aw, rats.

[sisyphusshrugged]

Tony Randall, RIP

Randall's acting career spanned more than five decades and included numerous roles on Broadway, television and movies.

Among his big screen performances, he garnered high praise for lending a comic touch to such '50s and '60s films as Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957), The Mating Game (1959) with Debbie Reynolds, Let's Make Love (1960) opposite Marilyn Monroe, and a trio of Doris Day-Rock Hudson comedies, including Pillow Talk (1959), Lover Come Back (1961) and Send Me No Flowers (1964). In 2003, he turned on the charm opposite Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGregor in Down with Love, a remake of Pillow Talk.

But he will mostly be remembered for his role as fussbudgitty Felix Unger opposite slob Oscar Madison, played by his old pal Jack Klugman, in The Odd Couple, which ran on ABC from 1970 to 1975.

The thesp also starred in four other series including One Man's Family, Mr. Peepers, and the short-lived sitcoms The Tony Randall Show and Love Sydney. The last notably featured Randall playing a homosexual, making him the first to portray an actively gay character on a network show long before Will & Grace and Ellen DeGeneres made it popular to do so.

A veteran of the theater, in 1991 Randall launched the National Actors Theatre, a Broadway and off-Broadway not-for-profit company which mined the classical repertoire of playwrights from Pirandello to Chekov as well produced works by modern masters like Arthur Miller.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Nothing tragic about the end of a long life well lived, but I feel bad for Randall's kids. Old enough (5,7) to have both known their dad, and probably remember him.

As I recall, the network took great pains NOT to make "Sydney" openly homosexual, because of complaints. Imply, don't tell, or something like that.