Henry Winkler is looking back at some of his unhappier days.
The Barry actor got candid about the challenges he faced following his Happy Days exit in 1984. After spending over a decade as the comb-toting, leather jacket-clad Arthur Herbert Fonzarelli—affectionately known as “Fonzie”—on the hit sit-com, reinvention didn’t come easy.
“There were eight or nine years at a time when I couldn’t get hired because I was ‘The Fonz,'” he shared in a May 8 interview with Today, “because I was typecast.”
The struggle for acting jobs also took a toil on Winkler’s mental health.
“I had psychic pain that was debilitating because I didn’t know what to do,” he shared. “I didn’t know where to find it, whatever it was, I didn’t know what I was going to do. I had a family. I had a dog. I had a roof. Oh. My. God.”
However, Winkler has no regrets. ”I loved playing ‘The Fonz,'” the 77-year-old said. “I love those people. I loved learning how to play softball. I loved traveling all over the world together with the cast. I would not have traded it.”