Garry Marshall, the prolific producer, writer, and director whose career spanned nearly six decades, has died at the age of 81, Variety reports. He was best known as the creator of long-running sitcom Happy Days and its numerous spinoffs, as well as the director of Pretty Woman and The Princess Diaries.
Marshall was born in the Bronx in 1934 to Anthony Marshall, head of a PR and industrial film production company known as the Marshall Organization, and Marjorie Marshall, who ran a tap dance school. After studying journalism at Northwestern University, Marshall wrote jokes for stand-ups, eventually landing a staff job on The Tonight Show with Jack Paar.
He moved to Hollywood in 1961 and partnered with writer Jerry Belson. The duo found success writing for Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball’s Desilu Productions on shows including The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Lucy Show, and Gomer Pyle, USMC. In 1966, he created his first sitcom with Belson, Hey, Landlord, which lasted one season on NBC. Critics knocked the show’s premiere for overuse of a laugh track, although, according to Marshall, it had been filmed before an overly enthusiastic studio audience. Their greatest hit together was The Odd Couple, a television adaptation of Neil Simon’s play starring Tony Randall and Jack Klugman that ran for five seasons starting in 1970.
Marshall then struck out on his own to create Happy Days, a nostalgic show set in the 1950s that originated in a failed ABC pilot. When American Graffiti raised interest in 1950s nostalgia—Ron Howard was cast in the film due to his performance in the pilot—Marshall recast the show and ABC picked it up. It ran for 11 seasons and spawned seven spinoff shows, including Laverne & Shirley and Mork & Mindy.
In the 1980s he began directing feature films, starting with 1982’s slapstick hospital comedy Young Doctors in Love; his other early directorial successes include Beaches and Overboard. He also worked as an actor—his credits stretch back to a bit part in Goldfinger—and handed in this legendary performance as a befuddled casino manager in Albert Brooks’ 1985 film Lost in America:
But his biggest film success was 1990’s Pretty Woman, the romantic comedy about a prostitute and a corporate raider that made Julia Roberts a household name. The film earned Roberts an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress while grossing nearly half a billion dollars worldwide. After a string of less successful films throughout the 1990s, including Exit to Eden and Dear God, Marshall rebounded with 1999’s Runaway Bride and 2001’s The Princess Diaries. In 2010 he started a successful series of holiday-themed ensemble movies with Valentine’s Day.
Over the years, he also somehow found time to write two memoirs, several plays, co-found Burbank’s Falcon Theater with his daughter, and direct productions for the Los Angeles Opera and the San Antonio Opera. He is survived by his wife Barbara, his children Scott, Lori, and Kathleen, and sisters Penny Marshall and Ronny Hallin.
Marshall had a running joke with Pretty Woman star Julia Roberts that the two would work together once every ten years: Pretty Woman was 1990, in 1999 they made Runaway Bride, and in 2010 Valentine’s Day. In 2014, Marshall dropped off the script for Mother’s Day with a note reading, “I know it hasn’t been 10 years, but I think we need to pick up the pace.” The film, starring Julia Roberts, was released this April.
