She Played ‘Kandi’ On Two and a Half Men, See April Bowlby Now At 43 - Ned Hardy (2024)

By Ross Tyson | December 19, 2023

Remember Kandi? The sweet, dimwitted blonde who stole Charlie Harper’s heart (and couch space) on Two and a Half Men? It’s been over a decade since April Bowlby graced our screens with her bubbly charm and comedic timing, but the actress has been far from idle.

April was born in Vallejo, California in July 1980. Her childhood was uneventful, with the future actress studying dance and wishing to be a ballerina as opposed to the acting career she would take up. She would go to college for dance and marine biology before deciding to get into a modeling career instead.

Two and a Half Men

While modeling wouldn’t last long, it would lead to a very quick turnaround for acting roles. Not long after she decided to make the switch and started taking auditions, April Bowlby got her first recurring role on the Chuck Lorre sitcom Two and a Half Men as the girlfriend of Jon Cryer’s character, Alan, in 2005. She would go on to appear in seventeen episodes throughout the show and eventually her character Kandi would marry Alan near the end of the series in 2015.

While she would be a regular character for most of season three and a portion of season four, her character would leave the show for a time after, leaving her open to other projects and pursuits with some credits to her name. She would still work her way through other shows starting in 2005, appearing in an episode of both CSI and CSI: New York as well as guest starring in one episode of Stacked, an unfortunate Pamela Anderson series that didn’t last long.

April Bowlby would find footing again in 2009 with two roles, the first as waitress Mia in overlooked Broken Lizard classic The Slammin’ Salmon before securing a regular role in acclaimed comedy Drop Dead Diva. She would go on to star in Drop Dead Diva for all six seasons, also picking up a spontaneously recurring role on How I Met Your Mother as one of Barney’s (many) backfired romances.

Exploring New Roles

In 2015 April Bowlby said goodbye to the last of her early recurring roles when she returned for the Two and a Half Men finale, also known as one of the strangest fever dreams in television history. Seriously, it ends with a piano being dropped on a fake Charlie Sheen before breaking the fourth wall and dropping a piano on creator Chuck Lorre. Nothing Makes sense, everything is chaos.

The next three years saw her dabbling in the bread and butter of steady-working actresses- Hallmark and Lifetime movies. She would star in both Hallmark Christmas and summer-themed romances, showing the greeting card company has range. Lifetime, meanwhile, would see her in the same old murder mystery love triangle trope. Typical Lifetime.

April Bowlby likes to keep her personal life mostly private, but she would meet her future husband Matthew Cooke at some point within this time. Cooke, himself a writer, director, and actor, is a vocal activist for climate change and social issues, would work closely with April for a future project, and the two were soon engaged.

What is April Bowlby Doing Now?

April found a series home and place in the wider DC Universe in 2018, taking the role of Elasti-Woman Rita Farr in Doom Patrol. April Bowlby got a real chance to flex her dramatic and whimsical muscles at the same time in DC’s little series that could, making an emotionally vibrant and complex character able to stand tall (and stretchy) alongside heavy-hitting actors like Diane Guerrero and the winner of Best Actor and our hearts, Brendan Fraser.

Rita Farr would be one of the few characters featured from Doom Patrol to appear across the various DC shows during the Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover event, with April Bowlby making her appearance on Legends of Tomorrow alongside the Waverider crew.

She would reunite in 2020 with members of the Broken Lizard crew as well, appearing in an episode of Tacoma FD. Her part would be a small guest role in the season two premiere of the show created by and starring Lizards Kevin Hefferman and Steve Lemme. The episode would end up premiering immediately after the world started free-falling from a cliff into what we have today, getting lost in the shuffle of Tiger King and bread-baking.

Marriage and Life Now

Through all the chaos she’s stuck mostly to her role in Doom Patrol, finishing out the show this year with season four, only appearing otherwise in a low-budget Christmas film in 2021. She hasn’t taken time off though, with her marriage to boyfriend Matthew Cooke also happening in 2020. The couple also welcomed their first child in October of 2022, with April frequently updating her adventures as a first-time mother on her Instagram account.

While Heather doesn’t have anything on schedule so far after Doom Patrol’s end, she’s not done acting. She’s just taking her time as a new mother, which while something awesome to experience, is also completely exhausting unless you have someone to raise them for you as other celebrities do. Her Insta definitely shows she’s enjoying the experience though, with smiles and laughter throughout.