Jerry Seinfeld & Larry David On The 4 Episodes That Defined Television

0:00You can't get smaller than that. It's a dot. We made a show out of a dot.

0:06Jerry Seinfeld: This is my greatest regret of the entire series. That might be the funniest bit ever in Seinfeld. What about you? Do you have anything to do? I sit here silent. Please make a note that Larry Oaks agreed with me on something. To make this interesting, because it's not, what if we have a little bet going of how many of his list and my list are the same? What's the bet? Whatever he makes. One of the most famous super agents. Hollywood super agent. Super agent Ari Emanuel. Famously the inspiration for the Ari Gold character in Entourage. Welcome to Rushmore. We are the civilians. The experts are here.

0:57All right, you know how you're always giving me a hard time that I can't ever make anything? You're always like, man, you, like, I just, I'm all ideas. Yeah. I made our site. You made our site? Yeah, I made our site. You didn't do s***. No, I made our site. Okay, how did you do that? It has everything. I made our site with Lovable. Oh, I kind of made our site. Lovable helped me make the site, but I did it. Whoa. And it has everything we talked about. It has a fantasy Rushmore simulator where you can type in your dream Rushmores with historical figures. How'd you do that? Yeah, exactly. Because I'm a genius.

1:29Lovable has made me a genius. No, actually, Lovable is a genius. Okay, you know what? And you are just semi-genius because you went to Lovable. This is semantics. I think what's important here is that I'm a genius, actually, and that I've made an incredible site with Lovable that I think you will be impressed with. Listen, here's what it is. Ready? You've always been Lovable, but Lovable is Lovable. Okay, agreed. Great. Agreed. Our site now, because of Lovable, is going to be incredible. And so thank you, Lovable. We've got this Fantasy Rushmore Simulator. We've got an archive of every episode we've ever done.

2:02We've got beautiful pictures of both of us on there that you can click. I need mine a little bit more airbrushed. Yeah, you do. I was going to say that to them, actually. It's a gorgeous site. Anybody trying to create a website should go to Lovable. because they're actually incredible at it. They keep on kind of iterating it and make it better and better and better. And so they've been incredible. Unbelievable. I've never known how, I can't code anything. I have no idea how to build anything online. And I have built a site and I'm actually building another one for fun right now. So. Thanks guys.

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2:59Let's go. Hey, everybody. So I don't know how many of you have watched the podcast. Okay, thank you. We appreciate that. So I don't know if all of you got the playbills. If you look inside the playbill, I think Warren Littlefield, who was at the time became president of NBC, we called him and he gave us a research report. It was first called, as you may or may not know, Seinfeld Chronicles. And this was the research report. Let's put it on up. It's in your playbills. This is the memo shared around the NBC executives after the Seinfeld Chronicles pilot, which is what it was called, aired. As one viewer put it, you can't get too excited about going to the laundromat.

3:53No segment of the audience was eager to watch the show again. Jerry's loser friend George, who was not a particularly forceful character, actually appeared somewhat more in charge, and viewers found it annoying that Jerry needed things to be explained to him. None of the supports were particularly liked And viewers felt that Jerry needed a better backup ensemble Despite the slice of life approach The program was considered only mildly realistic and believable And many did not identify with the things with which Jerry was involved Now, this show went The pilot was shot and viewed by the NBC May 28th-ish And it wasn't picked up at the time and then months happened.

4:38Kind of now we're going to bring out the legends themselves. The legends themselves, Jerry and Larry.

4:50You know what? So before we get started with the normal process, I'm just, Larry controls production of everything. He was very mad at me the whole time. I'm disgusted. this whole thing, okay? Okay. Because we didn't share with him our choices, which is the show that Ben and I created, not Larry. And he's very upset about that. So, Larry, please go. First of all, I don't like not being in control of something. We understand. And it makes me very anxious. I got it. That I'm leaving myself in your hands. Yes. Because I don't know what's going on here. Okay. Okay. So... And I don't like it. Okay.

5:37So we just read, I don't know if you heard it backstage.

5:42Jerry Seinfeld: We did. The research report. So if... We know it well. You know it well. Yeah. We've memorized it. And we both separately, without knowing, put it up in our toilets in our house. That's true. Yes. Yeah. So May 28th happens. You see... Did they show you the research report? Okay. They just said we're not picking up the show. Okay, so... And I was thrilled. Okay, okay. So May, June, July happens, as my understanding. A few months later, Castle Rock calls NBC. I don't know if you guys know this. They talk to Warren Littlefield, who's in the audience, and they say to Warren, you know, we got nothing picked up.

6:26You know, what are we going to do on this show? We want a show. everybody internally liked the show even though as we read the reviews wasn't great that i never heard okay okay okay hold on and warren talked because this came out of the budget of specials like bob hope's christmas show that's right okay yeah variety variety yeah and i think they had already spent all the money on all the pilots and warren goes i think it was ludwig rick ludwin with rick ludwig and he goes to him you gotta tell bob we're not going to do this christmas special we need two million dollars ish to give you four million four more shows right did you remember that yeah okay yeah yeah we yeah it was rick ludwig champion the show at nbc Right, Warren?

7:24Isn't that the way it happened? Yeah. Okay. They call you and they say, okay, do four more episodes. Okay? And in the first episode, Elaine's not in the show. The pilot. The pilot. So walk through how you guys decided what the next four episodes were going to be.

7:41Jerry Seinfeld: Well, they told us, as you remember, you need a girl in this show. Yeah, we had a girl. We had a... A waitress. A waitress. Yeah. But that really wasn't... It wasn't enough. How much time are they going to spend in that coffee shop? Left, caffeinated, right, or whatever. Yeah, that thing. Because we were two single guys. Relationship, we couldn't write a relationship. We didn't know anything about it. I had a... I was dating Richard Yates' daughter. Monica Yates. Monica Yates. I was dating her. For how long? What's the difference? I'm just asking the questions. I'm asking the questions here. What the fuck?

8:21How long can I date anyone for? Or how long could they take you? How long can I take? Yeah, okay. Two months. Okay, I'm sorry I asked the question, Jerry. Okay, okay, two months. Two months. And so, for some reason, we were able to remain friends afterwards. That was the basis of the...

8:40Jerry Seinfeld: Yeah, we thought if it's an ex-girlfriend, then you wouldn't have a will-they-won't-they thing, which we didn't want to deal with. And obviously, it would be someone of substance that would be fun to play with. and Larry knew Julia from SNL and he suggested her and we met with her and that was it. We did audition a lot of women. We did. We did. Was there anybody close besides her? No. But when I met with her and I read with her in another room for some reason. I don't know why. The two of you, yeah. So we go and I read the scene with her and I can see she's so perfect. She's such a strong and funny and hilarious.

9:22She's got a thousand moves. If you were taking her one-on-one in basketball, she would destroy you. She just can go left, go right, jump shot, stop, pivot, do anything.

9:32Jerry Seinfeld: Yeah. And Larry was staying in my apartment. I had a little two-bedroom apartment in West Hollywood. The deal was she had something that she had to do, a deal she had to get out of to do the show. And I said, if we can get her, forget it. She was so perfect and so she just matched the energy and the attitude that we have and that the other guys had. When you thought you if you got her it would be did you tell that thought process to Larry? I did I told him. And were you okay with that thought process Larry or were you like please I don't have any more? I said we're going to be very rich. I said we're going to be very rich.

10:12Now can I ask because we were talking about Go ahead. Can I ask the questions here? If you must. Okay, no problem. The first meeting, how did you meet?

10:24Jerry Seinfeld: Larry and I? Yeah. Well, we were both stand-up comics in New York in the 70s. Where? Where was the first meeting? Catcher Eye, the Star, the Improv. And we would talk in the bar. And when we would talk, it was literally just dialogue. You would just say, you could just put this in a show and it's hilarious. We were just doing it backstage just now. And also, we would occasionally write together. Yeah. he would bring his premises and i would bring mine and for jokes or just stand up stand up and we'd go to central park and and we'd just go over each other's material and and i would make suggestions and he would make suggestions to me got it so we always had a a excellent comedic rapport all right and so now the the five have aired right and you get a call my understanding warren littlefield's right up in the front row here stand up Warren Warren Littlefield he had just become the president and and Seinfeld happened and um Warren calls you I think he called you maybe and you said but when he picked up the four you said something like how many shows I'm gonna screw this up Warren so if I screw please help me how many shows make it past five episodes that get this rhythm no one had ever no network correct me if I'm wrong, Warren, no network had ever ordered four episodes of anything.

11:48Jerry Seinfeld: Plus a pilot. We don't really want this. I don't even know. Smallest order in the history of television. Smallest. Yeah. So they then call you after, because it was on Wednesday, not a Thursday after Cheers. I think so. That's right. And they said that they're going to pick up 12 more. Mm-hmm. and you say that and I've my understanding and don't squint at me Larry you say I don't have any more stories after eight yeah I must have said that I said I said it every season I said it every curb season yeah and 12 episodes was still kind of a half order it was a mid-season 12 episodes was a mid-season 13 actually 13 yeah it was also a half order yeah yeah and then the last bit of history of this um i think uh alan horn's in the audience too from castle rock alan are you here alan hey hey al hi he gets the call that they're moving it to after after cheers because it was the last season of cheers they were going to move you because it was doing well they were going to move you to the cheers slot right and i think mr date first they were moving us to 9 30 on Thursday night.

13:06Jerry Seinfeld: Can you just say the show had a rocky beginning and move on? No, no, no, no, no. Because these lines, these lines are the greatest lines of all time. You're sitting there asking a question, Larry is sitting there, and Larry goes, something to the effect of. I said, if they're not watching us on Wednesday, I don't want them watching on Thursday. Yeah. And they said, essentially, fuck you, we're moving it to Thursday. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They didn't listen to you. Thank God. Okay, so before we get started on the normal where you're going to... Yeah, yeah. Okay, I want to do a little bit of Seinfeld pop culture moments in my life that I still use because of the show.

13:47And I would just like to ask you how they came about. Because I use them, friends of mine use them all the time.

13:54Jerry Seinfeld: I'm not good at this. Larry's going to... Yeah, you're going to run. So the phrase which I have used with you, close talker. It wouldn't be any trouble? Of course not. When could it go? How about right now? How did you come up with that one? Did something happen? There are thousands of them. There's probably 200 in the audience tonight. Just people who just have no sense that they're talking like this to you. And you have to keep backing up until you fall. You know. A close talker. Yeah, but there's not only close talkers. Hold on. There's loud talkers. Hold on, I got... My brother's a loud talker.

14:37I'm online with him in a movie. I have to... He wants everyone to hear what he has to say. Okay. And then there's the low talker. Well, that was a good one. Wow.

14:52Jerry Seinfeld: What's that? Excuse me? Which is low talking, which we're going to get into later. Yeah. Okay. Okay, re-gift. You don't have the label maker, do you? Uh, no. I knew it! You're a re-gifter! Oh, yeah, some gift. How did that come up? Which one? Re-gift. That was Berg and Schaefer. Re-gift, yeah. That was a, that was a, one of the classics. Yeah. How about double dip? Did you just double dip that chip? Excuse me? You double dipped the chip! Which I'd never, I didn't know this kind of happened from Seinfeld. You dip once and end it.

15:30Okay, and then there's everything Nazi. Soup Nazi, this Nazi. I mean, everybody uses the phrase blank Nazi. This guy makes the best soup in the city, Jerry. The best. You know what they call him? Soup Nazi.

15:44Jerry Seinfeld: That was Spike Ferriston. Spike, yeah. Who was a writer on Letterman. and he was pitching shows, and we were asking him what's going on in New York, and he said, well, for lunch, we go to this place that the guy's really hostile, and they call him a soup Nazi. And we went, let's hear more about that. It's amazing how often, like, writers would, you know, they'd be talking, and they didn't know that they had gold right in their hands. Spike, that's a show. The soup Nazi. Okay. In the vault, which I've used with you and you've used... Here's what I was hoping this would come up. But you can't say anything to him, right?

16:22Jerry Seinfeld: I'm not saying anything. I'm putting it in the vault. I'm locking the vault. It's a vault! I wonder if you remember this. This is my greatest regret of the entire series. We had this bit on the show where if you wanted someone to keep a secret, you would say to them, well, you put it in the vault, and they would go, it's in the vault. It's in the vault, yeah. And there was one dialogue. I wonder if you can remember this. It was one section of dialogue we were working on, and we had established this running little line. And there was an opportunity for a character to say, but it's in the vault, and the other character would go, oy, the vault.

17:01I said, Larry, we're never going to get a chance

17:05Jerry Seinfeld: to make this joke ever again in our lives. To go, oy, the vault. Do you remember this conversation? I do, yeah. And I begged him, and he didn't want to do it. Okay, who came up with yada, yada, yada? Oh, I'm sure you have. They're out on the ocean and yada, yada, yada. And she says, those aren't buoys. Peter Melman. Melman, yeah. Wow, that was good. Okay, and then one of the greats of all time. Master of my domain. He was not master of his domain. Well that came from us playing with not using the word masturbation. We thought it would be more fun to just slalom around it and so we just started making up classics and there's more but I thought those were the classics we went over so here's how this goes now okay well what about you I sit here sorry yeah a lot okay okay so here's what I guess paid a lot a ton so Jerry Jerry you now you let this guy railroad you here you now shut the fuck it's either him or you okay so you now introduce Larry and then Larry introduces you kind of like that's how the fucking show go fuck you yeah you want me to introduce him Jerry talk you know you've never watched the the podcast right and yes I know I watched the one so about the end of but yeah Leno introduced and then okay you know guys don't want to do that because you guys are like okay so here's what we're gonna doubt you we're now gonna do okay relax relax relax relax okay we're now gonna do you're gonna do your four okay you name them in in a row okay Larry you're gonna name your four well I don't know his name Ben's gonna do his four and then I'm gonna do my four yeah okay well to make this interesting because it's not.

19:27Jerry Seinfeld: What if we have a little bet going of how many of his list and my list are the same? Because I'm going to bet that there's two that we have that are the same. I'm going to bet that there's one. Okay. Okay. What's the bet? Now we got a little something going here. Well, what's the bet? He says there'll be one show that's on both our lives. I get that. I say there'll be two. What's the wager? What's the wager? Whatever he makes.

19:59Jerry Seinfeld: Okay.

20:04Jerry Seinfeld: So he doesn't get anything tonight. No, he's a problem. All right, so your four. Okay, my four, not in chronological order. And I actually gave this a little thought. Wow. Did you do a little work? How much thought did you give it? I gave it some thought. Did you watch anything? No, I don't need to watch it. I did them. I was there. I lost a bet in the background to Larry based on that. Okay, my four are not in order of... There's no order. No order. I'm not rushing, but there's no order. The contest. You caved? It's over? You're out? Oh, my God. The queen is dead. I figured you'd cruise, at least through the spring.

20:53Jerry Seinfeld: That's gonna be on his list, too. The soup Nazi. Bread,$2 extra. $2? But everyone in front of me got free bread. You want bread? Yes, please. $3! What? No soup for you.

21:15Jerry Seinfeld: The Merv Griffin show, because I love that premise. This is the set from the old Merv Griffin show. They must be throwing it out. This stuff belongs in the Smithsonian. Yeah, at least in the dumpster behind the Smithsonian.

21:34Jerry Seinfeld: One minute Elliot Gould is sitting on you, and the next thing, your yesterday's trash. Come on, Kramer, get out of there. No, no, no, you go ahead. I'm not finished taking this in. oh jerry look merv griffin's cigar and the marine biologist very sick very sick in his head what did you do next then from out of nowhere a huge tidal wave lifted me tossed me like a cork and i found myself right on top of him face to face with the blowhole i i could barely see from the waves crashing down upon me but i knew something was there So I reached my hand and felt around and pulled out the obstruction.

22:19Wow. Now, do you want to go over how those came to be, or we can do that later?

22:25Jerry Seinfeld: Um, well, the contest doesn't require an explanation. The Soup Nazi doesn't either. Just the idea of the word Nazi in the episode. It's a Jewish show. It was just such a great, fun thing to do. The Marine Biologist, that was the best story tie-in finish to an episode we ever did. Yeah, that's true. Jason's speech at the end makes that. Monologue of the ages. Makes that. And the Merv Griffin show, because Kramer finds Merv Griffin's set in a dumpster and sets it up in his apartment. So just based on that one sentence. Enough said. That's it. So they're all high-concept shows. Yep. And I toyed with the boyfriend and the Merv Griffin.

23:13Jerry Seinfeld: I kind of went back and forth because I really like the boyfriend. That's a penalty. You can't mention the fifth one. You can only say what you say. I'm just conversing. It's a podcast, isn't it? People just talk. R &L D. So that's it. I love the choices. Okay. Contest. Got it. Why don't you tell the story of you pitching me the idea? First of all, the contest was in my notebook for a couple of years. Explain the notebook. My list of ideas. Explain the notebook. Had you done it, Larry? Had you done the contest? I was in a contest. You were in a contest. Yes. I was in a contest. And, you know, I wrote it in my idea book because I thought, oh, this is a funny idea.

24:04Every idea that I had that I thought was worthy of a show, as I would go through the notebook and we'd be sitting across from each other, I'd go and I would mention one, then I'd mention another, you know, some he liked, some he didn't. And then every time I saw the contest, I would just pass on it. I wouldn't even bring it up because I didn't think there was any possibility that he would want to do it. So for two years, I would pass it up in my notebook. And then finally one day, I said to him, here's an idea.

24:43And so I tell him about the contest, and he goes, love it. Love it.

24:48Jerry Seinfeld: Yeah. Wow. And so... And the look on his face when I said, that's funny, I like that idea. He was so shocked, it was the funniest look. Why do you think he wouldn't like it? Did you guys think that the network was going to let you guys do it? Or were you... I don't even think we thought about it. No, I didn't think they were going to let me do it. And in my head... So we would write titles of upcoming episodes on this board in our office. And NBC would come in every week to the read-through. Then they'd come back to our office to give us notes. Warren, we never listened to any of those notes. And so they would ask, well, what's this show about?

25:28What's that one about? And we didn't even put the contest up on the board because I didn't want them to ask us, what's this about? Right. And so it's the day of the read-through of the contest. And I have built myself up into this state. You're ready for battle. Because I know they're not going to let us do this show. Right. I just know it. And I know that I'm quitting if they don't. I am going to quit, okay? First of all, the read-through was insane. It was crazy. Was there a network exec at the read-through? Yeah, they were at the read-through. And as we're walking back to the office, I go, fuck them, I'm quitting.

26:14Which you had done on SNL, right? What's that? You'd done this on SNL. You'd quit. Well, the episode about him, yeah. Oh, that was another story, yeah. Anyway, they came back to the office. Fine, they didn't have a problem with anything. Sometimes, sometimes they would give us a note like, we don't know his name in the first act.

26:34Jerry Seinfeld: Right, yeah. Oh yeah, that's a good one, yeah. That's how you handle the networks. When they could give you something you can do, you pretend it's the greatest note in the world. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we can do that, we can do that. Yeah. So we've got to talk now about Lovable. Oh good. Because I don't think people realize, because I would definitely not know how to build a website. Lovable made it so easy. You and them working on it. It's incredible. It does everything that we've all talked about. And it did it like seamlessly. You are unbelievably lovable. But you know what's more lovable than you?

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28:47Just go to linkedin.com slash Rushmore. That's linkedin.com slash Rushmore. Terms and conditions apply. Now, can I ask you a question, Larry? Did you ever...

28:55Jerry Seinfeld: You don't have to say, can I ask you a question. You don't have to say that. No, that's how I do it. This is a show... Sometimes with him, you can't ask the question. It is true. You cannot ask the question sometimes. Yes, you can. Was there ever a moment that you, at the beginning, that they gave you notes on the show that you said, I'm out, I'm done, I'm not doing this, I'm leaving. Oh, yeah. What happened? Well, I was called... What season? The second season? This is after the 13 shows. Got it. I was called in... Jerry and I flew in from New York for a big meeting. They wanted to have a big meeting.

29:31And everybody from Castle Rock was there. And in the parking lot, Jerry's managers were there. But in the parking lot, before we went up to the meeting, they said to me, let them talk, okay? Don't say anything. This is after the 13th. This is after the 13th. I flew in from New York for this meeting. I said, okay, I'll let them talk. So they talked. Was Warren in the meeting? Warren, yeah, Warren was at the meeting. So they talked. and they were giving us sort of a way to go for the next season. Things that they didn't like, the Chinese restaurant in particular, and things they did like, but some of the things they didn't like, I liked, okay?

30:28And I didn't like anything that they said, okay? And so after, in the parking lot, I didn't say anything. I bit my tongue and in the parking lot after we were all gathered around in a circle I said good luck I'm not I'm not doing it I can't do it you're not doing any of their notes I'm not I'm not doing any of it I and I I'm quitting I'm not doing any of it and uh Alan Horn is here and he's yeah Yeah, yeah.

31:05Don't worry. Yeah, we'll take care of it. And they did.

31:09Jerry Seinfeld: And Jerry, what were you saying at the time when he's... Oh, it was so funny. It was just so entertaining. He said, this is what the show's about, and we're not changing it. Remember this line? Yeah. You said that in the meeting. I said that in the first... Yeah, I said that in the meeting. This is what the show's going to be, and we wanted to do, you know, the show of just absurd little conversations. We didn't want to have big plots, which of course we ended up having. But anyway, he says, this is what the show is, and we're not changing it. That was Larry's great line. How long was the meeting?

31:43Short. I was about... And Jerry, you were like, all right, if he wants to be hard-nosed about it, we're doing it. He always would calm me down. He'd go, don't worry, it'll be fine. Because it wasn't the first time that I quit.

32:01Jerry Seinfeld: All right, LD. Yeah. You're full. Okay, back to your list. So the contest. Yeah. So the contest? Yeah.

32:11I'm out.

32:26What? I'm out. I'm out of the contest. Next would be the opposite. My name is George. I'm unemployed and I live with my parents.

32:41Jerry Seinfeld: I'm Victoria. Hi.

32:48I just thought it was a really interesting concept. Great concept. And then, of course, Elaine, yeah, she becomes George. She turns into George. She loses her boyfriend, she loses her job, and she screams out, I'm George, I'm George. And he gets his$20 back. And he's even - He stays even-steven. The whole show, he plays poker, he breaks even. Everything that happens to him, it doesn't matter because he's going to even out in the end. So I like that dynamic.

33:21Jerry Seinfeld: My favorite line in that show is when George and I come up with this idea, And I say to him, well, George, if everything you do is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right. At the diner. At the diner, yeah. I love that line because it's just a pure absurdity, but he's stupid enough to believe it.

33:42Jerry Seinfeld: Okay, the opposite. Then I... And then the puffy shirt. Oh.

33:55Now that's a great looking shirt. Aye, Captain. I'm glad I ironed it. It's perfect. Look at it. It's fantastic. Kramer, how am I going to wear this? I can't wear this. This looks better than anything you own. You know, in two months' time, everybody's going to be wearing the pirate look. Oh, my God.

34:18Jerry Seinfeld: Ah.

34:22So I'm out to dinner, and this woman is sitting across from me.

34:29So first I'm going, I'm sorry, I can't. I'm sorry, I can't hear you. So she says, at first she makes it a little louder, and then her voice drops.

34:42And I go, okay, this is really funny. What if I had agreed to something crazy? And I come back in the office and I say, well, what could we agree to? We start to talk about it. And I had this blousey white shirt that I got in a secondhand store on Melrose Avenue. And I loved this shirt. It was blousey. It flowed. It was like a pirate shirt.

35:16And so then we started talking.

35:19Jerry Seinfeld: It took a long time, though, until you found the right thing. Yeah. That it was a puffy shirt. The greatest, I thought in that episode, George's mom and dad, as it relates to people in the show, those two were, and she was incredible when he moved in with her. The contest was her first show, and the puffer shirt was Jerry Stiller's first show. But the bologna sandwich, oh my god, and then with the hand and the nails. That's the hand model. And that was, she was unbelievable. The original? I mean, she was brilliant casting. Yeah. Had she done anything before? Sure. Estelle? Oh, sure, yeah. Is that the episode where the original hand model had been an obsessive masturbator?

36:06What's that? In that episode, right? The hand model, the original hand model, like the greatest hand model ever. Yes, yes. Well, he was... George had won the... He was not a master of his domain. Yeah. Right. And, um... Okay, so... Is that it? Is that four? No, that's three. That's three. That's three. Fourth would be the pen. Take the pen. Oh, no.

36:29Jerry Seinfeld: Go ahead. I couldn't. Come on, take the pen. I can't take it. Do me a personal thing. No, I'm not comfortable. Take the pen. I cannot take it. Take the pen. Are you sure? I'm positive. Thank the fans. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, Chief. Boy. Jack, what are you doing? Stop it. Jack, we should go. Oh, the pen. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good one. And, you know... This is not fair. It's really hard to do. Hard to do. Yeah. It's going to be hard to come up with four. Jerry's manager had... He came into the office one day. He had this pen. And I'm going, what's that? It's a tiny little pen. That's interesting.

37:05He goes, yeah, it's a space pen. Writes upside down. No kidding. He says, you want it? I go, no. Take the pen. OK. And then, of course, after I took the pen, you start to think, I have taken it.

37:24And Jerry's mom lived in Florida in one of those developments. My parents lived down there. So we had an affinity for that area and how they function. Right. And the friend who was head of the... was hysterical. The guy with the pen. Oh, he was unbelievable.

37:43Jerry Seinfeld: Sandy Barron. Oh, my God. That's the only episode without George, right? What's that? That's the only episode without George. I'm sorry. Yes, the only episode without George and Kramer also. Yeah, okay. And Sandy Barron, God bless him, may he rest, He had terrible health conditions. Emphysema. Emphysema, but it made him even funnier. It was the funniest emphysema. He couldn't catch his breath. He couldn't. Take it! Take it! Take it! Take it! He would stop in the middle of a line to get another breath to get the last three words out. He was so... Yeah, and he would wear those track suits. and he would zip down here.

38:31Jerry Seinfeld: It was just so horrible. But that was the new... You had changed out the father, your father. That's correct. John Randolph, of course, the first father. He changed the father before that show. Yeah. And, you know, I had others that were very close to making... Can I just mention a few? No, you can't. It's just a conversation, Ari. It's just a conversation. No. Oh, shit, go ahead. Okay, Ben, your four. We're gonna fight over the final four. Oh, Jared, we're gonna fight. We're gonna fight. My first is the contest. You know who isn't here? He was in the early class today, but I think you made quite an impression on him yesterday.

39:18What? What? Who? Me? Me? I made an impression? What impression? Let me just put this back. No, no, now, tell me now. What did he say? He asked about you. He asked about me. John Kennedy asked about me. What did he say? He wanted to know your situation. What situation? I have a situation. I told him you were single. That was good. That was very good. He said you were just his type. Okay, you're trying to hurt me. Are you trying to hurt me? You're trying to injure me, right? You're trying to hurt me. For the obvious reasons. My second is the opposite. Do you know what's going on here? Can't you see what's happened?

39:52I've become George.

39:55Jerry Seinfeld: Don't say that. It's true. I'm George. I'm George. So you won the bet by that. We only had one in common. Yeah. I just love George. I like seeing him have his moment. And I like seeing him get his job at the Yankees. The boyfriend?

40:23Did anybody call here asking for Vanderlei Industries? No, what happened to you? All right, listen closely. I was at the unemployment office, and I told them I was very close to getting a job with Vandalay Industries, and I gave them your phone number. So now, when the phone rings, you have to answer Vandalay Industries.

40:41Jerry Seinfeld: I'm Vandalay Industries? Right. What is that? You're in latex. Latex? Right. And what do I do with latex? I don't know. You manufacture it. Right here in this little apartment? And what do I say about you? You're considering hiring me for your latex salesman? I'm going to hire you as my latex salesman? Right. I don't think so. Wow. Can't argue with that. That's good. Yeah. Also, the boyfriend has the great, has maybe my favorite Vandelay arc of latex salesman. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And George really wanted to be a buff. They find out Keith Hernandez is like a history buff. He's like, I want to be a buff.

41:24Unbelievable. And my favorite episode, and I think it's funny based on what you guys were talking about, is the pitch. This should be the show. This is the show. What? This. Just talking. Yeah.

41:48I'm really serious. I think that's a good idea. Just talking? Well, what's the show about? It's about nothing.

41:58Which, to me, is also funny, because as the show, you know, I didn't know this until we kind of dove in so intensely over the past few months, but season four, the show went crazy because it moved to this slot, and at the beginning of season four, you have this kind of meta moment of you guys pitching the show that you're watching now. And so the entire world falls in love with Seinfeld, or those who haven't already, fall in love as you guys are kind of storying the selling of Seinfeld. Yeah, that was a great coffee shop scene. Oh, yeah. Also, just, I mean, George's off-Broadway play, La Cocina, is, um...

42:36And the raisin scene was unbelievable. Just the perfect episode. Those are my four. Okay, mine is a puffy shirt.

42:44Jerry Seinfeld: I agreed to wear this? Yeah, yeah. Well, when did I do that? When we went to dinner the other night. What, are you crazy? What were you talking about when I went to the bathroom? I don't know. I couldn't understand a word she was saying. I was just nodding. There you go. Where did I go? You mean she was asking me to wear this ridiculous shirt? This pirate trend that she's come up with, Jerry, this is going to be the new look for the 90s. You're going to be the first pirate. But I don't want to be a pirate. Um, the boyfriend? Say that again. Back and to the left. Back and to the left. Back and to the left.

43:29So what are you saying?

43:31Jerry Seinfeld: I'm saying that the spit could not have come from behind. That there had to have been a second spitter.

43:43The contest? I am never doing that again. What? You mean in your mother's house or all together? All together. Oh, give me a break. Right.

43:56Jerry Seinfeld: Come on. You don't think I can? No chance. You think you could? Well, I know I could hold out longer than you. Care to make it interesting?

44:10And I think the funniest moment in all of Seinfeld, the note.

44:29How did you hurt this? And then I took my pants off. You took your pants off? From my hamstring. Oh. He got about, uh, two inches from... there. Really? I think it moved.

44:50It moved? It may have moved, I don't know. I'm sure it didn't move. It moved! Oh, yeah, George... I don't... There are two scenes when he's doing the hamstrings, and then when he comes back... Yeah. ...and the conversation with you... Yeah. ...about what happened, and your conversation with him... It moved. It moved. He got the massage from the body. Oh, the move, yes. Yeah. That might be the funniest bit ever in Seinfeld. Okay, so now... We're the final four. We're now... I'm assuming on the final four, there's the contest. Everybody picked it, right? Yes.

45:32Okay, so you got to read them off. We got two boyfriends. We got two opposites. And then we got... We have marine biologists. We got Merv Griffin. We got Subnazi. We got the puffy shirt. We've got the note. I don't think you could go with the pen because you didn't have all four in it. You didn't have all four characters. What's the first thing you said? How what? I don't think the pen can be on there because not all four characters. Okay. Please make a note that Larry Oaks agreed with me on something.

46:11Jerry Seinfeld: But wouldn't you agree that the convergence, which really became one of the trademarks of the show, was the story converging in the end unexpectedly. In the marine biologist, that's the best convergence. I actually think... Which, by the way, and everybody probably knows this story, we didn't have that it was Kramer's golf ball that put the whale in distress until the night before we were shooting. I thought the best one was Puffy Shirt for that. With the moving in, him getting the job after he met them. the kind of low talker. You then got to link back when you say in that episode, I'm a master of my domain when he's getting his hands done.

47:01Yes. I don't know. Not to, because you're the expert.

47:05Jerry Seinfeld: No, there's no experts. It's whatever you like. There's no experts. The puffy shirt is... Well, it's so silly. Yeah. You know, and we like to take... To me, the essence of the show was taking something really small. For example, the red dot. There was a show called The Red Dot. Did that happen to you? Yeah, I had a red dot on my sweater. But you can't get smaller than that. It's a dot. We made a show out of a dot. So that's what we love to do. We like to take these small little things and blow them up. And the puffy shirt was taking something really small like that, a woman, and making a big...

47:56When did, though, going to what you said, because in the Marine Corps, I think it was three or four storylines coming together at the same time. When did that process the busboy? I can tell you exactly. It was the busboy. The busboy. Um, it was... So that's when you guys realized. It was season 13. It was when all of a sudden at the end of the show, the show ended with this guy, Elaine wanted to get rid of him, who was visiting her from out of state. And she was trying to get him out of the house. And, uh, he didn't, he missed his plane. No, she woke up late just before and then she packed him.

48:32Yeah, she packed him. And then, uh, um, the busboy who they, they lost him his job. They cost him his job because of the fire or whatever. And now the busboy meets up in the hallway, offstage, off camera. And we hear them fighting. We hear the busboy fighting with Elaine's date. In the hallway, and they get into a big fistfight, all offstage. And I remember thinking that this is something to shoot for. again where stories converge like that yeah and then it became it became a thing that we tried to do all the time i mean that was that that it was um that was the first one yeah yeah and then we can get back to this i just want i just want to know why and how because i've never seen in sitcoms vandalay goes master you know master you know my domain all these things keep on going and they and they you if you're if you're in it you have to follow them the whole way and you get the link back and everything else that i had never seen in this you're talking about within the episode or other within the show well when you did you did master my domain in the contest and it then shows up in puffy shirt because when he's doing the hand modeling and the other guy was not a master and george goes i won a contest and that that linked back well you know what it was never resolved in the contest who actually won.

50:03Jerry Seinfeld: True. Why did he do that? Wasn't that a mistake? There wasn't room for it. Then the finale... People still ask. Well, George says in Publisher he said he won. Oh, right. No, but then in the finale George admits that he cheated. No, that's right. Okay, so we have the contest. There's two boyfriends, there's two opposites. I'm okay with the opposite. It was one of the... The opposite is one of the great premises. One of the great premises. The opposite is going to make it. Yeah. Are you okay with that? Yeah. So we have to determine... The four of us got to determine four. The Rushmore. Oh, okay.

50:42And you just can't have... You can't have all... I love the marine biologist. I'm perfectly happy with the marine biologist. Okay. Whoa. Same. Okay. So we got three now. I'm okay with that. I mean, how can you not love the marine biologist?

50:58Jerry Seinfeld: We have three. Maybe the audience should have some vote here. No, this is not your... No, no, no, no, no, no. What? Give us... No, that's not happening. Okay? Okay. Okay, we've got the contest. We've got the opposite. We've got the marine biologist. How do you not pick Puffy's shirt? We got... How do you not pick the boyfriend? The boyfriend. One of the great... your obsession with the Kennedy assassination in that episode. Second Spitter? Second Spitter was... Right.

51:34Yeah, and Vandalay was in that.

51:37Jerry Seinfeld: Yeah. And you want to be my latex salesman. And I got to do the speech from JFK about the magic blues of the Kevin Costner speech. That was maybe my biggest thrill of the series in terms of a speech. It was a long speech. It had a lot of laughs in it if I got it right. And, you know, there's nothing more thrilling, if I may, there's nothing more thrilling in all of show business. There's nothing more thrilling in all of show business than you're getting laughed from a live audience and it's going out to millions of people at the same time. Because you don't get that in film. You don't get that really in stand-up you only get it when you're doing a sitcom like that yeah the three camera sitcom

52:31and then elaine breaks up with them and you're break up with them then you solve the spit and then they go i mean that that episode is just yeah that was pretty good and it's a two-parter i have to uh disagree as we knew you would let's hear you out it's not it's not Seinfeldian enough in its concept It's um it takes on a big subject like the Kennedy assassination does a parody of that So it's a parody show. It's not like it's not an interesting Tell you the premise and you laugh kind of show yeah, but it's got the thing of me wanting to

53:10Jerry Seinfeld: Make friend like we we did a seduction Yeah, right the guy and the guy trying to work you the best the best guy that Jerry's ever known and and in the car scene. Yeah, that's true. And then when he's getting dressed and he asks Elaine, what do you think? Yeah, that was good. That was good. Remember, you came out with that shirt? If he waits a month to call, he has a prayer. You came out, Elaine's in the kitchen, and you have this crazy kind of shirt, red thing on, and you're asking her, what do you think about the shirt? She's like... Yeah, the kind of dating... You're trying to impress... Oh, yeah, yeah.

53:43Jerry Seinfeld: That was a good... That's what we call a switch piece. That's called a switch piece. Yeah. You take the circumstances from one situation and switch them to another, and if you can make it all line up, it's satisfying. Are you going to be okay if the boyfriend happens? Or what would be your fourth choice then? I don't know if I'm going to be okay. Okay, what's another choice from there? The puffy shirt is more unusual. Yeah. It's a more original. Yeah, it's more original. I think the puffy shirt is a more original show. It's more original. You know, you've now got the audience going, Jared. Yeah.

54:15You're in a lot of slinkage.

54:19Jerry Seinfeld: We have someone standing up here. We have a raised hand. Did we have a metal detector? Was there a metal detector? What does the raised hand say?

54:30The understudy. The understudy. No. We're not going with your... Shut up. Okay. Okay. I think the puffy shirt. Yeah, I'm good with the puffy shirt. I'm good with the puffy shirt. You're okay with the puffy shirt? Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah. So here's our... Okay. Here's our list. Hit it, Ben. We've got the contest, we've got the opposite, we've got the marine biologist, and we've got the puffy shirt. Pretty good. I think it's pretty pretty, pretty, pretty. I give it three pretties. Okay, so before we end this, because that's usually the end, we have a little guess. We have a surprise. So I don't know if about a month ago in the Wall Street Journal if any of you saw the trivia winner of Seinfeld.

55:21There was a group of people that won trivia contest on Seinfeld. So Ben and I called them. We invited them out.

55:33Jerry Seinfeld: Oh, that's unbelievable. Okay, and they're here, so let's bring them out. Okay. So these are the 2026 right here. Wow. Okay, foremost Seinfeld experts. Foremost Seinfeld experts. I got to tell you, if we were casting, right, and we needed some really nerdy Jewish Seinfeld fans, yeah, if they're available, just book these five. Yeah, book them. So what, so we cold called this young lady, and I think she was shocked by it. But what we decided to do is we're going to ask you trivia questions. Oh, I'm not. Come on, we're doing this, okay? And we'll kind of see how you do. Okay. Okay? All right, fine.

56:25So we're going to start. You can introduce yourselves, and we'll go from there. Hi, I'm Megan.

56:30Jerry Seinfeld: Hi, Megan. Okay, so in the subway, what is the name of the horse that Kramer overhears a tip about and later wins a bet on? You know, I saw that clip today because they were putting it... Because the Kentucky Derby winner came from last. And they put it next to Kramer in that great scene in the OTV. You know the name? No. L.D.? Not a clue. Not a clue. Okay, what's the name? Papernick. Who? Papernick. Papernick? Yeah, Papernick. Papernick. Papernick is starting to make some ground, but Stanford Jenner's the leader. For the sixth, the guy who's Stanford Jenner, clear.

57:11Yes! Yes!

57:13Jerry Seinfeld: Oh, because of that guy on the crew, Pete Pomponicholas. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. What was that? Tell that story. There was a guy on the crew named Pomponicholas that was just a guy that we liked. Pete Pomponicholas. Extremely gassy fellow. Okay. Second question. What's your name? Dan. In the opposite, George says he is sick of tuna on toast. Nothing has ever worked out for me with tuna on toast. Chicken salad on rye! What did he order instead? What else? What else? Oh, uh... Egg salad. No, chicken salad. But there was another one? No, no, there was a beverage. Oh, and he gets, uh... Um, and a cup of tea.

58:00And a cup of tea. Yeah, okay. I want the complete opposite of tuna on toast. chicken salad on rye, untoasted, with a side of potato salad and a cup of tea. I'm Mike. Hi, Mike. In the Seinfeld Chronicles, the first scene of the entire series opens with an exterior shot of a coffee shop showing a different name than what is used for the remainder of the series. Name the cafe.

58:33No chance, right? What letter does it start with? Pete. Pete? Pete. Pete. Pete's luncheonette.

58:42Jerry Seinfeld: See, that button's in the worst possible spot. The second button literally makes or breaks the shirt. Look at it. It's too high. Hi, I'm Matt. So in the statue, what song does George say he was singing when he broke the statue as a kid? These are the questions. By the way, these are their easier questions. We read through some of their questions. These are the easy ones. Wow. Master of the house? She says, no, that's a good guess. She says, I was getting to the part where I'll never have the recipe again. Oh, MacArthur Park. When I was 10 years old, my parents had this very same statue on the mantle of our apartment.

59:23Exactly. And one day I grabbed it. I was using it as a microphone. I was singing MacArthur Park. And I got to the part about I'll never have the recipe again. And it slipped out of my hand and it broke. Okay, in the jacket, Jerry and George sit with Alton Bennis in the lobby while waiting for Elaine. What drink does Jerry order?

59:42Jerry Seinfeld: Wow, that's really tiny. You're really getting granular. Do you remember L.D.? I'm thinking. It's non-alcoholic? I don't know. Okay. Cranberry juice with two limes. What do you have? I'll have cranberry juice with two limes. And I'll have a club soda with no ice. That's a tough one. That's a very... That's a 10 out of 10 one. That's another tough one. Okay. All right. Now, here's a good one. In the red dot, when Elaine is trying to get George a job at Pendant Publishing, Mr. Lipman asks George who he reads. I got it! What is George's first response? First response. Mike Lupica. Mike Lupica, yeah.

1:00:29Very nice. Who do you read? I like Mike Lupica. Mike Lupica? He's a sports writer for the Daily News. I don't know why we became friends with after that episode.

1:00:42Jerry Seinfeld: Oh, you did? Yeah. That was one of my favorite jokes. What authors do you like? And then he goes on to say Art Vandele, and he says his favorite work was Venetian Blinds, which is our team name. These guys are nuts.

1:01:01Thank you very much, everybody. That's fantastic. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

1:01:09Well, all I'll say is, you know, final episode, 70 million people watched it. It's been a joy kind of for Ben and I to... I think I've gone through it. Ben and I have gone through it three times. Twice. And not speaking for the audience, but speaking for the two of us. it has been like a great like three months of watching it i've been calling larry every day as i see an episode cracking up too you can't believe what this guy would do every day four times a day he'd be calling and he doesn't even say hello he's just laughing in the phone well so i i know i'm speaking for the audience and for everybody you guys have given us such joy and we really appreciate it

1:01:53Jerry Seinfeld: Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Really appreciate it. Thanks, Ari. Thank you. Very sweet. You're welcome. Appreciate it. Thank you.