you still answer to Opie?

[A] Howard: My initial reaction every time I hear "Opie" is a little tightening in the gut. I'm not Opie. But I'm smart enough not to slug anybody. I used to get really tired of it. I'm sure Rob Reiner doesn't want to be called Meathead. Then I began to realize that I'm a baby boomer, and having gone through that phase with all the other baby boomers, there's a connection. I'm someone who grew up in front of people's eyes--as Letterman says when he introduces me. I hosted Saturday Night Live ten years ago and we covered this subject in a sketch. Eddie Murphy was playing Raheem the Film Critic, and he introduced me as Opie Cunningham. I had a mustache then, and he said, "We don't like that mustache on you. We want you to shave it off." So while he was trying to shave the mustache off, I was saying, "I'm a director now. I've got a movie out called Night Shift." Ever since that I'm always hearing "Opie Cunningham." Once in a while I'd just rather not hear it.

[Q] Playboy: One of your high school classmates was model and actress Rene Russo. Did she make puberty more excruciating--or less?

[A] Howard: She got a big bang out of the fact that Opie was sitting right in front of her in social studies class. I had this little practice of imagining sex with one girl in each class in each period. Rene Russo was my fourth-period fantasy. She had a great biker-chick look, with white lipstick and ironed hair. She was not part of the mainstream, not cheerleader material. No interest at all in school, but she had a cool sense of humor. I was shocked when she came to our 20th high school reunion, because I don't think she'd been to the tenth. Maybe it was her way of saying, "Hey, look, I succeeded at something. And I still look pretty damn great."

[Q] Playboy: Did you ever have a chance to realize your fourth-period fantasy?

[A] Howard: No. Rene was pretty intimidating at that time. But she was nice. She would cheat off my tests all the time. I would happily slip her an answer.

[Q] Playboy: You're telling us Opie cheated in school?

[A] Howard: Yeah. With the Vietnam war going on, getting good grades was important to me. And I wasn't above writing answers on the inside of my glasses.

[Q] Playboy: How close did you come to being drafted?

[A] Howard: I had a bad number, 41 or 42. I didn't want to go into the Army. And I made up my mind that I wouldn't go to Canada. I took Happy Days because I thought--though I hadn't seen an attorney--if I could get on a TV series the studio would try to keep me out of Vietnam. I read an article that said you could get a work deferment if your employment impacted the employment of 30 or more individuals. And a television production crew is 40 or 50 people.

[Q] Playboy: Let's talk about the Happy Days phenomenon.

[A] Howard: It was awesome. For a couple of years it was like being in a rock band. We had this young, teen audience. When we'd make an appearance at a mall somewhere it wouldn't be unusual for 15,000 to 20,000 people to show up. You're coming into so many homes. Less so today than in those pre-cable days. But it's still true. I'll bet more people would immediately recognize Tim Allen than any number of movie stars, outside of Tom Cruise and maybe Harrison Ford, Stallone, Schwarzenegger. With American Graffiti and Happy Days, and The Andy Griffith Show kicking into syndication, I was at the height of my visibility. At that point it was difficult to go places. If I went Christmas shopping I had to keep moving. Once I stopped to pay for something, people would start to crowd around. I didn't take it very seriously, but I was glad to be on the wave.

[Q] Playboy: You did enjoy the attention?

[A] Howard: I got a kick out of it. But I'd already been on The Andy Griffith Show. I took the position on Happy Days as a veteran. Been there. Done that. I postured. There were times when I wanted to bolt that show. I couldn't argue with its success, but my heart wasn't in it every day. I didn't find the episodes creatively satisfying or challenging. I was chafing to get on with my life. There were times when I'd be driving along the San Diego Freeway and I was supposed to turn onto the Hollywood Freeway to go to work and I'd just want to disappear, keep going to Tijuana. In retrospect I'm glad I didn't do something dopey like that.

[Q] Playboy: Why did you want to bail out?

[A] Howard: When my celebrity or recognizability was at its absolute apex it was pretty smothering. I didn't enjoy it. I was just married at that time, and I said to Cheryl, "I bet if I actually pulled this thing off and became a director, this would die down pretty quickly." And she said, "Do it. Do it."

[Q] Playboy: When did you make the switch to directing?

[A] Howard: From the time I was 18, directing was pretty much all I talked about. I created this scenario of how to build an empire based on one porno movie. Deep Throat had come out and I read how it was made for $8000 or something and it made $30 million. And I thought, Hmmm, that would buy a lot of autonomy. Then I began to imagine the marquee: Opie Gets Laid. I'd be kicked out of the business, but I'd have all this money to make independent films.

[Q] Playboy: How close did we come to seeing a version of Deep Opie?

[A] Howard:Happy Days was going through a transition from a gentle comedy to a broader kind of show. Fonzie had started out as a minor character. Henry Winkler had a brilliant take on him, and the writers and the audience could sense it. It was a real phenomenon. And it was someone's idea at the network to change the show to Fonzie's Happy Days. As a kid I had seen this, because on The Andy Griffith Show Andy was the straight man and Don Knotts was wildly popular, winning the Emmy almost every year. So I understood that there was a role for me on the show as the straight man. Winkler and I talked openly about what was going on. We acted well together and remained good friends. But the network's wanting to change the name of the show was tough for me to take. I felt slighted. My contract was over, and Paramount and ABC assumed that I would re-sign because they were offering to double my salary.

When it came down to deal-making time it was nerve-racking. Here I am, 20 years old, sitting in this meeting with no agents or lawyers with me. I told them I understood what was going on with the characters, but that I didn't sign on to be on somebody else's show. I just wouldn't do it. Couldn't do it. Apparently [producer] Garry Marshall stepped in and told them not to change the name. I've enjoyed gambling once in a while. It turned out to be a good decision. I was on Happy Days seven and a half years. When my contract ended, I left the show and took a producing and directing deal at NBC. The show ran another three or four years after that.

[Q] Playboy: And Ronny Howard had discovered clout.

[A] Howard:Happy Days was important for me because I got a crash course in the business. I began to discover leverage and power, how the industry works, how the networks make decisions. I'd been sheltered up to that point. Happy Days was a coming-of-age period for a person who knew he wanted to become a director and maybe a producer.

[Q] Playboy: But who definitely didn't want to be an adult actor?

[A] Howard: I didn't think I was going to be a movie star. I don't exude that kind of danger on-screen. I have an affable quality. But I was making the transition. I was getting good dramatic work in television movies. In the middle of doing Happy Days I got nominated for a Golden Globe for best supporting actor for a movie I did with John Wayne, The Shootist. And there was talk that I would get nominated for an Oscar. Every year Disney still sends me a family comedy they want me to star in. I'd probably go with a hairpiece.

[Q] Playboy: You grew up in the public eye. How did you manage to avoid occasionally making a fool of yourself?

[A] Howard: As I grew up, I wanted to emulate my father as a man. Now, as a father myself, I often think about how he might handle situations. You don't see him living an extreme lifestyle. He's a very moderate guy, almost an ascetic. He's relentlessly evenhanded and moral, that Midwestern, hardworking, no-nonsense breed of man. I've always admired that about him.

[Q] Playboy: Those aren't qualities one often associates with Hollywood.

[A] Howard: Being in this business is not filling a void for me. Most people get into this business as the ultimate act of rebellion. For me, rebellion would have been to get out of the business. When kids are 14 years old and they say they want to be an actor or director, their parents say, "No way. What are you thinking?" As a result, people who go into the business tend to be more rebellious. They develop a code of behavior that may be a little more experimental, a little more dangerous. They make asses out of themselves and it's not a big deal. Then, all of a sudden, they break through, and they're concerned about what people think of them. Suddenly it's, "Geez, I can't wear women's underwear out on the beach anymore. Someone will take a picture of me." Well, that's not the way I am. That's not what I do. There isn't a side of me that sneaks off across the border to dress in women's nightwear and have wild episodes.

[Q] Playboy: How did you avoid the crash that seems to befall so many child actors?

[A] Howard: I see myself as a quirk. I don't know very many kids who successfully--or painlessly--made the transition from child actor to adult actor. My transition was about as good as it gets. My parents always felt a little guilty about having gotten me into the business. Even today I periodically have to reassure them that I'm really happy with my life. They often see me tied up in knots.

[Q] Playboy: So you're a quirk who has no regrets?

[A] Howard: I don't because it worked out very well for me. The ease I feel on the set of a motion picture is a huge advantage for me. People tell me I never get upset, that I don't seem to be tense. Well, I'm unbelievably tense when I'm working. I just don't show it because it's comfortable for me to be there. When I was eight or nine years old a guy had a nervous breakdown right in front of me in the middle of a take on The Andy Griffith Show. All of a sudden he went off the script and drifted into this diatribe, wound up sobbing, fell off his chair and curled up into the fetal position. A bizarre experience. At the time I wondered if he was ad-libbing. Did he just forget his lines? Sometimes I don't feel very calm or composed, but having acted serves me well as a director. I understand what motivates people and what they're feeling.

[Q] Playboy: Will any of the four Howard children follow in your footsteps?

[A] Howard: Cheryl and I decided against that from the beginning. A lot of kid actors are treated as trained animals. They can do a cute look. They can say the dialogue. They gain enough technical proficiency to be able to hit the mark. And when they're no longer cute and they can't get away with those tricks, they're obsolete.

I wouldn't want to subject my kids to that. Not that I think they're without talent. They're clearly an interesting bunch and they are all drawn to various things artistic. You'll have to put in "he said, beaming." But being a child actor can be brutal. If you succeed, you're an out-cast. It's unavoidable that child actors will have to prove themselves twice over, because they're not fresh anymore. If your child really wants to be an actor, the odds will be a lot better for a career if he or she waits.

[Q] Playboy: When did Ronny Howard become Ron Howard?

[A] Howard: I tried to get it changed for American Graffiti, but they'd already done the credits. So after that I went with Ron.

[Q] Playboy: George Lucas' American Graffiti is a landmark coming-of-age film. Was it a coming-of-age experience for you as well?

[A] Howard: It was a liberating experience. Being on location. Working all night. It was the first time I didn't have parental supervision. On the nights I wasn't working, I'd go off to San Francisco and try to sneak into clubs. I looked so young I'd always get thrown out. I'd walk in the door and it was like doing a U-turn. But I got an eyeful. While we were filming American Graffiti I followed George Lucas around with a Super-8 camera. I bugged him like crazy. He liked it, though.

[Q] Playboy: Describe your documentary on the making of American Graffiti.

[A] Howard: Unfortunately, my mom lost all that footage. You know how some people complain about their baseball cards being thrown away? My mom dumped out all the Super-8 reels.

[Q] Playboy: Is George Lucas a mentor?

[A] Howard: We became real good friends. I have called him for advice. When we were doing American Graffiti, he said he wanted to do this science-fiction thing, like a serial in the old days with a comic-book feel. He couldn't begin to describe it in any way that was at all compelling. Star Wars just sounded bizarre. That's the thing about George. He's always been able to do something that you haven't quite seen before. Whether it was using the music the way he did in American Graffiti or the nonstop action in Raiders of the Lost Ark or the special effects in Star Wars. When he's at his best, he's making those kinds of breakthroughs. I think that's why he doesn't make a lot of films. I'm a little more content just to try to cook up a good story and get some good actors and to go out and make it.

[Q] Playboy: Is that how you decided to make The Paper?

[A] Howard: Coming off Backdraft and Far and Away I really wanted to do something that was logistically simpler. There were some terrific performances in both Backdraft and Far and Away. But I felt that my attention was pulled toward these big sequences that cost a lot of money and risk people's lives and are very difficult to execute cinematically. So I was looking for something simple. The Paper is not a deep, probing drama. It was a great excuse for me to hang around at The New York Daily News and The New York Post for hours and hours. And the actors started hanging around as well, particularly Michael Keaton. This is not a movie for kids. It allows the audience to look behind the scenes of the headline business, to relate to the pressures and stresses urbanites feel and everyone relates to. As soon as we started our research, I realized just how smart and funny that world is. There's a dry glibness and rhythm to the speech and the delivery. They have very good timing. It reminded me a lot of TV writers or actors.

[Q] Playboy: Some journalists might not be so thrilled by that comparison.

[A] Howard: As a director it reminded me of watching Thoroughbreds run. What was exciting--and a huge relief--was that the likes of Michael Keaton and Robert Duvall and Glenn Close and Marisa Tomei really came set to work. I had heard that Duvall was kind of cut-and-dried and just wanted to do one or two takes and move on. And that he didn't have much patience for the process. I thought he would be more set in his ways. I found that to be untrue. He was eager to try different takes and variations. He was looking to be directed. He has great taste, so it wasn't like he was far off. But he wanted the help in finessing the performance.

[Q] Playboy: You have made some high-grossing films, but do you feel you have attained the critical and artistic success of a Martin Scorsese or an Oliver Stone?

[A] Howard: I really don't think I'm quite there yet. But I don't want to answer in a way that makes it seem like my goal is to grow up and be Oliver Stone. There's no doubt that it's an uphill battle to get rave reviews for the kind of story I'm drawn to. I know on a commercial level I'm right up there in terms of who the studios would like to bet on. I've been reliable. I have stature.

I had a great conversation with Clint Eastwood after I saw his Unforgiven. He has a reputation for making movies in an ultraefficient fashion. Fewer days of shooting. Fewer takes. A throwback to John Ford, who never would do more than a couple of takes.

[Q] Playboy: Were you seeking advice on how to become an efficient filmmaker?

[A] Howard: Not necessarily, but that was my question. I thought Unforgiven had a polish that was extraordinary and difficult to achieve, because I know what it's like to work outside in the elements. So I asked him if he took more time to do this, given that it clearly was a project he'd been nursing along for years.

[Q] Playboy: Eastwood's answer?

[A] Howard: He said, "Nope. Just did it."

[Q] Playboy: Your kind of story is upbeat. Do you think you've been typecast as the director from Mayberry?

[A] Howard: Yeah. Mainstream moviemaker. I know I carry a sensibility born out of the kind of popular entertainment I grew up being part of. That's part of my outlook. Likable characters. And there's the celebration of the human spirit. I look around, I talk with people, look at their lives, read the paper and notice even with my own life that there are those moments when a person feels victorious. They feel they've achieved something very difficult. That's the stuff of memories, what makes life worth living. Each person has a highlight reel. Some people might have a perverted one [laughs], and what's fun and rewarding for them might not be for someone else. I find those moments rewarding as a moviegoer. But it has to be handled in the right way or it can be awfully corny and syrupy. But when it's handled well I find it rewarding. That's consistent with my personality.

[Q] Playboy: You and Scorsese both directed films for B-movie impresario Roger Corman. Have you compared notes?

[A] Howard: I'm a great admirer of Scorsese. Earlier this year I tracked him down and had lunch with him. Scorsese creates brilliant sequences. You might like one story more than another, but there will always be a great sequence, whether it's the boxing or one of the arguments between the brothers in Raging Bull, or Ray Liotta's cocaine-addled paranoia in GoodFellas. It's a brilliant sequence. He's trying things all the time. Sometimes it works well, and sometimes it doesn't work for everybody. He told me there's a classic storytelling style and approach that I embrace. And I think he was saying to me, "Relax, it's OK. That's what you do." Scorsese had come up with a list of 50 films for his daughter to watch.

[Q] Playboy: Did any of your films make the list?

[A] Howard: He didn't say anything about that. We were talking about classics. I don't think any of mine have reached classic status yet. My guess would be Cocoon is the leading possibility. Backdraft has established a passionate following. It has had real staying power in its post-release life. Far and Away is really a girl's movie.

[Q] Playboy: Some critics were less than kind to Far and Away.

[A] Howard: Many of them were. It would have been great if I could have made it earlier. I'd been working on that idea for eight years, from the time of Splash. There were times on Far and Away when it would flash through my mind that while a certain scene made sense for the movie, it wasn't exactly the way I see the world today. The movie has a kind of innocence. That was the choice I'd made eight years before, and it was still right for the movie as I was making it. But at times during the shooting and editing I would say, "This is a sensibility that is more representative of my outlook eight years ago. I think I've covered this ground." I love a great romance, and that's what Far and Away is. A romp like It Happened One Night. And I think it contradicted a lot of people's expectations, which were that the movie was going to be a sophisticated, historical drama about the Irish immigration. I'd seen the bleak look at the immigrant experience and didn't think we could do better than that.

[Q] Playboy: But you wound up with a big, expensive film.

[A] Howard: I'd always conceived of it as a modest film. The fact that it was shot in 70-millimeter became a marketing element. Maybe it was impossible to do the movie that was floating around in my head as inexpensively as I thought it might be done. But I certainly knew it wasn't a high-concept, easy-to-market movie. That's why it was nerve-racking when it became an expensive film. And it was competing against rock-and-roll party movies in an early summer market. Far and Away seems to be effective in its ability to entertain, but it isn't that kind of ride.

[Q] Playboy: Were the critics waiting in ambush?

[A] Howard: That's the first time a wave of negative criticism has hit me. I was frustrated by the way the movie was received critically and blindsided because the audience screenings were wonderful--with applause at the end of every preview. And I had a great time working on that movie. It was a dream come true. I got along well with Tom and Nicole. We went to great locations. The experience was perfect up until the film's release.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel there's ground that you have to recover since Far and Away?

[A] Howard: Both Backdraft and Parenthood were very profitable movies, so I don't, thankfully, feel that pressure. Once the dust settled, Far and Away was perfectly respectable. I was relieved when we finally were able to generate enough money worldwide so that the studio broke even. Had it really flopped, I might not be so philosophical about it. But I was able to shake that off after a while and say, "Well, nobody's getting rich off this movie, but nobody is getting hurt." They always say that once you establish yourself, you're allowed about three flops in a row. Nobody ever doubts that people are going to have an occasional flop.

[Q] Playboy: Were you anxious when Tom Cruise invited you to discuss the movie at a Church of Scientology compound?

[A] Howard: Yeah. There are certain things that you put up with. I chased John Belushi through the streets to try to get him for Night Shift. I jumped on a plane once and flew to New Orleans to have a meeting with Eddie Murphy. And flew right back. It was unbelievably inconvenient, but I did it. One day we were set to have a story meeting with Tom Cruise, and he was at a Scientology headquarters just outside of Palm Springs. It wasn't a big deal. It was interesting. I didn't feel that I was being recruited.

[Q] Playboy: Was Cruise holding out for something in return for starring in Far and Away?

[A] Howard: No. He was already in the movie. It was just where he happened to be. We wanted to have a story conference, he was there and so we scooted up and spent the day and had the meeting. I didn't feel I had to become a Scientologist because I had spent the day up there. I know a bunch of Scientologists. I've had almost no conversations with any of them about Scientology, beyond their lamenting that it's a burden because people are pretty judgmental about it. None of them makes a big deal out of it.

[Q] Playboy: Did Cruise insist that on Far and Away you use sound-recording equipment developed by Scientologists?

[A] Howard: That was some equipment of Tom's. He may have met people through Scientology he thought were good sound engineers and started working on it. I don't think the equipment is church-owned or -financed. I think Tom financed it. Having spent time around George Lucas, who's always pushing the technological envelope, I found the equipment interesting. One of the reasons that I went ahead and took the leap and used it on the movie was that I knew it could only help us. Far and Away was one of the first times the equipment was used--if not its maiden voyage. It doesn't so much create an effect for the audience involving speaker systems; it has more to do with recording technique, so that actors can go from speaking very loudly to speaking very softly, and it's not up to some poor sound mixer to catch that. There was this rumor going around that really bugged me--that Cruise didn't like the sound of his voice. But this equipment would never impact the quality of his voice or change its pitch or anything. And he never said one thing to me about that being a goal.

[Q] Playboy: You, Penny Marshall and Rob Reiner are film directors who all came out of the sitcom world. That seems to be unlikely training for movie directing.

[A] Howard: We happened to be the first class to graduate from TV. People coming out of television seek to find a balance between the good idea that they can get behind and one that they can communicate thematically, keeping it lively. Comedy writing, acting and directing have a lot to do with rhythm. You have to feel where that spot is for the laugh. You develop an ear. Some funny things said in the wrong rhythm are no longer funny. Some unfunny things said in the right rhythm can actually be funny. That's where actors like Michael Keaton and Tom Hanks have a tremendous advantage. They understand what that rhythm is about, and they have this ability to tweak those lines so they don't sound like dialogue anymore. Hanks did two years on Bosom Buddies, which was as sitcom as they get--a good one. Keaton had been on a couple of sitcoms that didn't work. But he had worked in that style.

[Q] Playboy: How important is humor--just plain yucks--in your movies?

[A] Howard: I love storytelling. But as much as I keep trying to stretch as a director and work in different genres, there's one thing I always come back to. It's the thrill of sitting in the back of a theater, hearing one of those really big laughs come through--like when Michael Keaton explodes into "Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" a million times in The Paper. I love feeling a little authorship or a sense of responsibility for getting people to feel that. Any kind of humor is like playing with a hand grenade. When it works it can be very exciting. When it doesn't, people immediately write it off as dopey. But then I use that term all the time. Dopiness is OK in my book as long as it's good. Wayne's World is a real dopey movie, but it's very well-executed.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel you get enough respect?

[A] Howard: Actors give me a lot of respect. They want to work with me. Splash was the turning point. It was Tom Hanks' first major film. Daryl Hannah had been in films but was not a movie star. John Candy had been in some films but hadn't really done a big part. Actors loved Splash. They liked the way it established Hanks. I've established two people successfully, Keaton and Hanks. I don't claim credit for Kevin Costner's career. I put him in a party scene in Night Shift because I needed someone who could speak a line. Years later I saw him again and asked if I had been nice to him that day. He said yes.

[Q] Playboy: You may have established Keaton, but he wasn't your first choice for Night Shift, was he?

[A] Howard: The studio took a total chance on Keaton. At the time he was doing stand-up. We had a budget for the movie. But really we had to get it cast. The idea was to get Belushi and Dan Aykroyd. It was up to me to try to get to Belushi. My partner, Brian Grazer--doing his neophyte producer thing--and I managed what we thought was going to be a five-minute meeting. Belushi's holding court. And suddenly he grows expansive. He starts talking about Happy Days. He starts talking about The Andy Griffith Show. And he tells me, "You're pretty funny. You know comedy. You could direct a comedy." And we're sitting around drinking beers with him for about three hours. No toots in there. So when we left we were high-fiving it. We thought we had it. It turned out we still couldn't get him to read the script. Never did get him to read it. We wound up getting the movie made anyway. And casting Michael Keaton. Belushi died while we were making the picture.

[Q] Playboy: We talked about sex earlier. What about power?

[A] Howard: What is power in our business? It boils down to the ability to get people to say yes--which is almost impossible. So there has to be fear involved. People have to be afraid to say no. No is the easy and safe answer when someone's talking about investing millions in a project. When you reach a position where people are hesitant to say no because they feel they might be missing out on something good, then you have power.

[Q] Playboy: We assume you get your phone calls returned real fast.

[A] Howard: I get my phone calls returned pretty quickly nowadays. But this business has little patience for those who are not hot. That's a reality everybody lives with. You fight for the opportunity to prove yourself, so that once you do prove yourself, things become a little easier. Now I don't have to be a gladiator every day. Now people want to seriously consider my ideas. It's a great feeling. It's not like everybody says yes to me all day long, every day. But it's difficult for people to just cavalierly say no. I was familiar with that reaction for a long time when it came to my directing. You don't want it to be too easy for them to say no. That's what I fight for in this business.

[Q] Playboy: You work in a business that is renowned for big egos. How big is your ego?

[A] Howard: I don't overpower people. That's not in my nature. I don't provoke people to perform at a higher level because everybody in this business at this level wants to achieve. All I do is try to ask difficult questions. I hate discussing this because I run the risk of sounding as though I really know what I'm doing and that I'm marvelously consistent. I don't have some great insight to offer. There's a good scene in All That Jazz where the director, who is played by Roy Scheider, is watching in the editing room and he's cursing at the screen, at the actor: "Why is he doing that? I can't believe it." And then he pauses. "Why? Because I'm the asshole who told him to do it that way."

[Q] Playboy: You and producer Brian Grazer have been partners in moviemaking for several years. You're known as a nice guy, while he has a reputation as a driven, aggressive money man. Tell us about your relationship.

[A] Howard: We're an odd couple. I think a lot of people probably scratch their heads and ask how the hell that partnership has sustained itself. Now, after almost ten years of working together, we know it works. We were introduced in 1977 or 1978 by this very cool woman named Deanne Barkley, one of the first top female power executives in Hollywood. She said, "You guys have to meet each other. You're going to be running the business." A couple of years later, we were the two youngest guys on the lot with offices.

[Q] Playboy: Is Grazer the player in the partnership and Howard the artist?

[A] Howard: Yeah. There are some great players out there and he's one of them. He has a knack for it. He's a good industry strategist. He knows how to read people, what they want to do, what they're looking for--not just the agents and studio executives but actors, writers and directors as well. The true players are not writers, directors and actors, though some revel in it. The purest players--and I don't put a good or bad connotation on the word players--are people who make it their business to take an idea and gather enough momentum to get it financed and maneuver the project through this maze of insecurity, fear and ego. They understand the subtlety of the process enough to sense when they have the leverage to make a move, to know when they're holding a flush or when they have to fall back and regroup. It's sales-driven, yet there's nodthng tangible to sell. So there's a lot of talk. Brian Grazer is one of the best. We make big calls together if we have something we're really trying to accomplish.

[Q] Playboy: What are you trying to accomplish when you're sitting in the director's chair?

[A] Howard: A big objective for a director is to get everybody to see the movie in roughly the same way. When everybody sees the same movie in their minds--it's obviously inexact--then the director can edit suggestions from the cinematographer, from actors, from whomever. The key is to be meticulous about casting. I call other directors. I call Bob Zemeckis. Oliver Stone. Steven Spielberg. Jonathan Demme. Casting is agony to me. It's important, yet I hate putting people through that process.

[Q] Playboy: And now we have to ask the obvious question about casting.

[A] Howard: I've never quite had an indecent proposal, but once in a while you'll get a girl in with a very short skirt who almost...but I've never had an indecent proposal. [Laughs] Everything's very businesslike, because it's too emotional otherwise. I can't do: "Let's meet at your house. Let's meet at a hotel." There was a lot of nudity in Night Shift. I had to interview a woman and say, "We need to look at your breasts." That was weird. People are ambitious. After I cast Shelley Long in Night Shift she called me and said, "I'd like to come over to your house." She came over and she was wearing a wig, looking dowdy. And I said, "Hi, Shelley." And she said, "Oh, did you recognize me?" And I said, "Yeah." We sat down and started talking and she said, "You may wonder why I have this wig on." The question had crossed my mind. [Laughs] She wanted to play all the girls in the movie. And she took a shot at it. I respected the effort, but I wasn't going to let her do it.

[Q] Playboy: You've been involved in the business side of movies more than most directors. Let's trace your interest in commerce.

[A] Howard: I thought about the idea of buying a one-minute commercial on Happy Days and saving, "Hi, I'm Ron Howard. You've seen me over the years on Happy Days and The Andy Griffith Show. Now I want to direct a movie. Send me a dollar."

[Q] Playboy: We assume you didn't consult a securities lawyer.

[A] Howard: I found out it was illegal and decided it could be pretty humiliating. Splash was flashy and showy and a huge hit. Brian and I became informal partners then. But we started kicking around the notion of trying to raise some money and gain influence. And in late 1984 or early 1985, Wall Street was (continued on page 146)Ron Howard(continued from page 66) hot--and high on Hollywood. The idea of taking our company public became interesting. No creative group had done that. I went out and bought a blue suit--I didn't have a business suit. Our dog and pony show consisted of me and slides from our movies. We thought it would be fascinating to see if it would work. And it did. We went public at eight dollars a share. I guess we went five or six years as a public company. Then, when our contract expired, we chose to take the company private.

[Q] Playboy: That was a controversial move. When you and Grazer proposed to take Imagine Entertainment, your film company, private, the financial press reported that some shareholders weren't happy, because there wouldn't be much of a company left once the two main assets--you and Grazer--quit.

[A] Howard: They were saying that you couldn't really walk away from a public company--contract or no contract. Well, in every report we made it clear how long our employment term was. Even at the dog and pony shows we talked about that. But in every situation like that people are going to be protective of the claims they think they might have.

[Q] Playboy: Were you disappointed with the way Imagine Entertainment performed as a public company?

[A] Howard: Yeah. Our television business did not live up to our expectations. We'd done a number of pilots and a couple of short-lived series, including one that was a spin-off of Parenthood. Brian and I were having a great deal more success making the movies. We were profitable. And we were proud of that, because a lot of companies had failed. But it became clear that for us to maximize the shareholders' value--and our own stake in the company--we were going to have to be more aggressive about raising capital, expanding our slate of films and trying to gain some assets, like a television station or distribution business. We were going to have to expand the company, learn to be corporate businessmen. And we did not want to do that.

[Q] Playboy: Besides not wanting to dedicate more time to administrative work, you and Grazer also wanted more money, right?

[A] Howard: Well, we were in a real catch-22. Initially we'd worked out a business plan that was designed in this way: We would take what amounted to about half of our street value in cash as salary. The company would get the full value, whatever our films could generate. So in our minds we were betting half of our salary, and our back-end profit participation, by not drawing it out but investing it in the company. As things evolved and the business changed and we grew more successful, the ratio changed from the original 50--50. Five years later we found that instead of betting half of our salary, we were betting more like 70 or 80 percent because even though our earning power had increased, our salaries hadn't. It was out of whack. Our street value went way up because we were having hits. And so we started analyzing the prospects of trying to draw larger salaries.

[Q] Playboy: In other words, you wanted a raise?

[A] Howard: Yeah. In a way that would work for the company. We spent a lot of time with the board of directors analyzing it and dickering around. Basically, if the company paid us even half of what we could get from a studio, it would in a way be capping its own earnings potential, therefore stunting the stock.

[Q] Playboy: Were you hurt by press reports that you were greedy when you succeeded in taking the company private?

[A] Howard: No. I wasn't hurt at all by that. Directors' fees have really gone up. Superstar salaries have tripled. How are you going to attract an audience's attention? Right now in our business, one of the few insurance policies is using trade names: movie stars. And the actors want to work with experienced directors, people they trust.

[Q] Playboy: You've wrapped your tenth feature film. You have final cut as a director. Satisfied?

[A] Howard: Yeah. This is where I've always wanted to be. And I got here a little faster than I expected. After Cocoon I was in a position of not having to be a director for hire. I could green-light a movie. I have as much control as I ever imagined. I have final cut. But I'm not surprised that I became a director and that I've succeeded with it. I always thought it was a great job.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel that your name can open a movie?

[A] Howard: Yeah. It's unusual. They do research on that, and with my past few movies, the research has shown that between 40 and 50 percent of the people list the fact that I directed it as one of the reasons they come. From the studio's vantage point the fact that I've been around now for three decades and never too far out of sight is something they view as a marketing asset.

[Q] Playboy: Will you continue to make movies about likable characters when critics often favor films about the darker side of life?

[A] Howard: Yeah. A lot of critics see a darker kind of movie as more artistic. But I'm not sure it's fair to say I would never make one of those movies. I haven't yet. I suspect that one of these days I will. At the same time I doubt that I'll ever get reviews that are better than those for Parenthood or Cocoon or Splash. I'm pleased that I haven't settled in and become a guy who just does scary movies or light romantic comedies or gangster pictures. My films don't usually fit into a studio's plan for a given year. They don't say they need a movie about Irish immigrants, a mermaid picture or a senior citizen film. I feel respected in that regard. But I don't think I've done my best work yet. Most of us don't think of ourselves as craftsmen or technicians. We're storytellers. We're artists. I would hate to be in the situation where studios say--and it's probably inevitable that I'm going to have to face this--I'm just not bankable. I hope it never happens. There are a few-directors who escape. John Huston directed until he dropped. That's what I want to do.

[Q] Playboy: How does Ron Howard the artist and storyteller feel about the theme-park ride that Backdrafl spawned at the Universal Studios tour? Is it an embarrassing commercialization of your story about heroism?

[A] Howard: No. I was thrilled with that. That's the nature of that movie. That movie was a ride--as much as I liked the story between the brothers. I even got to work on the theme-park ride a little bit. The best part was when I went on it and it scared me. You can feel the heat on that ride.

"I honestly can't remember when I was anonymous, I learned to write so I could give autographs."