Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mama's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad: A Pseudoclassical Tragifarce in a Bastard French Tradition was the first play written by Arthur L. Kopit

Arthur L. Kopit

Arthur Lee Kopit is an American playwright. He is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and a three-time Tony Award nominee: Best Play, Indians, 1970; Best Play, Wings, 1979; and Best Book of a Musical, for Nine, 1982...

. The play opened off-Broadway at the Phoenix Repertory Theatre in New York City in 1962 and moved to the Morosco Theatre for 47 performances on Broadway in 1963. The principal roles were originated by Hermione Gingold

Hermione Gingold

Hermione Gingold was an English actress known for her sharp-tongued, eccentric persona, an image enhanced by her sharp nose and chin, as well as her deepening voice, a result of vocal nodes which her mother reportedly encouraged her not to remove. She starred on stage, on radio, in films, on...

 (Madame Rosepettle), Sam Waterston

Sam Waterston

Samuel Atkinson "Sam" Waterston is an American actor and occasional producer and director. Among other roles, he is noted for his Academy Award-nominated portrayal of Sydney Schanberg in 1984's The Killing Fields, and his Golden Globe- and Screen Actors Guild Award-winning portrayal of Jack McCoy...

 (Jonathan, her awkward son) Barbara Harris

Barbara Harris (actress)

Barbara Harris is an American actress who was a Broadway stage star and later became a film actress. She appeared in such films as A Thousand Clowns, Plaza Suite, Nashville, Family Plot, Freaky Friday, Peggy Sue Got Married, and Grosse Pointe Blank...

, Alix Elias (Rosalie, seductive babysitter), and Sandor Szabo

Sandor Szabo

Sandor Szabo was a Hungarian professional wrestler of the mid-twentieth century. At first, due to his large size, he was promoted by Jack Pfefer and Jack Curley of New York City as a "freak talent", one of a number of foreign and extraordinary wrestlers booked to attract the curious. In the early...

 (Commodore Roseabove). The director was Jerome Robbins

Jerome Robbins

Jerome Robbins was an American theater producer, director, and choreographer known primarily for Broadway Theater and Ballet/Dance, but who also occasionally directed films and directed/produced for television. His work has included everything from classical ballet to contemporary musical theater...

.

The play was turned into a film of the same name in 1967, starring Rosalind Russell

Rosalind Russell

Rosalind Russell was an American actress of stage and screen, perhaps best known for her role as a fast-talking newspaper reporter in the Howard Hawks screwball comedy His Girl Friday, as well as the role of Mame Dennis in the film Auntie Mame...

, Robert Morse

Robert Morse

Robert Morse is an American actor and singer. Morse is best known for his appearances in musicals and plays on Broadway. He has also acted in movies and television shows. His best known role is that of J. Pierrepont Finch in the 1961 Broadway musical, and 1967 film How to Succeed in Business...

 and Barbara Harris

Barbara Harris (actress)

Barbara Harris is an American actress who was a Broadway stage star and later became a film actress. She appeared in such films as A Thousand Clowns, Plaza Suite, Nashville, Family Plot, Freaky Friday, Peggy Sue Got Married, and Grosse Pointe Blank...

, and directed by Richard Quine

Richard Quine

Richard Quine was an American stage, film, and radio actor and film director.Quine was born in Detroit. He made his Broadway debut in the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II musical Very Warm for May in 1939 and appeared in My Sister Eileen the following year...

.

Barbara Harris reprised her role of Rosalie from the 1962 play in the film version.

Plot Summary

Described by the author as a "farce in three scenes" the story involves an over-bearing mother who travels to a luxury resort in the Caribbean, bringing along her son and her husband (who is deceased, but preserved and brought along in his casket).

Cast (film)

• Rosalind Russell
  Rosalind Russell
  Rosalind Russell was an American actress of stage and screen, perhaps best known for her role as a fast-talking newspaper reporter in the Howard Hawks screwball comedy His Girl Friday, as well as the role of Mame Dennis in the film Auntie Mame...
  
   as Madame Rosepettle
• Robert Morse
  Robert Morse
  Robert Morse is an American actor and singer. Morse is best known for his appearances in musicals and plays on Broadway. He has also acted in movies and television shows. His best known role is that of J. Pierrepont Finch in the 1961 Broadway musical, and 1967 film How to Succeed in Business...
  
   as Jonathan
• Barbara Harris
  Barbara Harris (actress)
  Barbara Harris is an American actress who was a Broadway stage star and later became a film actress. She appeared in such films as A Thousand Clowns, Plaza Suite, Nashville, Family Plot, Freaky Friday, Peggy Sue Got Married, and Grosse Pointe Blank...
  
   as Rosalie
• Hugh Griffith
  Hugh Griffith
  Hugh Emrys Griffith was a Welsh film, stage and television actor.-Early life:Griffith was born in Marianglas, Anglesey, Wales, the son of Mary and William Griffith. He was educated at Llangefni County School and attempted to gain entrance to university, but failed the English examination...
  
   as Commodore Roseabove
• Jonathan Winters
  Jonathan Winters
  -Early life:Winters was born in Bellbrook, Ohio, the son of Alice Kilgore , a radio personality, and Jonathan Harshman Winters II, an investment broker. He is a descendant of Valentine Winters, founder of the Winters National Bank in Dayton, Ohio...
  
   as Dad (Narrator)
• Lionel Jeffries
  Lionel Jeffries
  Lionel Charles Jeffries was an English actor, screenwriter and film director.-Early life and career:Jeffries attended the Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, Wimborne Minster, Dorset. In 1945, he received a commission in the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry...
  
  as Airport Commander