By JAMES D. WATTS JR. Scene Writer on Sep 1, 2012, at 9:32 AM Updated on 9/01 at 10:08 AM
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Theatre Tulsa’s lengthy and storied past, and its hopes and plans for the future, have been well-documented of late. So now, let’s consider the company’s present — its season-opening production of Neil Simon’s “The Odd Couple.”
On the surface, it would seem a safe choice to open Theatre Tulsa’s 90th anniversary season. Simon’s plays — and this 1965 comedy in particular — have been staples of the community theater world for half a century. “The Odd Couple” is also familiar to millions through the long-running situation comedy from the 1970s, which starred Tulsa native and Theatre Tulsa alum Tony Randall.
But that familiarity — and the workman-like craft with which this work has been written — can breed a kind of casual contempt: “It’s just a string of jokes and one-liners, and all you have to do is make the punchlines punchy.”
Fortunately, director Troy Powell and his cast have a great deal more respect for the material. The laughs are all where they should be, the physical comedy is smartly staged and smoothly enacted, yet nothing is pushed too hard. There is never a sense of the actors trying to get, or expecting to hear, a laugh.
In other words, this “Odd Couple” is about as real — and therefore as genuinely funny — as this play can be.
The story is simple: two recently divorced men — one who lives more or less like a bear with furniture, the other an anal-retentive type with more tics than a room full of metronomes — decide to share an apartment in New York City.
As Oscar the slob, Tony Schneider is loud and brash, full of manic energy and a wizard at making even the most Borscht Belt wisecracks sound like perfectly natural speech. You may not believe him to be a natural slob — there is something a little too studied and controlled about the way Oscar untidies a room — but otherwise he inhabits the part fully.
Jeffrey Huston, on the other hand, is absolutely believable as Felix, a fellow who takes passive-aggression to an almost Zen-like level. Huston makes no effort to turn Felix into a lovable person — he’s wonderfully infuriating, whether going about his pathological cleaning routines or morosely moping about, well, about everything — which makes the character all the more real. You can understand why few people would want to share the same space with this fellow.
Bob Ball as Murray, John Gibson Miller as Roy, Ron Friedberg as Speed and Mike Bernart as Vinnie, make up the quartet of poker players who visit Oscar’s digs for the weekly game. Each character is a type, and each actor does an acceptable job with what they have to do.
Jessica Branston and Stephanie Powell keep the Pigeon sisters from becoming too cartoonish, even if their English accents never quite ring true.
Director Powell has made a few changes to bring the show closer to the 21st century, but a few anachronisms remain (does anyone still consult TV Guide?). And the oddly fluctuating light from some of the on-stage lamps got a little annoying.
But then, the way people can annoy even the ones they love almost to the point of violence by doing what they think is the right thing is what “The Odd Couple” is all about. And you laugh because these terrible people — as recognizable and familiar as they may be — are locked safely behind the stage’s “fourth wall.”
“The Odd Couple” continues with performances 7:30 p.m. Saturday and Sept. 6-8, and 2 p.m. Sunday in the Tulsa PAC’s Doenges Theatre, 110 E. Second St. For tickets: 918-596-7111, tulsaworld.com/mytix.
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