On March 1, 1954 in Duncan, Oklahoma, Ronald Howard, a future Hollywood legend was born.\nRon Howard has been a household name almost as long as the 70 years he\u2019s lived. The Hollywood heavyweight has been going nonstop in film and television, a career he started as a toddler.\n
In addition to his impressive career, the multiple award winner \u2013 who also demonstrates longevity in his personal life \u2013 has been married to his wife Cheryl for almost half a century.\n
Keep reading to learn more about Howard, his decades-long career and marriage!\n
On March 1, 1954 in Duncan, Oklahoma, Ronald Howard, a future Hollywood legend was born.\n
Howard was only 18 months old when he appeared in his first film, Frontier Woman, and when he was two, he made his stage debut in The Seven Year Itch.\n
Soon after the freckle-faced redhead started his celebrity journey with his role on The Andy Griffith Show (1960 to 1968).\n
In this time, when the little boy played Opie, the son Griffith\u2019s character, Howard had the full support of his parents, who were both in the entertainment industry.\n
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\u201cRemember how we always said, \u2018You can do it if you want, but you don\u2019t have to?\u2019 Well if you start this, you can\u2019t quit\u2019,\u201d said Howard, recalling a conversation he had with his parents decades before. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to do other parts on other shows, if you don\u2019t want, but you\u2019d have to keep doing this one.\u201d\n
Explaining that he understood the message his parents were delivering, Howard adds, \u201cI think it was pretty clear at that point that I was enjoying it, and I was good at it.\u201d\n
Actually, he was great at it, and he was about to reach a level of stratospheric stardom.\n
While starring in The Andy Griffith Show, Howard also appeared on the big screen in 1962\u2019s The Music Man, a musical film that was a huge commercial success.\n
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A natural talent, he then starred in 1973\u2019s American Graffiti, which also starred Harrison Ford, Richard Dreyfuss and Cindy Williams, whom he would work alongside in the future.\n
It was in 1974 when he was cast as Richie Cunningham in a new series created by Garry Marshall called Happy Days, which appeared on TV screens in homes across the world from 1974 to 1984.\n
The TV show spawned a few popular spin-offs like Laverne & Shirley, starring Williams and Marshall\u2019s sister Penny, and Mork & Mindy with Robin Williams as Mork, the favorite Orkan.\n
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It was in 1970 \u2013 before he won a Golden Globe for his performance as the innocent teenager on Happy Days \u2013 that Howard met the high school sweetheart, Cheryl Alley, whom he would marry in 1975.\n
\u201cI met her, and there was never anybody else,\u201d Speaking with People, the director of the Da Vinci Code continued, \u201cShe\u2019s unbelievably supportive and always has been. Our compatibility has endured through all kinds of experiences.\u201d\n
After 50 years of shared experiences, Howard, who earned an Oscar for directing A Beautiful Mind, commemorated the 50th anniversary of his first date with Cheryl on Instagram.\n
\u201cNov 1 1970 Cheryl & I went on our 1st date,\u201d he wrote alongside a photo of himself wearing socks with images of Cheryl\u2019s face. \u201cWe went to see a re-release of Stanley Kramer\u2019s It\u2019s a Mad Mad Mad World and then got some pizza at now defunct Barnone\u2019s in Toluca Lake. Quite a start, right?\u201d\n
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He also shared their plans that day, \u201cWe\u2019ll be driving in the same \u201870 VW Bug I picked Cheryl up in 5 decades ago. It runs great. So do we.\u201d\n
His \u2018good luck charm\u2019 Speaking with the Television Academy, Ron called Cheryl his \u201cgood luck charm,\u201d and explained that is why she appears in every film he makes.\n \u201cAt a certain point, I became very superstitious about making sure that she appears, that she\u2019s at least identifiable in one frame,\u201d he said. \u201cThey don\u2019t have to be big cameos, but she\u2019s gotta be in there.\u201d\n In addition to bringing her husband some luck, Cheryl is also a published author who holds a bachelor\u2019s degree in psychology and a master\u2019s degree in screenwriting.\n The power couple are grandparents to six children and the parents of four, daughter Bryce, twins Paige and Jocelyn and son Reed.\n Bryce \u2013 a recognizable actor \u2013 is known for roles in movies like Jurassic World and The Help, while Paige made her feature film debut in the 2009 movie Adventureland. Since she\u2019s appeared in films The Employer and Collection.\n Reed is a professional golfer and Paige\u2019s twin sister Jocelyn is very private.\n The secret to longevity \u201cPeople say, \u2018How\u2019d you do it?\u2019 There\u2019s no technique,\u201d Howard tells People. \u201cThere\u2019s no tactic, other than communication is really important. You have to learn to communicate and have difficult conversations in constructive ways. Beyond that, there\u2019s an element of luck because people either grow together or they don\u2019t and I don\u2019t think you can force that.\u201d\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ron Howard has been a household name almost as long as the 70 years he\u2019s lived. The Hollywood heavyweight has been going nonstop in film and television, a career he started as a toddler. In addition to his impressive career, the multiple award winner \u2013 who also demonstrates longevity in his personal life \u2013 has\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":85991,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[670],"tags":[693],"class_list":{"0":"post-85821","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-news"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Screen-Shot-2024-08-14-at-14.30.22.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85821"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85992,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85821\/revisions\/85992"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nCheryl made several cameos in Howard\u2019s projects and even played herself on the TV comedy series Arrested Development, produced and narrated by Howard.\n
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\nNearing their 49th anniversary on June 7, the Emmy Award-winning producer shares that \u201ccommunication\u201d is the secret to their enduring love.\n