Navigating Garry Marshall's Long, Mostly Successful Hollywood Career What struck me most about your new memoir, "My Happy Days in Hollywood," in which you recount creating shows like "The Odd Couple" and "Happy Days," is that you still talk to your sister Penny. It sounds as if she made your life hell during "Laverne and Shirley." Yeah, that was my worst show experience. The "70s were druggy years on a lot of shows. It was just a mess, but of course I still talk to her. I don't think you can tell your family that you can't come in the house. I've always tried to make people happy - the only one I totally didn't was my sister. That's one of the reasons I did "Beaches." Women say things to each other, and the next day they go shopping. Men say things to each other, and they don't talk for 30 years. So you've done "Beaches" and lots of romantic comedies besides and are known as a particularly good director of women. How do you treat female actors differently? You've got to remember first it's a girl. A lot of people forget that. There's a difference. Even God realized that. I think more with a girl you have to say, "I love your work, I love you, you're going to be good, it's fine, you're going to be all right." Afterward, I hug everybody. I like hugging because in the moments they're working, they're very vulnerable. It never ceases to amaze me that Hollywood made "Pretty Woman," a love story between a hooker and her john. I felt it was a love story, but in Jonathan Lawton's original script, he had a different story. The prostitute he had was in her later 30s and had carried on and rolled around with hundreds. I knew if we lowered the age and made her a new girl in the business, then people would say, "Oh, please don't do that, honey." So Julia Roberts was a virgin prostitute, and her first trick was going to be Richard Gere? In the minds of some Disney people it was. It wasn't in the minds of the audience or me. On "Georgia Rule," a set that became famous for Lindsay Lohan's bad behavior, you asked if you could go out with her at night and see what she was up to. So? She didn't think I was dressed properly so she got me a shirt and a hat. I thought I was so hip, at a smart place with all the young and famous. I asked Lindsay, "Am I happening?" And she said: "Not with those shoes. I forgot to fix your shoes. They were Velcro, and she made me keep them under the table the whole time. I just wanted to see what was going on. Nothing was going on. Everybody was trying so hard to be happy. Your latest movie, "New Year's Eve," got skewered pretty hard by critics. I got killed on the last one, but it made $146 million worldwide. Critics seemed to react badly to the fact that the movie featured a bunch of stars, from Robert De Niro to Jessica Biel. Is there something appealing to actors about these kind of ensemble pictures? No matter how big a star, there's no star who is totally secure, and one of the things that causes such tremendous anxiety is that you have to carry the picture. One headline will say that "Hunger Games" made $80 million; the other headline says "John Carter" lost $200 million. The movie industry isn't an exact science. So with an ensemble, you get a good salary, and when it gets terrible reviews, you can say, "I only had one scene, it wasn't me." Fred Fox Jr., who was the writer credited with the famous episode where Fonzie jumped the shark on "Happy Days," said that the idea came from you. Yes, it was my idea. Considering the phrase's fame, any regrets? Well, it wasn't good. I think "New Year's Eve" is a good picture, but I don't think that episode was very good. We were stuck in Malibu making believe we were in Hawaii, and we had to do something a little special for Fonzie. So I said: "Jumping's worked well for us. Let's jump something maybe on water skis. At the time we put it on, viewers didn't throw rocks at it or send letters, but later some very clever guys said that's when the show turned. So if it's used about a show going down, fine. I got a word into the American vernacular.