Key Points
Marlee Matlin needed somewhere to go after she got out of rehab and ended her turbulent relationship with William Hurt.
Happy Days star Henry Winkler, who first met Matlin when she was a teenager, opened his home up to her.
Matlin ended up becoming a part of the Winkler family and considering their house her home away from home.
Marlee Matlin ended up having plenty of happy day thanks to Henry Winkler.
The Oscar-winning actress, who at 21 became the first deaf performer to win an Academy Award, tells her story in the new documentary Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore. And part of that story is the key role Winkler has played in her life as an inspiration and a friend.
The two first met when Winkler was touring the country as a member of the Happy Days cast and Matlin was just a teenager with big dreams. They kept in touch, and Winkler was Matlin’s soft place to land during a difficult time in her life.
Matlin had a tumultuous two-year romantic relationship in the 1980s with her Children of a Lesser God costar William Hurt, recalling in her 2009 memoir that he was often abusive toward her. However, Hurt did encourage her to go to rehab for her alcohol and drug addiction, and it was there that she realized the unhealthy nature of their situation.
“There were a lot of things I learned in rehab,” Matlin says in the documentary, “that pointed to things not being right. The physical abuse and verbal abuse, the mental and emotional abuse was not right. I learned that there.”
Matlin says the experience made her and Hurt realize their relationship was never going to be the same after rehab. “I decided I had it,” she says. “I walked out of that house and I never went back.”
Instead, she went to Winkler in search of help after he invited her to come to his home in California and talk.
Winkler remembers that moment clearly. “Knock on the door. Marlee,” he recalls in the doc. “‘I have no place to stay. I just broke up with my boyfriend. Can I stay with you just for the weekend?'”
Naturally, the actor said it was no problem. Then, “two years later, she finally moved out,” he deadpans, before breaking out into a wide grin.
“That family took me in as if I were one of their own,” Matlin adds. “I”ll never forget that.”
Winkler also notes, “She was not completely whole at that time, so I told her, ‘If you know what you want without ambivalence, if you’re clear about what you want, everything else will fall into place.'”
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Henry Winkler and Marlee Matlin
His words rang true, and Matlin found her footing in Los Angeles, as she booked the TV show Reasonable Doubts and met her husband, police officer Kevin Grandalski. The two married Aug. 29, 1993, in the backyard of Winkler’s home. Home video footage of the ceremony is also included in the film.
“There was no other thing to do,” Winkler says in the doc. “There was no other place for her to get married except in our yard, in her home away from home.”
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Winkler and Matlin remain close to this day. While doing press for the film at its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, Matlin told PEOPLE that she considers Winkler her “fairy godfather.”
Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore hits theaters Friday.
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