How to apply @mock.patch for method and keep access to original method within one or more Tests?

While working on unittests for python application I faced interesting case when mock.patch method are used as decorator to patch method. See simplified example and description of problem below:

import unittest
import mock

from app import utils as app_utils


class TestA(unittest.TestCase):

    def setUp(self):
        pass

    @mock.patch('app.utils.method_b', return_value=None)
    def test_method_a(self, mock_method_b):
        actual_result = app_utils.method_a()
        # Assertion code

    def test_method_b(self, *args):
        actual_result = app_utils.method_b()
        # Assertion code

Pay attention that test_method_a mocking app_utils.method_b and test_method_b are going to call original app_utils.method_b. I faced situation that test_method_b cannot call actual app_utils.method_b because it's mocked by test_method_a.

I knew few methods of how to resolve that problem:

• use from app.utils import test_method_b, - so method would leave in namespace of my test.py
• use mock.patch as context manager via with statement.

The question is whether that possible to resolve problem without applying solutions above?

I need to keep using mock.patch as decorator and keep imports as is, if possible.