Happy Days star Henry Winkler shares emotional reaction after meeting Oscar-winning idol

Happy Days star Henry Winkler was glowing with happiness after meeting his lifelong idol, Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins, alongside his wife, Stacey Weitzman. The 80-year-old wore a blue button-up shirt and a beige jacket as he stood with a wide smile on his face next to Anthony, who sported a bright Hawaiian shirt and purple trousers for the special day. 

Stacey stood on Anthony’s other side in blue jeans and a striped knit cardigan, while The Silence of the Lambs star’s wife, Stella Arroyave, put her arm around Henry, dressed in an all-white flowing outfit.  

“Stacey and I met my idol today!!! And his fabulous wife Stella,” Henry posted on X. When asked about the beautiful painting that he held in the foreground of the photo, the iconic actor revealed that it was actually painted by Anthony himself. “Anthony is an artist and a composer,” he clarified. 

Henry has spoken at length about the deep impact that Anthony’s work has had on him, with the father of three telling Entertainment Weekly that the 88-year-old was his “idol”.

“I have become a better actor. I have. I’m getting closer to the actor I dreamt about being when I was doing the Fonz,” he said, referring to his Happy Days character. 

“Some of my idols in acting are Jack Nicholson and Anthony Hopkins, where there’s no distance between their soul and their character. You can’t even put a sheet of paper between the two. There is something so magnificent about that. And I have been working to try to get there.”

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He later shared with NPR that Anthony shaped some of his on-screen performances. “I want to be the most talented actor. I want to be Anthony Hopkins. But I could never have played Gene Cousineau without this latter part of my life journey. And that’s not even hyperbole. I want to say, definitively, that is true,” he explained. 

Anthony has undergone a major career pivot in recent months, and revealed that he was releasing a classical music album in August titled Life is a Dream. “Music was my first desire, my first wish,” he said in a statement on his record label’s website. “I’ve been composing music all my life. Some of these pieces have lived with me for decades, and I still find myself returning to them.”

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The album is set to be Anthony’s “most personal musical project to date” with “works written across different periods of [Anthony’s] life, revealing a composer whose music shares the same emotional depth and storytelling that define his screen career.”

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The statement added that his work is influenced by his Welsh upbringing, “the landscapes of his boyhood”, and “important people and experiences that have accompanied him over the years”. 

His first single, “Bracken Road” reflects on his childhood in Margam, Wales, and the natural beauty that he grew up around. Anthony composed the piece back in 1963, and it has become an important part of his body of work.