At a time when there are so many celebrity feuds, it’s easy to forget that there are some people in the public eye who don’t actually hate each other. In fact, they’ve drawn on their common experiences and their respect for their work to create meaningful friendships. By all accounts, actors Jack Klugman and the late Tony Randall – TV’s beloved Odd Couple – had such a friendship.
In his slim, moving and sweet memoir Tony and Me: A Story of Friendship, Klugman recounts this special relationship, and what it meant to both men. For one thing, he reveals that he and Randall were quite like Oscar and Felix, the characters they played on television. Klugman was a slob and Randall was neat and finicky. But that’s not why the show worked so well, Klugman said. It’s because the two actors clicked and played off of each other, which Klugman largely attributes to Randall’s improvisational skills and generosity as an actor.
But their friendship was rooted in more than a shared love of acting. These are men who cared about each other, and Klugman delves into that, too, talking about how Randall supported him when throat cancer took Klugman’s voice away. It’s sweet reading him describe how much it meant when Randall invited Klugman to perform in a benefit revival of “The Odd Couple” on stage, and there’s no doubt that Randall’s death was a tremendous blow to Klugman.
Celebrity tell-alls are a dime a dozen, but an honest, tender examination of a Hollywood friendship? That’s rare, and that’s what makes Tony and Me worth reading.