Henry Winkler’s Wife Says the ‘Happy Days’ Star Fudges His Fish Stories

Henry Winkler has a reputation as one of the nicest guys in Hollywood, but according to his wife of 48 years, Stacey, that reputation doesn’t survive contact with a fly rod.

The couple sat down with Graham Bensinger for an interview about their marriage, and the conversation turned to fly-fishing, an activity Stacey says brings out a side of her husband nobody else sees.

Bensinger raised the question of whether Winkler exaggerates the size of the fish he catches. Winkler denied it immediately.

“Wait a minute. Really?” Winkler asked, before insisting, “I write down in my book exactly. I don’t round off. That I do only in charity.”

Stacey wasn’t having it.

“The biggest charity is your fish size,” she said. “You are about your fish size the way other people are about… other sizes.”

Winkler seemed genuinely thrown by the accusation.

“I have just learned something I’ve never known,” he said. “I don’t pad my numbers, but my wife believes I pad my numbers. Shocking. I’m shocked. I’m hurt.”

Why They Fish in Separate Boats

The bigger issue, it turns out, isn’t the measurements — it’s the boundaries. The Winklers used to fish together, dividing the boat so Stacey had the water toward the front and Henry had everything behind the oars.

The arrangement broke down whenever Stacey’s side looked more productive.

“I’m here to catch a fish,” Winkler explained. “And sometimes her water on the other side of the oar looks really fishy.”

Stacey described it differently, saying his fly would “slap into my water” rather than simply wind up there.

She said the sport transforms her husband entirely.

“There was just no way because he’s too crazy,” she said of fishing together. “He is this reasonable man who turns into a 7-year-old.”

Winkler and his wife agreed that their first fly-fishing trip together produced more arguments than the rest of their marriage combined.

“So then what I would do would be to not catch fish to make you feel better?” Stacey asked. “That would have been so thoughtful,” Henry replied.

The Solution — And a New Irritant

Eventually the couple settled on separate boats, separate guides and separate stretches of river. That solved most of the conflict, except for one thing: when Stacey lands a big fish, she sends her husband a photo.

“He gets irritated,” she said. “I do not get irritated,” Winkler insisted.

Winkler has his own theories about why his wife keeps out-fishing him, floating the idea that “there is something about female pheromones that attract the fish,” or alternatively, that she might be editing her photos.

Stacey maintains that fishing is the one place where her husband’s famously easygoing nature disappears entirely.

“If you are fishing somewhere in your area and Henry thinks he sees some bubbles or whatever, he’s going there,” she said. “So, there is nothing sacred.”

After nearly five decades of marriage, the Winklers say they’ve learned the essentials: separate boats, separate territory, and don’t trust your husband’s estimate of how many inches that fish really was.