`Curb Your Enthusiasm'
Larry David's “Curb Your Enthusiasm” just ended after 12 seasons on HBO. Some background here… Larry David was the producing partner and writer on “Seinfeld” with Jerry Seinfeld. It was a show about nothing and became one of the most popular TV shows ever and lives on in syndication, most recently on Netflix. Larry wrote many of the iconic Seinfeld episodes, such as “Bubble Boy,” “The Contest” (Master of my domain!), “The Face Painter” and “The Puffy Shirt.”
We're dealing with Hollywood here and huge egos. After seven seasons, Jerry approaches Larry and says, “It's my name on the show and your scripts are getting all the media attention. I'm gonna pay you to go away. Give me a number.”
Larry says, “How's $85 million?”
Jerry: “Done!”
So, Larry David takes his insane check and moves to LA's Westside with all the other entertainment, finance and entrepreneurial moguls. It's rumored that both Larry and Jerry have each earned over $1 billion (with a “B”) from the syndication of Seinfeld.
Years go by and HBO approaches Larry and tells him, “We want you to do a show about nothing, but here in LA.” This was how Curb Your Enthusiasm was born. Larry got to hire his friends and his new series attracted a who's who of Hollywood celebrities that wanted to do cameo roles, including the cast of Seinfeld (Jerry Seinfeld, Michael Richards, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander), Sean Penn, Michael J. Fox, Jon Hamm, Shaquille O'Neal, Bob Odenkirk, Elizabeth Banks, Ben Stiller, Bill Buckner (Boston Red Sox), Rob Reiner, Gina Gershon, Hugh Hefner, Stephen Colbert, David Schwimmer, Dustin Hoffman, Martin Scorsese, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Mel Brooks along his wife Anne Bancroft, Ted Danson and his wife Mary Steenburgen, Woody Harrelson, Bryan Cranston, Bill Hader, Vince Vaughn and Bruce Springsteen. The list goes on and on as actors loved the free-flowing style of production and the fact they can make fun of themselves.
There were no scripts, only story outlines for each scene. The actors got to improvise their lines and they shot each scene five or six different ways. Then in post-production, they decided which shot worked best. Interesting fact as it took 24 years to produce 12 seasons of “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” They produced another season whenever Larry felt like working and he took six years off between seasons 8 and 9.
Larry David played an obnoxious version of himself, a billionaire with zero human qualities and no filter. If Larry had a thought in his head, it came out of his mouth. Without trying too hard, narcissist Larry offended everyone around him. The show is about all the people who annoy Larry and how he annoys them back. Larry's character had long-winded opinions on everything in life, usually wrong.
Fans of the show have their favorite episodes. Mine are:
“Palestinian Chicken” — A Palestine chicken restaurant opens next to a Jewish deli. Larry falls for the Arab restaurant owner and during their sexual encounter, she screams antisemitic insults at Larry. I still laugh out loud today.
“The Car Pool Lane” — Larry picks up a prostitute as he needs a second passenger to use the diamond lane in heavy freeway traffic so he can get to the LA Dodgers opening day game.
“Happy New Year” — Larry uses a red MAGA hat to repel people he doesn't want to be around. The Westside of LA is heavily Jewish and very liberal, so nobody wants to be around someone wearing a red MAGA hat.
“The Ski Lift” — Due to mechanical issues, Larry is stuck on a ski lift with an orthodox Jewish woman. She informs Larry that Orthodox Jewish women can't be with any man who is not her husband after sundown. One of them has to jump off the ski lift 50 feet above the snow. You already know where this is going.
“Opening Night” — Larry plays the role of Max Bialystock in Mel Brook's Broadway production of “The Producers”.
“The Black Swan” — Larry kills the pet black swan of his country club's manager.
“The Grand Opening” — Larry invests, with other partners, in a new restaurant. They find out the hard way that the replacement chef they hired was a Holocaust survivor and has Tourette's syndrome and screams obscenities from the open-air kitchen.
“Shaq” — Sitting courtside for a Lakers game, Larry trips and injures Shaquille O'Neal.
If ya got HBO's Max streaming service, I recommend you watch “Palestinian Chicken,” season 8, episode 3.