TRUTH be told, actor Jason Bowser has been playing the role of Felix Unger since his boyhood — while he and his now-late dad were in restaurants with Bowser’s Mom. With little prompting, wiseacre Dad and Bowser would gleefully reenact “The Odd Couple” 1968 movie scene in which Jack Lemmon as Unger made loud, odd noises in a restaurant to try to clear his sinuses.
The movie was long a favorite of Bowser and his father — so much so that the son figures that they watched the flick together maybe 25 times. Goodness knows how many times they imitated Felix in public, much to the chagrin of his mother.
“People in the entire restaurant would be staring at us, and Mom would slowly be slinking under the table (embarrassed),” Bowser said.
Bowser officially will portray the neatnick character who moves in with lovable slob Oscar Madison (Gregory Andis) in the comic dinner theater production presented by the local Passion for Acting Theatre Company beginning Friday at Willow Leaves of Hope. Organizers see the dinner theater presentations as timely, joyous stress relief at a time when they say residents need a small respite from political struggles, Ukraine’s agony, gas prices and more.
“This allows people to shut off their brain and simply have fun,” Bowser said.
“This doesn’t require a whole lot of thought,” Andis said.
But cast members are betting it will demand a whole lot of guffaws at late playwright Neil Simon’s heralded wit and whimsy.
“This is just written so well,” Bowser said. “Everything in it is funny — the story, the interactions, everything.”
Bowser, known in recent years for his humorous stage antics in a range of roles, loves the idea that “I get to throw a lot of physical comedy into this,” as he put it when referring to the over-the-top and hypochondriac Unger.
Co-producer and co-director Connie Kiviniemi-Baylor, alongside daughter Kathryn Baylor, picked the show for an understandable reason after her troupe has done a few lesser-known but praised works.
“One of the main reasons I chose this,” Kiviniemi-Baylor said, “is for the name recognition. Everybody loves ‘The Odd Couple.’”
She figures if people ever could easily relate to the play’s premise and scenario, it would be now.
“In the last couple of years that we’ve had, so many people have had to work from home among their loved ones,” Kiviniemi-Bayor said. “And many of them have discovered that perhaps being with those loved ones 24/7 was not always ideal. We certainly see that with Felix and Oscar. They discover that they’re great friends — but it turns out to be more on a social level.”
Andis calls his part in the production “a bucket-list role.”
“This shows a kind of men-behaving-badly syndrome,” Andis said.
He acknowledged that he relates to the lazy sportswriter Oscar character at least a little.
“I’m not always the neatest guy in the world,” Andis said. “But then again, I certainly don’t leave beer cans and bags of potato chips around the house.”
The former banker-turned-vocational-rehab worker loves embracing this form of work, too.
“I don’t play golf worth a darn,” Andis said. “So this is my outlet.”
