Odd Couple genius Neil Simon, bard of Broadway, dies
PROLIFIC and popular playwright Neil Simon, author of The Odd Couple, has died of pneumonia complications aged 91.
Long-time friend Bill Evans, who donated a kidney to the writer in 2004, confirmed his death yesterday.
Simon, who also wrote The Goodbye Girl and Lost In Yonkers, penned over 40 plays and earned 17 Tony nominations.
He once had a record four plays running on Broadway simultaneously and in 1983 became the first playwright to have a theatre on the New York street named after him.
Friends last night paid tribute. Star Wars actor Mark Hamill shared a photo of Simon alongside a quote from a 1997 interview.
In it Simon said: “There’s no more money anyone can pay me that I need. There are no awards they can give me that I haven’t won. I have no reason to write another play except that I am alive and I like to do it.”
Humour
Tony award-winning actor Harvey Fierstein recalled Simon’s mix of humour, drama and introspection and described his death as “a loss for the entire entertainment industry”.
US actor and comedian Josh Gad wrote: “To say Neil Simon was one of the primary influences on my life and career is an understatement.”
Simon’s 50-year reign began when Come Blow Your Horn hit the stage in 1961. Two years later it was adapted into a film with Frank Sinatra.
He won Tony Awards for The Odd Couple, Biloxi Blues and Lost In Yonkers, and a fourth for his overall contribution to American theatre.
In 1968 The Odd Couple was adapted into a film starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau. It made over £34million as the fourth highest-grossing picture of 1968.
Comedy Lost In Yonkers bagged the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for drama.
Simon married five times – twice to the same woman – and leaves a wife, actress Elaine Joyce and daughters, Ellen, Nancy and Bryn.