Henry Winkler Didn’t Actually Jump the Shark
While Winkler isn’t particularly athletic, he does know how to water ski, which is how writers came up with the idea for the infamous “jump the shark” episode. The actor surprisingly did all of his stunt work for the episode, except for the actual jumping over the caged shark.
Henry Winkler “Jump the Shark” episode. Source: MovieStillsDB.com, Copyrights: Miller-Milkis Productions
The show’s producers didn’t want to take the chance of Winkler accidentally getting hurt. However, the stunt backfired and became famous in pop culture to describe the downhill spiral of a hit television show. The stunt was so unlike Fonzie and so far removed from the Happy Days world that some people say that it was the beginning of the end of the hit show’s reign.