Seinfeldia
Page 27
Writer Andy Robin, right, and his wife, Anna Macgregor Robin, backstage at a Seinfeld taping. COURTESY OF ANDY ROBIN
Writer Fred Stoller and the monkey he befriended on the set. COURTESY OF FRED STOLLER
Actor Steven Hynter, who played comedian Kenny Bania, and writer Fred Stoller on the set. COURTESY OF FRED STOLLER
Writer Fred Stoller and actor Wayne Knight, who played Newman. COURTESY OF FRED STOLLER
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jerry Seinfeld, Michael Richards, and Jason Alexander in the emotional final moments of shooting, taken by David Hume Kennerly. GETTY IMAGES
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jerry Seinfeld, Larry David, and director Andy Ackerman at the final table read. GETTY IMAGES
In 2012, Jason Alexander hands out samples of the Original SoupMan soup, the inspiration for the episode “The Soup Nazi.” GETTY IMAGES
Kenny Kramer poses amid his merchandise at the Brooklyn Cyclones’s Seinfeld-themed game in 2013. PHOTO BY JENNIFER KEISHIN ARMSTRONG
Seinfeld fans Matt Bergstein, Emily Donati, Evan Chinoy, and Jerry Kallarakkal at the Brooklyn Cyclones’s Seinfeld night in 2013. PHOTO BY JENNIFER KEISHIN ARMSTRONG
“Soup Nazi” actor Larry Thomas poses with fans at the Brooklyn Cyclones’s Seinfeld night in 2013. PHOTO BY JENNIFER KEISHIN ARMSTRONG
Jerry Seinfeld, Jason Alexander, and Larry David while shooting the final Seinfeld. GETTY IMAGES
Nearly 5,000 fans came out to watch the Seinfeld finale together in St. Louis. GETTY IMAGES
Monica Shapiro and Richard Yates, with Monica’s brother-in-law, Richard Levine, and sister, Sharon Yates. Monica was one of the inspirations for the character of Elaine; her novelist father, Richard, was the model for Elaine’s father, Alton Benes. COURTESY OF MONICA SHAPIRO
Jerry Seinfeld and Bob Wright, the former NBC president who tried to talk Jerry into doing a tenth year of Seinfeld for $5 million per episode, at the 2004 release party for the show’s DVDs. GETTY IMAGES
NBC programming executive-turned-filmmaker Jeremiah Bosgang chats with Jerry Seinfeld in Bosgang’s independent feature Show Me Your Potatoes. COURTESY OF JEREMIAH BOSGANG
Michael Richards, the guest-star chimp, and Jerry Seinfeld. COURTESY OF FRED STOLLER
Acknowledgments
SEINFELDIA IS FULL OF COLORFUL, funny, smart characters to whom I am forever indebted. Those who shared their experiences with me for this book did so generously, thoroughly, and often hilariously. Thanks especially to director Tom Cherones and the show’s writers who spoke with me, answered my weirdly detailed questions on demand (“What kind of car did you drive in 1993?”), shared tremendous photos with me, and helped me get in touch with their colleagues: Alec Berg, Jennifer Crittenden, Spike Feresten, Tom Gammill, Gregg Kavet, David Mandel, Bill Masters, Peter Mehlman, Dan O’Keefe, Max Pross, Andy Robin, Jeff Schaffer, and Fred Stoller, you are excellent people. Thank you to Jeremiah Bosgang, Adam Rainbolt, and Rick Lipps for sharing tales from some of the most interesting peripheries of Seinfeldia, and for having awesomely Seinfeldian names. Chela Holton, Monica Shapiro, Kenny Kramer, (decidedly noncrazy) Joe Davola, John Peterman, Jason Shelowitz, Larry Thomas, and Jonathan Wolff, your stories made this book special. Anthony Tobia, Sabine Sebastian, Greg Miller, William Irwin, Jazmine Hughes, Kelli Marshall, Josh Gondelman, and Jason Richards get extra props for keeping Seinfeldia alive in the 2010s and beyond.
My early readers, Erin Carlson and Heather Wood Rudúlph, saved my sanity. So did Kathryn Sanders, my right-hand woman throughout researching this book. So did A. Jesse Jiryu Davis, of course, who has made me a better writer and human being since the second I met him. Much, much love to Carter Covington and Patrick Sean Smith, also known as my West Coast office (and occasional infirmary); and to Dave Freiberg and Bill O’Meara, my Chicago office. Thanks for the support, listening, lunches, drinks, and cushy assignments that allowed me to pay my bills, Andi Bartz, Melissa Collom, Allison Hantschel, A. K. Whitney, and Kim Potts.
Superagent Laurie Abkemeier can’t be thanked enough. Neither can Jon Karp and the team at Simon & Schuster, who made my literary dreams come true, then handed me this idea.
Love, as always, to my family, who taught me to appreciate weirdness and humor.
© A. JESSE JIRYU DAVIS
JENNIFER KEISHIN ARMSTRONG is the author of Mary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted, a history of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. She writes about pop culture for several publications, including the New York Times Book Review, Fast Company, New York’s Vulture, BBC Culture, Entertainment Weekly, and others. She grew up in Homer Glen, Illinois, and now lives in New York City. Visit her online at JenniferKArmstrong.com.
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Source Notes
“Seinfeld is something I learned to do”: Jerry Seinfeld, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Michael Richards, and Jason Alexander, Sein Off (New York: Harper Perennial, 1998), 11.
Chapter 1: The Origin Story
ventured into a Korean deli: Chris Smith, “Jerry Seinfeld: Making Something Out of Nothing,” New York, April 6, 1998.
Catch a Rising Star: James Kaplan, “Angry Middle-Aged Man,” The New Yorker, Jan. 19, 2004.
Lee’s Market: Matthew Kassel, “Korean Deli Where Seinfeld Was Conceived Has Closed,” New York Observer, June 12, 2014.
Korean jelly: “How It Began” documentary extra, Seinfeld, seasons 1 & 2 (Culver City, CA): Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 2004), DVD.
first become friends in the bar of Catch a Rising Star: Jerry Seinfeld, Reddit AMA, Jan. 6, 2014: https://www.reddit.com/comments/1ujvrg/jerry_seinfeld_here_i_will_give_you_an_answer/.
“actually typed something out”: “How It Began.”
“This . . . is what the show should be”: Ibid.
after their comedy sets at the Improv: Ibid.
worried about filling an entire ninety minutes: Ibid.
“two guys talking”: Ibid.
shared a car, a TV, and one pair of black slacks: Anne E. Kornblut, “Cashing In,” Daily News (New York), Jan. 27, 1996.
funny at age eight: Ron Givens, “Funny, Didn’t Look Like Him,” Daily News (New York), Nov. 23, 1997.
spent his childhood watching: Seinfeld, Reddit AMA.
Kal Signfeld Signs: Givens, “Funny, Didn’t Look Like Him.”
At Birch Lane Elementary School: Jerry Oppenheimer, Seinfeld (New York: HarperCollins, 2002), 26.
he grew obsessed: Ron Givens, “Not Part of Wild Bunch During Turbulent Period in U.S., Jerry Went His Own Way,” Daily News (New York), Nov. 24, 1997.
Julius Caesar: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 51.
geometry class as training for comedy: Jerry Seinfeld, interview by Larry Wilde, On Comedy, Laugh.com, July 24, 2001.
acted in school productions: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 91–4.
eavesdropped: Seinfeld, Reddit AMA.
graduated in 1976 as an honor student: Seinfeld, interview by Larry Wilde.
His first appearance: Tod Caviness, “Get Your Laugh On!,” Orlando Sentinel, Jan. 3, 2013.
practiced his routine with a bar of soap: Jerry Seinfeld, interview by Judd Apatow, Club Comedy, Syosset High School radio station, circa 1984 (exact date unknown); republished online by the New York Times, May 27, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/27/magazine/27apatow-t.html?pagewanted=all.
Comedian Elayne Boosler: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 119.
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four years: Seinfeld, interview by Larry Wilde.
After three episodes: Scott Williams, “Jerry Gets the Last Laugh,” Daily News (New York), Nov. 25, 1997.
“Funny is the world I live in”: Jerry Seinfeld, interview by Peter Lauria. BuzzFeed Brews, BuzzFeed.com, Feb. 3, 2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RxKMvX7LRA.
“the Olympics”: Seinfeld, interview by Larry Wilde.
JERRY SEINFELD OF MASSAPEQUA: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 188.
“the difference between thinking you’re a comedian”: Mark Goodman and Michael A. Lipton, “A Bittersweet Goodbye,” People, May 25, 1992.
In 1988: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 236.
doing up to three hundred appearances: Chris Smith, “City Slicker,” New York, Feb. 3, 1992.
“which means I sucked”: Kaplan, “Angry Middle-Aged Man.”
putting himself on trial: Jim Windolf, “Master of the Domain,” New York Observer, Sept. 16, 1996.
“a combination of Bozo and Einstein”: Kaplan, “Angry Middle-Aged Man.”
affiliates . . . refused to air it: Dennis Perrin, “Fridays: The SNL Ripoff That Nearly Surpassed the Original,” Splitsider, Jan. 31, 2012, http://splitsider.com/2012/01/fridays-the-snl-ripoff-that-nearly-surpassed-the-original/.
Fiat convertible: Deirdre Dolan, Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Book (New York: Gotham Books, 2006), 109.
In David’s one season: Tom Shales, “SNL in the ’80s,” Washington Post, Nov. 12, 2005.
Prognosis Negative: Kaplan, “Angry Middle-Aged Man.”
William Morris: George Shapiro, interview by Bill Dana and Jenni Matz, Archive of American Television, Feb. 12, 2007.
The Steve Allen Show: Allan Neuwirth, They’ll Never Put That on the Air (New York: Allworth Press, 2006), 251.
told NBC executives: “How It Began.”
November 2, 1988: “Notes About Nothing,” Seinfeld, seasons 1 & 2.
to have his days free: “How It Began.”
5:15 P.M.: Smith, “Jerry Seinfeld: Making Something Out of Nothing.”
“What would you like to do in television?”: “How It Began.”
recent investment . . . from Columbia: Shapiro, interview by Bill Dana and Jenni Matz.
They weren’t sure: “How It Began.”
“He’s expressive”: Lawrence Christon, “Laughing on Empty,” Los Angeles Times, Jan. 17, 1989.
Shapiro asked a staffer: Oppenheimer, Seinfeld, 243.
Chapter 2: The Players
making disco jewelry: John Tierney, “With the Help of ‘Seinfeld,’ Legend in His Own Time,” New York Times, Jan. 18, 1996.
Bic clear-barrel pens: Jerry Seinfeld, interview by Jenny Woodward, New York Times, Dec. 20, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/video/magazine/100000001965963/jerry-seinfeld-how-to-write-a-joke-.html.
Seinfeld worried: “How It Began.”
wanted to use Kramer’s real name: “Kramer vs. Kramer: Kenny to Cosmo,” Seinfeld, season 3 (Culver City, CA: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 2004), DVD.
with yet another shrug: “How It Began.”
Stage actor Nathan Lane: Bradford Evans, “The Lost Roles of Seinfeld,” Splitsider, April 14, 2011, http://splitsider.com/2011/04/the-lost-roles-of-seinfeld/.
Top Gun costar Anthony Edwards: “Jason + Larry = George,” Seinfeld, season 5 (Culver City, CA: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 2005), DVD.
Robert Schimmel: Mike Flaherty, “A Comic’s Trip,” Entertainment Weekly, Nov. 5, 1999.
Rob Reiner had seen Jason Alexander: Jason Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington, Archive of American Television, May 10, 2013.
Seinfeld had noticed: “Jason + Larry = George.”
McDonald’s McDLT: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
young George Burns: Alan Bunce, “ ‘Everything’s Relative’: Fast-Paced Gags Keep the Show’s Laugh Track Puffing,” Christian Science Monitor, Sept. 28, 1987.
“I thought there’d be more plumes”: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
invited to read for the Seinfeld part: “How It Began.”
a few pages of the script: “Jason + Larry = George.”
Woody Allen prototype: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
That’s the guy: “Jason + Larry = George.”
About a week: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
“complete waste of time”: “Jason + Larry = George.”
“Not so obviously Woody”: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
David could see the chemistry: “Jason + Larry = George.”
By the time he landed: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
yoga: “Michael Richards,” People, May 14, 1998.
thousand pounds of dirt: “Kramer vs. Kramer: Kenny to Cosmo.”
Seinfeld knew Richards’s work: Michael Richards, interview by Jerry Seinfeld, “It’s Bubbly Time, Jerry,” Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, September 27, 2012: http://comediansincarsgettingcoffee.com/michael-richards-its-bubbly-time-jerry.
Tony Shalhoub and character actor Larry Hankin: Evans, “The Lost Roles of Seinfeld.”
“the mysterious hand of the universe”: Richards, interview by Jerry Seinfeld.
Richards had to read for the producers: “How It Began.”
“Well, if you want funny”: Warren Littlefield, Top of the Rock (New York: Anchor Books, 2013), 74.
“So, Mr. Experience”: “How It Began.”
pages contained few to no behavioral cues: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
first test came: Stephen Battaglio, “The Biz: The Research Memo That Almost Killed Seinfeld,” TV Guide, June 27, 2014.
“Who will want to see”: David Zurawik, “The world according to Seinfeld,” Baltimore Sun, May 3, 1998.
“I’m not from New York”: Neuwirth, They’ll Never Put That on the Air, 227.
about four hundred households: Battaglio, “The Biz.”
In the first week of May: Littlefield, Top of the Rock, 78.
“You can’t get too excited”: Battaglio, “The Biz.”
“Jerry Seinfeld, who was familiar to about a quarter of the viewers”: Littlefield, Top of the Rock, 77.
“the oversexed head”: NBC, “NBC Announces New Season’s Prime Time Schedule,” press release, May 16, 1989, Rick Ludwin Collection, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH.
“aimless wandering”: Kathryn Baker, “Seinfeld Plays Himself in Sitcom,” Associated Press, July 5, 1989.
network’s rights to The Seinfeld Chronicles neared expiration: Battaglio, “The Biz.”
Bob Hope special: Littlefield, Top of the Rock, 83.
“lacked estrogen”: Elizabeth Kolbert, “A Visit with: Julia Louis-Dreyfus,” New York Times, June 3, 1993.
Chapter 3: The Network
Patricia Heaton . . . Megan Mullally . . . Rosie O’Donnell: Evans, “The Lost Roles of Seinfeld.”
She joined at twenty-one: Jonny Black, “Julia Louis-Dreyfus Facts: 21 Things You (Probably) Don’t Know About the ‘Veep’ Star,” Moviefone.com, Aug. 29, 2014, http://news.moviefone.com/2014/08/29/julia-louis-dreyfus-facts/.
youngest female cast member: Megh Wright, “Saturday Night’s Children: Julia Louis-Dreyfus (1982–85),” Splitsider, Dec. 18, 2012, http://splitsider.com/2012/12/saturday-nights-children-julia-louis-dreyfus-1982-1985/.
shocked to find a cutthroat atmosphere: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, interview by Dave Davies, Fresh Air, NPR, May 3, 2012.
New York sensibility: Margot Dougherty, “Laughing Out Loud with Julia Louis-Dreyfus,” More, April 2013.
Lucille Ball, Mary Tyler Moore: Daniel Fienberg, “Julia Louis-Dreyfus Talks Emmys, ‘Veep,’ and the New Nicole Holofcener Film,” Hitfix, Aug. 8, 2012, http://www.hitfix.com/the-fien-print/julia-louis-dreyfus-talks-emmys-veep-and-obscenities.
Preston Sturges’s funny, sexy heroines: John Patterson, “Julia Louis-Dreyfus: Bucking the Seinfeld ‘Curse,’ ” Guardian, June 15, 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2012/jun/15/julia-louis-
dreyfus-veep-iannucci.
parents wouldn’t allow her: Kolbert, “A Visit with: Julia Louis-Dreyfus.”
left Northwestern before graduating: Jenny Hontz, “On the Wild Side,” Northwestern, Fall 2014.
eating cereal: Scott Feinberg, “Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Queen of Frazzled Single Women, on Taking Her Act to the Big Screen,” Hollywood Reporter, Dec. 11, 2013.
sat on a sofa: “Queen of the Castle: The Elaine Benes Story,” Seinfeld, season 7 (Culver City, CA): Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 2006), DVD.
figured this thing would get canceled: Patterson, “Julia Louis-Dreyfus: Bucking the Seinfeld ‘Curse.’ ”
cowboy boots: “Queen of the Castle: The Elaine Benes Story.”
came from her upbringing: Kolbert, “A Visit with: Julia Louis-Dreyfus.”
good enough to worry Alexander: Alexander, interview by Amy Harrington.
Thelonious Monk poster: Smith, “Jerry Seinfeld: Making Something Out of Nothing.”
crunched on cereal: Larry David, interview by Jerry Seinfeld, “Larry Eats a Pancake, Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, July 19, 2012: http://comediansincarsgettingcoffee.com/larry-david-larry-eats-a-pancake.
holding on to most of Cheers’ audience: Steve Weinstein, “ ‘The Simpsons’ Jumps Into the Top 10,” Los Angeles Times, June 6, 1990.
later recalled Fox rejecting the idea: “Kramer vs. Kramer: Kenny to Cosmo.”
Preston Beckman: Littlefield, Top of the Rock, 87.
“brisk funniness”: Ken Tucker, “White House Showcase, Jerry Seinfeld Sitcom,” Inquirer, July 5, 1989.
“This Jerry Seinfeld”: Tom Shales, “He’s a Stand-Up Kind of Guy,” Philadelphia Daily News, May 31, 1990.