In the history of pilot reports, ‘Seinfeld’ has got to be one of the worst of all time.
I was young enough to certainly realize the excitement of how popular ‘Seinfeld’ was.
I personally have dealt with any adversity in my life with humor. That’s why I told America to ‘Read my hips!’ on ‘Dancing With the Stars’ or was happy to play along with Jason Alexander and Jerry Seinfeld in the great restaurant scene on ‘Seinfeld.’
Things that make me laugh range from a wonderful stand-up like Jerry Seinfeld, Louis C.K. and Chris Rock to my son Gabe, who does great improv work. I also look backwards to the great comedic actors like Jackie Gleason, Paul Lynde and Phil Silvers.
I saw ‘Seinfeld’ on TV and told my mum that would be something cool to try one day, and she was like, OK, ‘Here is a five-year-old telling me what they want to when they grow up’ sort of thing, and what would they know, right!
My TV comedy idols are the Charles brothers, who did ‘Cheers;’ Larry Gelbart, who did ‘MASH;’ and Larry David, who did ‘Seinfeld.’ When I was 6 or 7-years-old, I’d watch ‘Saturday Night Live’ and guys like John Belushi and Dan Akroyd became my on-screen heroes.
One way in which ‘Friends’ did resemble ‘Seinfeld’ is that it really found its audience over the summer of 1995 in reruns. That’s when the main title song, ‘I’ll Be There for You’, by the Rembrandts, exploded, too.
The pilot of ‘Seinfeld’ was made and dropped. ‘Seinfeld’ was not supposed to go to series.
I’ve never seen ‘Friends;’ I’ve never seen ‘Seinfeld.’ I’ve heard people reference these things but I’ve never seen them.
Some of the greatest shows in history – ‘Seinfeld,’ ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’ and ‘House’ – had puny starts but the benefit of schedule protection, increasingly scarce in today’s DVR world. Cable nets can tolerate small ratings, building hits in progress like ‘Breaking Bad,’ or marathon their way to a ‘Duck Dynasty.’
I like ‘The Office.’ I particularly like the British version with Ricky Gervais. Of course, I liked the ‘Seinfeld’ show a lot. I thought that was an awfully good show.
Not Going Out’ is a pretty neutral sitcom – to quote the ‘Seinfeld’ thing, it’s not really about anything.
It’s always interesting for me to watch the pilot of an established show because you see how the writers and actors weren’t really sure what the show was and what the dynamics were. If you look at the pilot for ‘Seinfeld,’ for example, it’s practically unrecognizable.
Comedians, we’re just people who whine. But we happen to be funny when we whine. Like, if Jerry Seinfeld wasn’t funny, you’d want to punch him in the face; he’d just seem like a whiner to you. But the fact is that he’s funny.
Being asked to be in the last episode of ‘Seinfeld’ is not something you pass on. It was a great honor.
Pages: 1 2
