TV pick: The Odd Couple

Oscar (Matthew Perry) and Felix (Thomas Lennon) must adjust to life under one roof.

Latest iteration of a well-worn concept doesn't lack for one-liners.

Chandler Bing might have possibly been the funniest Friend - we asked the internet and that's what it said - but the guy who played him has had a hard time finding a lasting second act on the small screen.

It hasn't been for lack of trying.

Matthew Perry has starred in three major series since his star-making show finished in 2004. But all have proved one-season wonders - Studio 60 on The Sunset Strip might have been Aaron Sorkin's first outing since The West Wing but it lasted one series; Perry created his own sitcom, Mr Sunshine, about a guy running a San Diego arena but it was canned nine episodes in; His Go On, about a sports talk radio host joining a support group after the death of his wife, got decent reviews - and plenty of comparisons to Community - but lasted only one season.

Now Perry, it seems, has decided to avoid all that originality that got him nowhere and go back to two old staples of American comedy - the multicamera sitcom and yet another take on The Odd Couple, which has been a play, a film, a 1970s show, a cartoon, and an 80s remake of the 70s show.

It means as Oscar Madison - the role played earlier on screen by Walter Matthau and Jack Klugman - Perry is playing yet another sportscaster, one who now broadcasts from his Manhattan apartment and so can be a slob.

But his man-cave existence is disturbed by the arrival of Felix Unger (Thomas Lennon), his fastidious old college pal who needs a place to stay as he goes through a divorce, something Oscar went through years ago.

So far, so similar - even the theme tune and titles pay homage to the original.

Those who remember the 70s show and its chemistry between Jack Klugman and Tony Randall will undoubtedly think this The Odd Couple is lacking for something.

But the opening episode certainly doesn't lack for one-liners. They come thick and fast and if you don't think they're all funny, the show's laugh track thinks otherwise.

The first show is mostly about Oscar and Felix adjusting to life under one roof.

Oscar has designs on his hot neighbour Casey (Leslie Bibb) and hopes that setting Felix up with her neurotic sister Emily (Lindsay Sloane) will be just the match he needs to get over his broken marriage. Those sisters from downstairs date from Neil Simon's original play.

But there's something quite 90s and Friends-ish about it all too. Maybe it's how every second scene comes punctuated by yet another knock at the apartment door.

Or maybe because as Perry's Oscar gets exasperated with his fusspot flatmate, he can't help but yell in a voice that is just so Chandler. Because that's what a Friend would do.

When: 8.30pm, Fridays
Where: Prime
What: Matthew Perry goes flatting, again

- TimeOut