If Broadway ever erected a monument to the patron saint of laughter, Neil Simon would have to be it. City Theatre Austin is thrilled to announce the May production of his iconic American comedy The Odd Couple featuring City Theatre favorites Zachary Gamble and Darwin Ragsdale as Oscar Madison and Felix Ungar. Guest director Tracy Hurd is set to direct Simon’s comedy about a slovenly, cigar-smoking sportswriter and a depressed, neurotic clean-freak, who try to live together after their wives have dumped them.

 

Neil Simon's witty dialogue, vibrant characters, timely themes, and hilarious one-liners have made him one of the most produced playwrights of the twentieth century and a true legend of American stage comedy. The Odd Couple is one of his funniest and most popular plays. The iconic characters of Oscar the slob and Felix the neat freak have become mainstays of popular culture. More surprisingly, its touching insights about friendship remain equally moving, over 60 years after it was first written.

 

The play centers on two mismatched roommates. When recently failed marriages force slovenly Oscar and fastidious Felix to share an apartment, their relationship begins to resemble the patterns of their own disastrous lives. The couple must determine whether those differences are irreconcilable. As the audience enjoys the non-stop hilarity, Oscar and Felix realize, along with good friends and new loves, they are both better people as a result of their friendship.

 

The movies and television might consider Neil Simon a patron saint as well. He has had more plays adapted to film than any other playwright. Throughout the 1960s and 70s, he would turn out hit after hit for the stage and screen – The Odd Couple, Sweet Charity, Barefoot in the Park, The Goodbye Girl, Plaza Suite, The Prisoner of Second Avenue – all establishing his place in the entertainment industry. He has been showered with more Academy and Tony nominations than any other writer, and he is the only playwright to have four Broadway productions running simultaneously. Now, not only getting the laughs, but he was also getting the awards, winning four Tony Awards, two Emmys, a Screen Writers Guild Award, and a Pulitzer Prize. He has written over thirty plays and holds the record for the greatest number of hits in the American theater.

 

Perhaps his true success, however, is in his unique way of exposing something real in the American spirit. Neil Simon has for over 60 years invigorated the stage with the ability to create humor from the lives of everyday people. From the beginning, he shows us – between, in, and around the funny lines – the identity we have with all of his touching stories and unforgettable characters.

 

Of Simon, actor Jack Lemmon said, “Neil has the ability to write characters — that we’re supposed to root for — that are absolutely flawed. They have foibles. They have faults. But they are human beings.”

 

Tracy Hurd directs the production for City Theatre and features the cast of Zach Gamble, Darwin Ragsdale, Charles Dennis, Payton Trahan, Matt Gauck, Mollie Kirby, Hannah Zickel, and Lauren MacLeod.

 

Celebrating its 20th Anniversary Season, City Theatre is an Austin-based, not-for-profit arts organization and is sponsored in part by the Austin Creative Alliance and the Cultural Arts Division of the City of Austin. Founded in 2006, the company has been recognized by the Austin Critics Table Awards, the B. Iden Payne Awards, the Central Texas Excellence in Theatre Awards, BroadwayWorld Austin, Central Texas Live Theatre, and has twice been voted “Best Theatre Company” by Austin American-Statesman’s Austin 360. CTC is dedicated to providing a quality, reputable, and diverse public theatre and stage entertainment experience that is accessible to all artists and the entire Austin community. CTC continues to offer its student and group discount ticket program for any show.