Ron Howard Inducted into TV Academy Hall of Fame
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Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images(BEVERLY HILLS, Calif.) — Ron Howard was honored Monday night in Beverly Hills, Calif., as one of the new inductees into the Academy Of Television Arts & Sciences’ Hall Of Fame.
Though he’s known now as a big-time director, Howard launched his entertainment career as a young TV actor in the early 1950s, eventually landing starring roles on The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days.
How has the TV biz changed since he first entered it? Howard said Monday night, “I began doing shows all on soundstages, where they would do remarkable things, build swimming pools on the set, having cars driving around the stage, gunshots, all kinds of things. But now the equipment such that you can take a camera and go make a television show, make a quality television show, sort of anywhere in the world.”
Star Wars creator George Lucas was on hand to celebrate Howard, whom he called a “genuinely great human being.”
While Lucas was on the red carpet, he was asked to provide insight into Disney’s upcoming Star Wars movie, due out in 2015. He didn’t have much info to share, saying, “I’m not really involved.”
But what about the recent interview Lucas gave to Bloomberg Businessweek in which he suggested that Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, and Carrie Fisher will return for Star Wars: Episode VII?
He remarked, “I’m not really connected into the world. I mean I did that quite a number of months ago. Disney wanted me to do it so I did an interview.”
The other new TV Academy Hall of Fame inductees were sportscaster Al Michaels, CBS executive Leslie Moonves, CBS Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer, Law & Order creator Dick Wolf, and the late TV innovator Philo T. Farnsworth.
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