I just returned from a round trip journey to another world where on one hand everything was in its place and in another nothing was.
On the job, at a South Florida public media organization that calls itself serious, but is delirious and thinks that there is nothing wrong.
The perfect storm of sustained macroeconomic challenges over the past years facing the traditional underwriting market has led to a sharp reduction of dollars in cumulative radio ad spending.
Meanwhile at home aka Hotel Bruce everything was in its place where it should be and there was a clearly defined structure set by my friend.
Talk about old friends. Bruce and I double dated with our first wives when they were pregnant with girls. Our daughters are now mothers.
Ours is the reverse because it was Bruce aka Felix who opened his doors to his home. I was more like Oscar.
Since the beginning of time humanity has burdened itself with puzzling questions such as “What is the sound of one hand clapping?’ Or “How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?”
Sadly, we may never know the answers, but thanks to two great bits of progress, the television and the advent of the rerun, a fourth even more significant question has emerged: Can two old male friends share a living space without driving each other crazy? The answer is “of course not,” especially if the two guys are Oscar Madison (Jack Klugman) and Felix Unger (Tony Randall) of The Odd Couple. Below are episodes exemplifying the magnificence of this quintessential ‘70s sitcom.
Season 3 “Password”
We’re not the only ones who consider this the highpoint of the series. TV Guidenamed it the fifth greatest TV episode of all time. Game show host Allen Ludden spots Oscar in a restaurant then invites him to be on Password. Naturally, Felix invites himself to be Oscar’s partner. What happens next may be the most satisfying bits in sitcom history. They don’t win. We do.
https://youtu.be/oN3rumkshQM?si=Spx6SjA8xjL68mUy
Season 3 “I Gotta Be Me”
[amazon template=right aligned image&asin=B00US8DH5Y]Oscar and Felix are kicked out of group therapy so they try a role reversal wherein neat-freak Felix will become sloppy and vice versa. Fighting ensues until the two pals decide to dip the fork of friendship into the fondue Oscar has made. When Felix hurries to the bathroom shortly thereafter, Oscar samples the fondue and determines, it “needs ketchup.”
https://youtu.be/ucavPLpowWc?si=fSM-coNCCDk8XqlH
Season 3, “The Princess”
Oscar nominee and Golden Globe winner Jean Simmons stars as Princess Lydia who Felix has been hired to photograph. Oscar however mistakes her for just another model so he invites her to a hockey game. The two fall in love. Oscar proposes. Their marriage is foiled by a prince from Iran. (“We get oil and he get’s me.”) Jack Klugman won an Emmy Award for this one. Don’t miss the opening close-up of Felix Unger’s studio a.k.a. F.U. PRODUCTIONS.