The third prime-time version of “The Odd Couple” premieres at 8:30 p.m. Thursday night on CBS, starring Matthew Perry as the endearing slob Oscar Madison and Thomas Lennon as the uptight neat freak Felix Unger who becomes Madison’s roommate after separating from his wife.
“The Odd Couple” initially aired on ABC from 1970-75 starring Jack Klugman as Madison and Tony Randall as Unger. Another version ran on ABC in the 1982-83 season starring Demond Wilson as Madison and Ron Glass as Unger.
The latest version has several tweaks from the original.
Instead of being a newspaper sports columnist, Madison is the host of a radio sports talk show, a change made “simply (as) an attempt” to update the series and make it “a little more lively” by showing him interviewing Houston Rockets center Dwight Howard, NFL Network host Rich Eisen and other real-life athletes and sportscasters playing themselves, according to executive producer Bob Daily.
The original also included guest starring appearances by real-life athletes and sportscasters such as football stars Bubba Smith and Deacon Jones, tennis hustler Bobby Riggs and ABC sportscaster Howard Cosell.
This is the second consecutive series Perry has portrayed a radio sports talk show host. He also portrayed one on “Go On,” which ran on NBC during the 2012-13 season.
While Klugman and Randall were the only regular cast members in the original version, the cast of this version also consists of Yvette Nicole Brown as Madison’s assistant Dani, Wendell Pierce as his longtime agent Teddy, and Lindsay Sloane as a quirky next-door neighbor who helps Unger adapt to his new life as a bachelor and rein in his eccentricities.
“The Odd Couple” will have the same Neal Hefti-composed theme as the original, but this version was performed and arranged by Trombone Shorty, the bandleader and frontman of the hard-edge funk band Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue.
The initial impetus toward getting “The Odd Couple” on CBS’ schedule came from Carl Beverly, who has produced such series as CBS’ “Elementary” and Showtime’s “Masters of Sex.” Beverly approached his longtime friend, Eric Tannenbaum, an executive producer of “Two and a Half Men.”
“He kept saying, ‘We should do ‘The Odd Couple,”‘ Tannenbaum told City News Service. “I kept saying, ‘We’ve got ‘Two and a Half Men’ on the air. I talked with CBS people and they said, ‘It’s such a classic. It’s very hard to do.’
“Then I knew ‘Two and a Half Men’ was not going to continue past this year and he came back to me again and said ‘Can’t we do it this year?’ And I said ‘It’s time. It’s been long enough. We should.”‘
Unbeknown to Tannenbaum and Beverly, Perry had been driving and thought ‘It would be great to remake ‘The Odd Couple.”
“I had a cast in mind, a network in mind and then found out that it was actually being developed at CBS, so almost everything that I thought of in the car came true,” Perry said last month during CBS’ portion of the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour.
Perry said he thought “The Odd Couple” should be on CBS “because they are able to launch shows better than any other network.”
CBS Entertainment Chairman Nina Tassler said the factors contributing to her decision to order “The Odd Couple” were “the tenacity” of Tannenbaum, his wife Kim, also an executive producer on the series, and Beverly, the “extraordinary chemistry” Perry and Lennon illustrated in a meeting with CBS executives and Garry Marshall, who produced the original version, saying “I’m behind this show.”
Marshall is credited as an executive consultant. He attended the filming of each episode, and suggested jokes and storylines, Daily said.
Daily, whose producing credits include “Frasier” and “Desperate Housewives,” said he sought “The Odd Couple” to have “warmth and heart.”
“We’re trying to avoid snark as much as possible,” Daily said. “We want it to be smart and sophisticated and not pander to the audience at all.
“My writing staff worked on ‘Frasier,’ ‘Modern Family,’ ‘Cheers,’ ‘Everybody Loves Raymond.’ I hired people from those shows because it is our dream to create that kind of smart show that trusts the audience’s intelligence.”
— City News Service