My Happy Days in Hollywood by Garry Marshall

in New York. The bottom line is that Jack was a messy gambler and Tony was a finicky neat freak.
    Their acting styles also were completely different. Tony would ask for changes in the script when he knew something would make it better and stronger. He liked saying, “Change this!” and having us listen to him. In his previous film work—such as
Pillow Talk
and
Send Me No Flowers—
stars Rock Hudson and Doris Day had always said “Change this!” and the director or writer would accommodate them. Tony was just a supporting actor in those films, so he didn’t have the same clout. In
The Odd Couple
, Tony was the star, and he liked the power that came with that new role. Jack, on the other hand, simply needed to know what his character “wanted” in every scene. Once he had his motivation Jack asked for little else. Plus you could get any line or joke past Jack if you pitched it to him at 3:45 P.M . because by 4:00 he would be out the door to listen to the racetrack results on the radio. He would come back on the set afterward, and his head would be right back into work.
    The first season we shot the show without a live audience, but Tony didn’t like it that way, and neither did I. He desperately wanted us to shoot in front of a live audience, which some sitcoms at the time were doing. He found the canned laughter grating, like nails on a chalkboard. We agreed that a live audience would make the show stronger because the laughter would be more spontaneous and genuine, but nobody listened to us. Paramount wasn’t rushing tospend extra money to accommodate a live audience on our soundstage. So Tony decided to take matters into his own hands. He went on Johnny Carson’s
Tonight Show
and asked viewers to write in to Paramount and tell them to get rid of the canned laughter on
The Odd Couple
. He said, “If you all write letters, Paramount will listen.” And he was right. Shortly after that
Tonight Show
aired, people began to write letters to Paramount asking for the change in format. From the second season on we always filmed in front of an audience, and I think in everyone’s opinion it was a better show. The audience could act as a referee between Tony and Jack and me. Having a live audience is a quicker and more definitive way to find out what is funny and what is not.
    While Tony liked a live audience, he didn’t like live children. He found children a distraction when he was working. Each week we had two run-throughs. One was at 4:30 P.M . and kids could come, and the other one was at night, for adults only. Tony didn’t think that kids should be allowed to attend either. He hated the 4:30 one, so we even tried to limit the number of kids in attendance. Whenever my own three children came to visit the set, we hid them under the audience bleachers so Tony wouldn’t see them. For the entire run of the show my children were in fear of Tony discovering their secret location and being thrown off the lot. (It is ironic that many years later Tony had two children with his second wife, Heather, and seemed to love every second he had with them.) My daughter Lori later appeared in an episode called “That Is the Army, Mrs. Madison,” in which we see Oscar marry his wife, Blanche, through a series of flashbacks. Every day at the rehearsals Lori would dodge around the set trying not to make eye contact with Tony for fear he would fire her. But deep down he was the sweetest of men.
    The thing about producing your own television series is that things can go wrong and you have to learn to fix them on the spot. In an episode called “I’m Dying of Unger,” the scene was falling flat. The lines were fine, but the comedy wasn’t popping. I suggested that Tony and Jack do the scene again, exactly as written. But I added a twist: I had Murray the cop put his nose through the peephole of Oscar and Felix’s door. Felix saw the nose and instantly knew whowas on the other side. The scene suddenly got laughs and all our problems