You know him as the Fonz. And probably Barry Zuckerkorn, the Bluth family鈥檚 inept lawyer on Arrested Development.
But you don鈥檛 know the depth of Henry Winkler鈥檚 talents unless you鈥檝e seen him play Gene Cousineau, the self-styled master acting teacher on HBO鈥檚 first-year comedy, Barry.
Winkler stopped by the Times recently for a video interview to talk about finding yet another role of a lifetime. Here are excerpts from the conversation.
Q: Did you know there were so many actors wanting to play Gene?
A: I did not know that. I auditioned for it. And when I first got the call, I said: 鈥淥K, just tell me this. They say I鈥檓 on a short list. OK. Is Dustin Hoffman on that list? Because if he is, I鈥檓 not going in.鈥�
Q: You鈥檙e not going to waste your time.
A: No, I don鈥檛 have a chance. So I go in, and I audition for (series co-creator and star) Bill Hader, and I get it. OK, whew! And then it is the Super Bowl in February, and I went to a friend鈥檚 house, and there were agents there and they said: 鈥淲hat are you doing?鈥� And I said: 鈥淲ell, we just shot the pilot of Barry.鈥� And they went: 鈥淵ou got that?鈥�
Then we went to see a good acquaintance of ours, John Lithgow, on Broadway, and he said: 鈥淲hat are you doing?鈥� And I said: 鈥淲ell, I鈥檓 doing Barry.鈥� And he went: 鈥淚 wanted that!鈥� And I went: 鈥淥h my God, this is amazing.鈥�
Q: When you were coming up, did you have an acting teacher such as Gene?
A: Everybody has had someone like Gene. The whole premise of the series [is] people who are torn apart. [Gene] goes out on auditions. He鈥檚 a regular working actor. And you know, you lose a commercial to a gecko, you teach. And so, then in the classroom, he鈥檚 treated like an emperor. That is his arena because outside of those four walls, he doesn鈥檛 seem to be able to practice what he preaches.
Q: We see Gene go out for an audition and he鈥檚 going for the role of Man in the Back of the Line. It鈥檚 humbling.
A: It is humbling. It is humbling in real life, let alone on the screen. But I knew that I had done that [audition] scene correctly, because I did it and then I turned away, knowing that [Gene鈥檚] never going to get this, and all I heard from video village, where the producers and the writers sit, was, 鈥淥h.鈥� And that pathetic 鈥淥h,鈥� I figured I got it right.
Q: There鈥檚 a great dinner scene where Gene ambushes Det. Moss. She thinks she鈥檚 there for information, but in his mind, it鈥檚 a date. And he really sells it.
A: You know what? As an actor, when you do a scene like that, you do a scene with the love of your life. I think underneath all of his baloney, he truly cares. He is
smitten by this woman.
Q: What advice do you have when it comes to acting?
A: When I was 27, I got the Fonz. And because I changed my voice, I changed my body, it was like a key that unlocked my imagination. And at that moment, after all of my training, I realized that I really am just a character actor. I am not a leading man. But I knew, without the change of voice, without the detail of the Fonz, I wasn鈥檛 the actor I wanted to be in my mind or in my imagination.
So that was 27. And now I鈥檓 72, so I鈥檝e flipped the numbers, and I am closer to the actor that I thought about being when I was 27. Some people can do it right away, there is no difference between the character and their soul. There鈥檚 no space. I dreamed of that, but I couldn鈥檛 accomplish that. And maybe, I鈥檓 just getting there now.
