Are they supposed to be gay?
-
TheAdlerian — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 06:32 PM)
No.
They were supposed to be "neurotic" people.
Alfred Adler gave a definition of "neurotic" which was a fully capable person who makes all kinds of excuses to not do what he knows makes sense, then feels bad that he didn't do the thing that makes sense.
So, Felix is precise, super organized, smart, and so on BUT he can't relative to people, so he can't stay married, and so his LIFE is a MESS.
His socks are perfectly organized but he has no life or love.
Thus, Felix is a neurotic failure who thinks he's perfect because his socks are organized.
The show was about two people who created a private hell for themselves through their personalities and can't get along with anyone.
The moral of the story is, don't be set in your ways. -
TheAdlerian — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 06:50 PM)
See my answer below.
Felix has a similar personality as Sherlock Holmes who is a favorite character of mine.
It's based on the idea in psychology of a Perfectionist.
That's someone focused on details so much they don't really function well in life. That's because life is random and they can't take it. So, the "perfect person" ends up very imperfect because they can't deal with life. -
TheAdlerian — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 06:47 PM)
Right but overtly on the show they did not see at all homosexual.
This is another example of the "that's gay" thing.
I actually watched The Odd Couple as a very little kid with my family. They and many others loved the characters.
The explanation was that their obsessions ruined their lives in a comical way.
Felix is also an example of a Perfectionist-Faliure from psychology. This type of person is talked about a lot in psychotherapy.
Sherlock Holmes is a Perfectionist-Failure also.
So, the gay thing wasn't thought of. However, NOW if you guys are friends and support each other they must want to ass ****.
That's a puerile message.
The Odd Couple is a whole huge psychological show. It's childish to assume it's just about two guys who want to ****.
If they are homosexuals, it would be because of their neurosis. -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 07:58 PM)
So ostensibly the two characters were not presented as homosexuals because in those times that would have been unacceptable and his play would never have been produced.
However, the fact that the author was popular in the gay community, and that gay men in those times often posed as heterosexual roommates as a professional cover, leads one to believe the story was based on a real life homosexual relationship. The true Odd Couple were gay. The inspiration was homosexual. Straight males didn't live like that.
And children should not be thinking about two guys ****ing.
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy -
Deluded Juice — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 08:13 PM)
There are a lot of gays involved in theatre and Simon's productions all started out on the stage before they were movies so there ya go.
I never thought of Felix and Oscar as being gay until now but the more I think about it the more it sure seems like it is possible that they were.
I do not buy into the idea that a lot of buddy movies where they are like a lot of times I have seen posters suggest it for other movies.
It gets ridiculous.
But these two are fitting in with the typical signs of gayness for characters. -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 08:34 PM)
Adlerian is pretending this is similar to ridiculous charges that there is homosexual sublimation in everything, like Batman and Robin for example.
But you used the word "supposed". Of course as represented, the Odd Couple were heterosexuals. But I believe it was based on a homosexual relationship.
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy -
Deluded Juice — 4 years ago(July 10, 2021 07:12 PM)
In your opinion or have you ever heard that Tony Unger was a friend of Dorothy?
He was a breeder at a late age and some chick claims he was doing that to hide being gay.
I think that was just her speculation.
What do you think or what have you may have heard?
Wait.
Tony Unger?
LOL
I was combining two names and didn't mean to!
I mean Tony Randall!
Not Felix Unger. -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 04:43 AM)
Okay, my bad, the OP said Neil Simon was gay so I went with that. I googled a bit and I can't find any evidence that Simon was gay. However, Simon had a following in the gay community and the homosexual aura of
The Odd Couple
is widely discussed.
Tony Randal was not gay either. But he played a gay stereotype. And he did play a closeted gay man in a tv series,
Love, Sydney
.
What Neil Simon Gave His LGBTQ Audience
When considering what is there in Simon’s work for the LGBTQ community, one has to consider The Odd Couple. Though ostensibly the story of a pair of bachelor roommates, fussy Felix and outré Oscar, the play (which went on to become a film and television series) was, in many ways, a portrait of day-to-day male couplehood that one could describe as proto-gay. Also, without Felix and Oscar, we wouldn’t have had Bert and Ernie — the Sesame Street characters that gave many of us our first ideas of what a life could look like outside a traditional heterosexual-couple-as-heads-of-household paradigm.
https://metrosource.com/how-should-the-lgbtq-community-remember-neil-simon/
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy -
I love hutch — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 05:10 AM)
I always thought that Tony Randall was gay. But regardless, he did come across as effeminate. Even in "Pillow Talk", I thought he was prissy.
In the movie version, Jack Lemmon does not seem gay or behave effeminately.
"My life is over. I might as well dance with Johnny Slash!" -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 06:25 AM)
Actually, while Tony Randall often plays a gay stereotype, Jack Lemmon tends to play characters more like gay men in real life. Just my observation.
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy -
TheAdlerian — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 05:12 AM)
Love Sydney was a good show.
He was a lonely guy who found a family in a single mom and daughter.
Meanwhile, Felix is the same as the Sherlock Holmes personality I mentioned. It has nothing to do with liking HOMOSEXUAL SEX and to do with mastering pointless minute details at the lose of the big picture of life.
The whole show is about comic selfishness in these guys they can't see. -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 06:22 AM)
What's all this Sherlock Holmes talk? Was he a raging queen?
The word
homo
comes from the Greek for "same". It simple refers to the
same
sex,
sex
as in gender. It doesn't always mean
****ing
.
<<< [gay eyes]
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy -
Deluded Juice — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 11:25 AM)
And that could be my bad in claiming that Simon was gay.
I could have sworn that when he died I saw something about a male partner that was in his will or that survived him.
Instead what I came across was a mention that his first wife starred in Goodbye Girl and his current one with their kids was with him when he passed.
So I dunno what I saw the first time or where it was.
Perhaps it was from Toy Cannon on his RIP thread for Simon.
TC is known for spreading falsehoods in his "obit" threads.
Like he claimed that Tom Petty was dead before he actually was.
And that Larry King died of Covid when he did not.
So I would not be surprised if that is where I saw a possible BS claim that Simon was gay.
Funny thing is that when I Google, "Was Neil Simon gay," a lot of hits also asking about the Odd Couple being gay come back! -
Platonic_Caveman — 4 years ago(July 11, 2021 04:00 PM)
Yeah, like the one I posted above about Neil Simon and his affinity with the LGBT community and how
The Odd Couple
was made to appeal to gays in more homophobic times.
What Neil Simon Gave His LGBTQ Audience
https://metrosource.com/how-should-the-lgbtq-community-remember-neil-simon/
Toy Cannon is a weird dude now that you mention him.
First, is that black guy in his avatar pic him?
Second, he's generally a decent guy but I got in a bizarre argument with him once on the Politics board.
So if he trolls, that explains a lot.
Administrator
"filmboards is a bold experiment in free speech and anarchy"
I GameBoy