Summary
Larry David often mined his own best work to come up with ideas forCurb Your Enthusiasm, and some of the show’s episodes remake oldSeinfeldclassics.CurbandSeinfeldhave a lot in common, so it’s no surprise that David has seen fit to recycle certain storylines. Both shows focus on the minutiae of everyday life, with characters who fret over the most insignificant social interactions.
Curb Your Enthusiasmdoesn’t usually directly copy oldSeinfeldepisodes, but it does remix story ideas.Curbaired on HBO, so it was allowed to get away with ruder and more outrageous material than NBC would ever letSeinfelddo. David has a lot of fun with this license to roam, and he puts clever twists on situations that he first explored withSeinfeld.Over the course ofCurb’s 12 seasons, David remade several classicSeinfeldepisodes with fresh new ideas.
Curb Your Enthusiasm: 20 Best Larry David Quotes
Larry David might not have the most tact on Curb Your Enthusiasm, but the misanthropic protagonist’s brutal honesty has resulted in some great quotes.
9Season 7, Episode 10, “Seinfeld”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 5, Episode 10, “The Cigar Store Indian”
Season 7 ofCurb Your EnthusiasmremakesSeinfeldin plenty of ways, some more subtle than others. The entire season is a remake ofSeinfeld’s best multi-episode arc, in which George and Jerry desperately try to get their sitcom made at NBC. Larry follows a similar path to theSeinfeldcharacters, but in a meta twist, the show that he is trying to get made isSeinfeld.There have been hopefulrumors of aSeinfeldrevivalever since the show ended, but this is the closest thing Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld are likely to produce.
Season 7 ofCurb Your EnthusiasmremakesSeinfeldin plenty of ways, some more subtle than others.
Curb’s season 7 finale, “Seinfeld,” contains another reference to an old episode ofSeinfeld.Julia Louis-Dreyfus accuses Larry of leaving a ring on an antique wooden table by placing his drink down without using a coaster. This leads to him leading a solo investigation to uncover the real culprit, with his famous quote"Do you respect wood?“The whole affair refers to “The Cigar Store Indian,” aSeinfeldepisode in whichGeorge frets over a water ring Jerry leaves on his parents' coffee table.
8Season 8, Episode 1, “The Divorce”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 6, Episode 4, “The Chinese Woman”
Curb Your Enthusiasmreinvented itself brilliantly with Larry and Cheryl’s divorce. Season 8 opens with the faint hope that they might be able to smooth things over, but Larry quickly ruins his chances simply by being himself. He puts his trust in the hands of a divorce lawyer named Berg, thinking that he is Jewish.Larry later finds out, much to his horror, that Berg is a Swedish name, and his lawyer isn’t Jewish at all.
Berg says “Oy” and hangs a mezuzah on his door, while Donna quotes Confucius to Estelle and claims that she loves Chinese food.
This is oddly reminiscent ofSeinfeld’s season 6 episode, “The Chinese Woman,” in which Jerry, and then Estelle, believes that a woman named Donna Chang is Chinese until they meet her face-to-face and discover that she’s white. Berg and Donna Chang both make others question their ethnicity in various ways. Berg says “Oy” and hangs a mezuzah on his door, while Donna quotes Confucius to Estelle and claims that she loves Chinese food.
7Season 3, Episode 4, “The Nanny From Hell”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 2, Episode 12, “The Busboy”
Season 3 is one of thebest seasons ofCurb Your Enthusiasm,and episodes like “The Nanny From Hell” prove why. Larry attends a dinner party at the home of one of his restaurant’s investors, and he begs the family’s nanny to let him into the house to use the bathroom, rather than using the one designated for guests in the cabana. The nanny is soon fired for letting Larry into the house, and he takes it upon himself to find her a new job. This is one of the rare episodes where Larry is trying to be the good guy.
The nanny is fired, and Larry takes it upon himself to find her a new job. This is one of the rare episodes where Larry is trying to be the good guy.
InSeinfeldseason 2, episode 12, “The Busboy,” a similar situation plays out with George. After his comments inadvertently get a busboy fired, he tries to make amends by going to his home to apologize. George leaves the door open, allowing the man’s cat to escape.Larry’s plan also backfires inCurb,as he gets the nanny a job with Jeff and Susie, only for the nanny to throw Susie off of her balcony in a fit of delirium.
6Season 12, Episode 8, “The Colostomy Bag”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 4, Episode 21, “The Smelly Car”
Season 12 ofCurb Your Enthusiasmseems to referenceSeinfeldmore often than other seasons of the show. Episode 8, “The Colostomy Bag,” follows Larry and Richard Lewis as they go to inspect a second-hand car that Richard has his eyes on. Since he recently lost his sense of smell after catching COVID, Richard needs Larry’s perfectly functional nose to let him know if the car has a bad smell.
Season 12 ofCurb Your Enthusiasmseems to referenceSeinfeldmore often than other seasons of the show.
As the title suggests,Seinfeldseason 4, episode 21, “The Smelly Car” features a similar problem. Jerry’s car gets infested with the horrific stench of body odor after a valet drives his car. Eventually, he realizes he has no choice but to give up on the car entirely.Curb’s story has Larry on the other end of the transaction. Rather than struggling to see a foul-smelling car, he is trying to buy one for Richard.
5Season 7, Episode 2, “Vehicular Fellatio”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 3, Episode 11, “The Alternate Side”
BothCurb Your EnthusiasmandSeinfeldare characterized by the callous ways that the characters treat their relationships, and both shows have had episodes where characters suddenly find themselves trapped in relationships that they don’t really care about. InCurb Your Enthusiasm’s “Vehicular Fellatio,” Larry tries to break up with Loretta while she is going through cancer treatment.
Curbrecycles this storyline again in season 12, when Larry pretends to have a debilitating disease just so Irma will dump him.
4Season 8, Episode 3, “Palestinian Chicken”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 8, Episode 8, “The Chicken Roaster”
Curb Your EnthusiasmandSeinfeldboth feature episodes in which characters go to extreme lengths just to enjoy the food at a newly-opened local chicken restaurant. In “Palestinian Chicken,“Larry discovers a new Palestinian restaurant which has opened next door to a Jewish deli.While his Jewish friends protest the restaurant, he risks his social standing by eating there, partly because the food is so good and partly because he meets a beautiful woman, even though she is an anti-Semite.
Curb Your EnthusiasmandSeinfeldboth feature episodes in which characters go to extreme lengths just to enjoy the food at a newly-opened local chicken restaurant.
InSeinfeld’s “The Chicken Roaster,” a restaurant opens up across the street with a bright red light that shines directly into Kramer’s apartment, making him unable to sleep. Kramer and Jerry initially team up to protest the restaurant, but Kramer allows himself to get hooked on the chicken. ‘Palestinian Chicken” has one ofCurb Your Enthusiasm’s best endings, and “The Chicken Roaster” also goes out on a high note, with Kramer having a breakdown after the restaurant closes.
3Season 12, Episode 5, “Fish Stuck”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 3, Episode 3, “The Pen”
Larry David may have gotten more brazen with hisSeinfeldtributes inCurb Your Enthusiasm’s final season, because “Fish Stuck” has a reference to a classicSeinfeldepisode that’s hard to ignore. Larry realizes that whenever he compliments a friend’s belongings, they offer them to him. He tests this theory out by admiring Ted Danson’s pen, which the actor promptly offers to Larry.
Larry David may have gotten more brazen with hisSeinfeldtributes inCurb Your Enthusiasm’s final season, because “Fish Stuck” has a reference to a classicSeinfeldepisode that’s hard to ignore.
“The Pen” spins a bizarre social drama out of a similar situation, as Jerry accepts an astronaut pen from Jack Klompus, a friend of his parents.“Fish Stuck” also evokes another oldSeinfeldepisode.Larry urges a gay couple to give their son the surname “Mantle”, rather than the surname of the other parent, “Zeckelman”. InSeinfeldseason 7, episode 13, “The Seven,” George also inspires a couple to name their baby after Yankees legend Mickey Mantle, but he only offers the name “Seven” by accident. He had been planning on saving it for his own son.
2Season 2, Episode 8, “Shaq”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 6, Episode 24, “The Understudy”
In one ofCurb Your Enthusiasm’s best episodes, Larry accidentally injures Lakers star Shaquille O’Neal while stretching his legs at an NBA game. This makes him a social pariah among his Lakers-loving friends, even though he and Shaq soon become good friends when he visits him in hospital. Shaq is a surprisingly great guest star forCurb Your Enthusiasm,and his episode seems to refer to aSeinfeldepisode with another famous guest.
Shaq is a surprisingly great guest star forCurb Your Enthusiasm,and his episode seems to refer to aSeinfeldepisode with another famous guest.
In “The Understudy,” Jerry dates Bette Midler’s understudy in the Broadway adaptationSeinfeld’s most famous fake movie,Rochelle Rochelle.George injures Midler at a softball game in the park, and Jerry’s girlfriend suddenly gets her moment in the spotlight.Just like inCurb,people believe that the injury was inflicted on purpose, and the city turns against George, Jerry, and the understudy.
1Season 12, Episode 10, “No Lessons Learned”
Remake of Seinfeld Season 9, Episodes 23 & 24, “The Finale”
The most obviousSeinfeldremake inCurb Your Enthusiasmis the series finale. This is Larry David’s response to the years of criticism he has faced forSeinfeld’s controversial finale. As an act of defiance, he tells the same story all over again, with a few minor twists. Both series finales feature the main characters on trial, with a long list of character witnesses from classic episodes returning to make sure they get locked up.
Larry and Jerry Seinfeld finally realize what they did wrong, and they agree that Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer should have avoided jail in the end.
Curb Your Enthusiasm’s finalemakes several overt references toSeinfeld’s finale. Early on in the episode, Leon reminds Larry that everyone thinks he screwed upSeinfeld’s big send-off. Later, Larry and Jerry Seinfeld finally realize what they did wrong, and they agree that Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer should have avoided jail in the end.Curb Your Enthusiasmends with one last tribute toSeinfeld,and a wink to Larry’s critics.
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Cast
Curb Your Enthusiasm is a Comedy television show created by Larry David, the same creative mind behind the wildly popular sitcom, Seinfeld. Starring Larry David himself, along with Cheryl Hines, and Jeff Garlin, the show acts as a semi-fictionalized look at Larry’s every day life and the people he would come in contact with.
