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“Happy Days” star Anson Williams opened up about discovering true love in his later years.
The 73-year-old actor married author and actual property dealer Sharon Scott Williams, née MaHarry, 65, in May 2023 at their dwelling in Ojai, California. The pair not too long ago collaborated on a one-woman stage play primarily based on Sharon’s e book “Crazy Mama: A Memoir of Love and Madness.”
During an interview with Fox News Digital, Williams recalled how he and Sharon first met whereas they have been each married, misplaced contact and reconnected once more greater than a decade later.
“It’s a very interesting story,” Williams stated. “I bought my Ojai house, almost 14 years ago, and at the time, Sharon was in real estate, and she sold it to me and to my wife at the time.”
“Happy Days” star Anson Williams opened up about discovering true love in his 70s. ( Michael Tullberg/Getty Images)
He continued, “And, years later, I mean, years later, when I was divorced and went through all that, and I ended up with the Ojai house.”
Williams filed for divorce from his second spouse, Jackie Gerken, in September 2019, however requested a dismissal of the divorce submitting the next month. The TV star filed for divorce from Gerken once more in June 2020. The former couple have been married for 32 years and share daughters Olivia Jean and Gabriella Rose, each 20, and Stella Rayne, 15.
WATCH: ‘Happy Days’ star Anson Williams shares how he found true love in his 70s with spouse Sharon
In the aftermath of his divorce and following an earlier battle with colon most cancers, Williams stated that he found himself in a low place and commenced considering once more of the girl he had met years earlier.
The 73-year-old actor married author and actual property dealer Sharon MaHarry in May 2023. (jfizzy/Star Max/GC Images)
“She never left my mind,” Williams stated of Sharon. “Always kind of there. And I was up here all alone and just, you know, not in a great — not a great place. And I just called one day.”
“I didn’t know her situation, but it turned out her husband had passed and all this went on. And so I asked her to lunch, and we’ve been together since that lunch,” he stated.
“But here’s what’s funny,” Williams continued. “We’re having lunch and it’s been years. And she’s sitting down at a table. I sit down and we have a three-hour lunch. And I mean, just an amazing three hours crying and just such, such a connected experience.”
“And finally we say, you know, ‘We got to go. We got to — you know — and she goes, ’Yeah, yeah. Can you please hand me my crutches?’ I go, ‘Excuse me?’ It turned out that she had taken a fall, a bad fall down the stairs, was in the hospital for a month, had all this corrective surgery on her knee and was one day out of the wheelchair,” he recalled.
WATCH: ‘Happy Days’ star Anson Williams says he and spouse Sharon have ‘an undefinable chemistry’
“So I help her out. And she had this challenge of going to a writer’s retreat in Italy in not that much time, like maybe six weeks. And so the challenge was getting her to walk well enough to be able to walk on the cobblestones of Italy and get to that retreat.”
“And we did it,” he stated. “So the whole beginning of our relationship was giving and caring and, it’s just progressed from there into such a — just a monumental relationship and now a creative partner.”
In July 2023, Sharon instructed People journal that previous to reconnecting with Williams, she had given up hope of discovering love once more after shedding her husband of 35 years to a long-term sickness.
“I just thought this was it. I’m a widow, this is who I am now,” she recalled.
“I wrote kind of a synopsis of where I was when I met Anson,” Sharon stated. “I’ve never been in such a dark place. And he completely turned that around. It was like a gift from God that I met him.”
Sharon recalled that she agreed to just accept Williams’ lunch date invitation on the encouragement of her daughter. She instructed the outlet that receiving her daughter’s blessing “absolutely freed me to take advantage of this, whatever it was,”
“And I wasn’t sure what it was at that moment, but what a beautiful gift she gave me,” Sharon added.
The pair met over a decade in the past when Sharon bought an Ojai dwelling to WIlliams and his then spouse. ( GP/Star Max/GC Images)
During his interview with Fox News Digital, Williams mirrored on how he and Sharon had modified one another’s lives. He in contrast their connection to the chemistry that he shared with his former “Happy Days” castmates.
“Selfless love goes a long way,” he stated. “It reminds me a little bit of ‘Happy Days.’ It’s an undefinable chemistry,”
“And someone who always sees the best in you. Boy, that changes you. When someone sees the best in you, you work — you make sure you’re going to stay the best.”
“When someone sees the worst in you, you’re always — you’re always scratching to get air,” he continued. You know what I imply?”
“It’s simply you do not develop,” Williams explained. “You do not get higher, you recognize? And when you might have somebody that basically loves you and sees the perfect in you, you simply develop. You develop. You develop as a human being. And it is like breaking by way of the clouds to the blue sky. And it is like that day by day. Every day.”
“That makes a relationship,” he added. “And teamwork too.”
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The California native’s “Happy Days” co-star and close friend Don Most served as the best man during Williams and Sharon’s wedding, which took place in the backyard of the home that the bride first sold to the groom in 2010.
Williams recalled how he was touched by the speech that Most gave in honor of the newlyweds during their nuptials.
“Just a beautiful, heartfelt, you recognize, bro converse, brother,” he told Fox News Digital. “Just so completely happy for me. So completely happy for us.”
“I imply, who would have identified that we would be collectively? Together as a group doing a play, ‘Crazy Mama,’”he said. “It’s such a terrific group and I imply, the love of your life and also you’re capable of work collectively? And to have the ability to take this award-winning author and do one thing so vital for her life.”
Williams continued, “You know, for her, it is a great alternative to let go too and specific and to assist by way of her life expertise with humor and sensible writing, serving to different households get by way of arduous conditions.”
Williams said he never forgot Sharon and they reconnected 13 years later. (Michael Tullberg/Getty Images)
Starring two-time Emmy Award nominee Lee Purcell, “Crazy Mama” is a one-woman play with musical accompaniment that is based on Sharon’s memoir “Crazy Mama, A Memoir of Love and Madness.” The book was the winner of the 2014 Southwest Writers Competition, and won the Santa Barbara Writers Conference Fiction Award, per Sharon’s website.
The play chronicles the “soul-crushing grip of her mom’s psychological sickness, the steely resilience of the human coronary heart, and the way, by the grace of some invisible energy, Sharon’s dream to get her actual Mama again comes true,” according to a press release.
“Crazy Mama” will be staged April 12-14 at the Theater of The Museum at the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in Bethel, New York.
WATCH: Anson Williams recalls ‘Happy Days’ co-star Don Most’s best man speech at his wedding
During his interview with Fox News Digital, Williams recalled how he and Sharon decided to adapt her memoir into a one-woman show.
“[Sharon] is a wonderful author, and he or she wrote brief memoirs about her life, rising up with a schizophrenic mom who had a complete breakdown when she was eight-years-old,” Williams said. “And she did it with gut-wrenching moments, humor, actually, actually related with everybody who learn it and made psychological sickness an actual tactile, embraceable state of affairs.”
He continued, “And she gained awards, main awards. And I believed to myself, ‘You know, this can be a one-woman present. This is a play.”
“I stated it might be sensational and in addition entertaining, academic, opening doorways to reconnect and on the identical time actually bringing focus to the issue of psychological sickness.”
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Sharon adapted her memoir into the play, which Williams is directing. The Golden Globe nominee is an experienced television director whose credits include helming episodes of “Melrose Place, “Beverly Hills, 90210,” “Sabrina the Teenage Witch,” “Lizzie McGuire” and “The Secret Life of the American Teenager” and a variety of TV films.
While talking with Fox News Digital, Williams shared his ideas on probably the most difficult points of directing “Crazy Mama.”
“Well, it’s funny, I started in theater years ago before directing film and so for years now, decades, I’ve been directing mostly television and going back to theater is exciting,” he stated.
Williams continued, “But what’s really challenging about this is it’s a one-woman show with a blues guitar player. So the simplicity of it is challenging and it’s all performance.”
He went on to reward the play’s star Purcell as a “fabulous actress.”
“She’s memorizing an hour and a half of material, playing about 18 different characters,” he stated. “And she’s sensational. She’s sensational, and we’re very, very lucky. But really, the challenge is not getting in the way of it. Not over directing it, simplifying it, keeping it focused toward the audience.”
“And it’s going just fantastic,” Williams continued. “And I just can’t wait for people to come out there and see this show. It literally is the best script I’ve ever been part of. It’s so important and so entertaining and just will be a memorable experience for everyone in that audience.”
“Also, I’ll be there at every show and sign autographs, talk to people, whatever. You know, whatever I can bring to the show. But it’s going to be just a memorable show and a memorable opening for the Theater for Bethel Woods.”
The two not too long ago collaborated on the brand new one-woman play “Crazy Mama.” (Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)
Williams additionally shared his ideas on what he hopes audiences will take away from watching “Crazy Mama.”
“I want them to take away the importance of family, the importance of education, the importance of embracing a problem, not running away from it,” he stated. “And also what’s wonderful about ‘Crazy Mama’ is it took four years, but she gets her mother back. And, it’s a very much a rocky ending.”
He continued, “And I want people to feel closer together when they leave the theater than when they came in. I want them to embrace their family, embrace their friends, reprioritize their lives, and also get involved with mental illness.”
“The way to correct this is in a very tactile, human way. Everybody has some kind of problem, which is so interesting,” Williams added. “No, not every mother had a psychotic breakdown. But everyone has some problems someway connected with that audience in so many different ways. Positively, it opened them up again. They’re not alone. And the one thing the show gives people, the one word is hope. It really does. It gives people hope.”
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The actor shared that he turns into emotional each time he watches the play.
“I can’t get through without crying, and I cry hopeful tears, I cry. It brings me back to my life, my problems growing up. And it actually softens problems because my parents aren’t there anymore,” he stated.
Williams continued, “But what it did, it brought me back. And so much I was holding in, I let out, I went, ‘Oh my God, I was wrong.’ I embraced it now from afar. It really soothed my feelings. You know, it stopped so many wrongful memories with understanding of the situation.”
“The play does that for every single audience member. They walk out of there again, feeling closer and having hope and commitment to facing their problems together.”
Tickets for “Crazy Mama” are on sale now and may be bought right here: BethelWoodsCenter.org/CrazyMama
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