Has Jerry Seinfeld ALWAYS been like this?

[TSExile]

I grew up with his sitcom, which has surprisingly aged very well. He was surrounded by such a great supporting cast and had Larry David at the helm for much of its run.

Now, he is railing about wokeness, cancel culture and "real men". Seinfeld used to have a pretty apolitical public persona, so is this a new thing?

https://www.salon.com/2024/05/29/i-miss-a-dominant-masculinity-jerry-seinfeld-looks-to-turn-back-the-clock-on-gender-roles/

[Irish_Dem]

1. His recent movie was terrible.

An film for grownups but written in a child like way.
Even top name actors could not save it.

Something has happened to him.

[OAITW r.2.0]

9. Never was a huge Seinfeld fan, but the episodes I watched were pretty funny.

Watched the pop tart movie....it kinda sucked.

[Irish_Dem]

12. It was awful, a real disappointment.

Written and produced by one of the top comedians of his era.
His TV show was brilliant.

His movie a disaster.

[BoRaGard]

38. Yup, his movie was super lame

[Voltaire2]

60. Freshmen level sophomoric humor.

[PatSeg]

67. I never cared for his show

I only watched it because my kids liked it. In spite of some very funny moments, I found the characters to be exhaustingly shallow and self-absorbed.

More recently I watched some episodes of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. At first I thought it was kind of a fun show, but soon I grew tired of Jerry Seinfeld and didn't find him funny at all. Maybe that's one of the reasons I didn't care for "Seinfeld" years ago. I don't really like HIM. When I said that, my daughter-in-law said the same thing.

So finding out that he really comes across as a jerk isn't surprising to me at all. I think that is what I would have expected from someone so superficial.

[lame54]

23. It was silly and fun. We loved it

[betsuni]

25. He's always said comedians never really grow up and that they're the smartest stupid people.

That's why, like children, they see things in a different way and often get to the truth of things and that makes a joke funny. Nothing happened to him. This is outrage about nothing.

[Irish_Dem]

33. His TV show was sophisticated and witty. Cutting edge.

Then to see him put together such a juvenile, poorly written movie was shocking.

I am also responding to the part that Jerry has gone MAGA it sounds like.
Someone who everyone assumed was liberal.

I don't know what happened to this guy.

[betsuni]

34. I don't understand what in the interview was MAGA.

"Seinfeld" was Larry David for the best years, as "Curb Your Enthusiasm" shows. Both are misanthropes, politically incorrect, liberals. They are comedians. Neither one of them have attacked Democrats, far as I know.

[Dorian Gray]

35. He hasn't gone MAGA

he's joining the majority of society in clapping back at overly corrective political correctness/wokeism. It's the trend in the world. There is a reaction against not being able to say what you're thinking AND make mistakes without the fear of being chased with a figurative pitchfork.

Is it right or wrong? I suspect it's complicated.

And the Masculine male that he's yearning to go back to is Hugh Grant, foppish hero of the 90s. lol. It's not like he's promoting liver king or Andrew Tate.

Comedians push boundaries. He's older and crotchety.

His dating history was more problematic than these statements, tho.

[Omnipresent]

51. It's all over corrective..

Throwing people away for this stuff is just plain wrong.

[Voltaire2]

68. Offs I'm so tired of this crap defense of bigotry.

Yeah it’s bigotry. Right now the fascist consensus is focused on transphobia and phallic worship. Odd combination, but it makes sense. (The phallus and the lack of the phallus as the unobtainable object of desire. )

They think they have traction on hating trans people and on promoting a hyper masculinity that is literally straight out of the fascist culture of 100 years ago. They may indeed have that traction and idiots like Seinfeld, who likely thinks he is a ‘liberal’ have subsumed this ideology and are promoting it.

[Dorian Gray]

72. Wait... did he mention trans people at all?

[Sky Jewels]

65. It's become very clear indeed that Seinfeld was riding on Larry David's back

for the duration of the TV series. Larry is the comedic genius. Jerry is an arrogant, self-centered, entitled rich prick who whines about not being able to punch down anymore and blames "the far left" for killing his ability to make racist, misogynistic observations.

[johnp3907]

2. I always found him annoying and unfunny.

So I'm not surprised.

[mahina]

32. oh same!

[TSExile]

3. Remember the 1990s?

The biggest male names on TV that decade were Seinfeld, Tim Allen and Kelsey Grammer. It looks like they are all firmly on the Right.

[NanaCat]

4. He always seemed like a smarmy wanker to me

YMMV

[Straw Man]

24. Well, he WAS a smarmy wanker -- at least on-screen.

Much of the humor of the series was based on that persona.

[Dorian Gray]

36. The dude dated teens. Of course he was a smarmy wanker

I don't know why anybody is feeling particularly surprised.

[obamanut2012]

49. 17 year old high school student, he was 38

[Groundhawg]

5. No. he used to be solidly on our side.

[TSExile]

14. That's what I thought.

Julia Louis Dreyfus and Jason Alexander are staunch liberals who have raised/donated money to both Obama and Biden. I always thought Seinfeld was of a similar mindset.

[Groundhawg]

15. he is.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

62. He donated to both George W. Bush and Al Gore in 2000.

[Voltaire2]

70. That is telling.

[TSExile]

6. Remember when he, nearing 40, dated a 17-year-old girl?

Something tells me that wouldn't fly now in this TMZ and social media world.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

7. The guy who was dating a 17-year-old when he was 38? Fuck that guy.

[TSExile]

8. He's lucky this was pre-internet.

Even as a young tween/teen, I thought that was weird and creepy.

[usonian]

10. He has two problems that the rest of us don't have

1. He has money.
2. He's a comedian, and comedy can be edgy. In my (unpaid) humor, I think twice or thrice before saying anything. I worked at Cal Berkeley and offended none because I respected all and thought before speaking. His colleague Michael Richards let loose some racist remarks. Oh, and "real men" don't talk about being "real men". They just behave in a strong, compassionate and helping way. That's hard to do in the crazy world of entertainment. Comedy clubs are much wilder than TV or other media. To quote from a Seinfeld episode, it's bizarro world.

Disclaimer: I haven't read the article.
"Real Life" keeps me busy.

[RockRaven]

11. Yes.

Middle aged men dating teenagers says quite a lot about what said men are like, beyond their sexual preferences. It speaks to various other values and moral reasonings.

[Tom of Temecula]

13. Ever since he stopped being funny

So yeah, he's been this way forever.

[Emile]

16. Kramer, Elaine and George I liked, Seinfeld sucked.

[oasis]

58. Yup, George carried the show

along with Elaine and Kramer.Jerry S. was more of a straight man.

[Voltaire2]

71. Richards got his failing standup career cancelled

by having his notorious n* meltdown. Perhaps that is what set Jerry down the fascist culture rabbit hole.

[haele]

17. Yes. Just not as bad as he is now, because he knew he had to play to an audience.

His humor has always ended up sounding like a college freshman stream of consciousness, putting on a worldly act to impress the older folks or potential bosses and co-workers.
A lot about nothing much. I'm cool with wry or even sarcastic humor, but Seinfeld always seemed to be more of a whiner than wry.
What you're hearing now is his ego getting in the way of his wit, such as it is.

Haele

[mucifer]

18. Larry David was the brains behind the Seinfeld show. Jerry eventually

learned from him and was able to write without him when Larry left. Seinfeld said all of this in an interview.

Larry David HATES trump. He did make fun of liberals in some episodes of Curb. Mostly about people misunderstanding Larry's intentions and hilarity ensues. But, publicly all he says is how much he hates trump. He doesn't bash liberals woke stuff or whatever.

[TSExile]

19. Yes, I knew about Larry David.

Remember his portrayal of Bernie Sanders?

[GenThePerservering]

20. Jerry, that celebrity stubble doesn't like you. nt

[betsuni]

21. Great interview, Seinfeld mostly talks about comedy, see here:

http:://

He likes to do his writing with a pen. The importance of place. New York and LA. He's a lone wolf. Anti-Semitism was a relic in the '90s, his trip to Israel. Many things are politically polarized now and he's more political. On being protested, they want to express rage but off-target -- comedians don't control anything. Mobs. He reads bad reviews because it's funny, insane to think you could ever make something everybody likes. He's a happy person who hates everything.

[DET]

22. Well, That's a Shame

Seinfeld is my favorite TV show. The writing is brilliant (with the exception of the last couple of years). The show has aged amazingly well. Unfortunately, however, Seinfeld’s creative efforts since the show ended have been pretty disappointing. Nonetheless, Seinfeld has always seemed like a pretty laid back, friendly guy. I honestly can’t tell if this new throwback Seinfeld persona is a lame attempt at humor or who he really is. I hope it’s the former.

[TSExile]

53. It really has aged extremely well.

A lot of it has to do with his amazing supporting cast and the mundane situations the characters found themselves in that ended up in hilarity. Still, the show was and is a product of its time. I don't know if it could be made now and be a huge hit. Even in the 1990s, Seinfeld wasn't a huge hit out of the gate. It took three or four seasons for them to really hit their stride. Something else that warmed my heart - by all accounts, the Seinfeld set was a very happy one.

[GoneOffShore]

26. I had the displeasure of photographing him several years ago -

We expected Barbra Streisand and Bette Midler to be the divas that evening, but Jerry's ego could barely fit through the door.

[PCIntern]

30. I know what you mean:

My private junior high/high school used to have a fairly well-respected Arts Festival every Spring and I was the sound department for three of my six years there. We would get these C list celebrities who would come in through the door and act as though they were Tony Curtis or Martha Graham. Of course we put up with their shit.
Then we spent the rest of our lives telling the stories of their stupid vanities.

[Think. Again.]

27. Sometimes it's difficult to resurrect a person's glory days...

...it's rare that celebrities can make a successful comeback after their initial run is over, and trying to do that by jumping on some current cultural bandwagon is usually more embarrassing than successful.

[EarnestPutz]

28. Gazillionaire, whose comedy show was about selfish, self-centered people, turns out....

......to be actually a Republican with no social conscience in real life. Is that about right?

[betsuni]

29. The interviewer said Trump's probably going to be president and Jerry said, "I don't like that talk."

He's not a Republican. Also, in the interview at no point does he say the word "woke." Can anyone point to anything that he says that makes him right-wing or Republican?

[Abolishinist]

54. Neither he nor thee are right.

[Norbert]

31. I wonder how lively the discussions between him Jason and Julia was back then

Both of them are far from anti-woke.

[Bucky]

37. You don't find out who you really are till you have money

Money is surprisingly character-revealing.

[betsuni]

39. How did money change Seinfeld, Larry David, Hugh Grant, Melissa McCarthy, Amy Schumer,

Jim Gaffigan and other comedians and entertainers like Beyonce and Taylor Swift? How?

[Bucky]

40. My point was specifically that money DOESN'T change people

It reveals them

[betsuni]

41. Don't understand! Could you please explain?

How were Seinfeld, Larry David, all the comedians and actors in the movie bad before they had money?

"If you write a best-selling book, you can be a millionaire too." Who said that?

[Oopsie Daisy]

42. Oh goody! Someone NEW to hate-on. (I'm sure this will come as a big relief to the other boogieperson targets.)

[betsuni]

44. Liberals do seem to be targets of hate.

[Voltaire2]

43. Does he know he is not the most masculine guy?

Also what the fuck is he talking about? This is fascist nostalgia for a mythical past.

[betsuni]

47. He says in the interview he never grew up, that means he's not masculine.

What is fascist in the interview?

[skypilot]

56. This sure gave me pause:

Seinfeld also cited an “agreed-upon hierarchy” as a factor in his nostalgia for the early 1960s, in which his film "Unfrosted" takes place, chiding a broader equality as a source of discomfort in the modern era.

[Voltaire2]

57. yeah that wtf

[Johnny2X2X]

45. Ivory Tower syndrome

Some of these celebs are isolated from real life for so long that when they try to grasp at something to be relevant, they miss the mark.

Nobody cars about "woke" anymore Jerry.

[betsuni]

46. Where in the interview does he say "woke"? I didn't hear it so would appreciate anyone who

heard it to tell us where he said it in the interview.

[TSExile]

52. Not in that interview...

...but in another recent one:

https://wibc.com/330421/jerry-seinfeld-says-woke-culture-ruined-tv-comedy/

[JHB]

48. Yeah, he was

Now he's joined the bunch of aging comedians who forgot that audiences and their tastes change. That has ALWAYS happened, it didn't start with "wokeness."

They won't adapt. When their jokes fall flat they choose blame the audience, and then call it "cancel culture" when their popularity plummets and new audiences just don't want to deal with them.

[Johonny]

50. He dated a 17 year old as a 31 year old

And Howard Stern was the only one at the time giving him shit for it. But yeah, Jerry is a complainer. That's his bit. He just feels out of touch, but was he really in touch?

[Voltaire2]

59. Stern is one of the few celebrities who recognized

what was going on and openly rejected the fascist right consensus. For all his raw humor and very peculiar obsessions he has become one of the good ones.

[TSExile]

64. Agreed.

I've never been a Stern fan, but I appreciate him doing an interview with President Biden recently and also for calling out Jerry Seinfeld in the days where he was dating a minor 20 years his junior. I don't remember anyone else in the media doing that.

I also just remembered that Wayne Knight did an anti-T**** ad in 2020. It had to do with USPS, and he was playing Newman.

[Sky Jewels]

66. Howard Stern, unexpectedly, has turned out to be a great guy.

He got a lot of therapy and re-evaluated his whole life. I've seen recent interviews with him and I can hardly believe it's the same person I remember from the 90s.

[usonian]

55. And What's this about Jerry Seinfeld?

A schmo about nothing.

[myohmy2]

61. there...

...seems to be a group of special public figures that many people continually ooooh and aaaah over like Barbra Streisand, George Clooney, etc...

...Jerry Seinfeld has always struck me as being part of that group...but I've always thought he was 'okay' at best...

...for me now, he's past his 'sell-by'...

[Sky Jewels]

63. He has turned into an entitled, grumpy, arrogant asshole.

I used to be a fan and now I really dislike him. He blames "the far left" for killing comedy and preventing him from being able to punch down.

I recently saw him make a guest appearance on a show that John Mulaney hosted. He was such a negative JERK. He kept interrupting everyone and was very rude about the show itself. I hope John Mulaney never engages with him again after that.

Such a POS. And "that's a shame."

[Chakaconcarne]

69. There does appear to be a critique or reaction to everything these days...

where it's an offense to someone no matter what you say...

I get it to a point..absolutely!! but at times it gets a little ridiculous and it teaches us all to not have even the slightest bit of tolerance even if it's the slightest bit different to our perspective.

Any Gaza thread here will reveal that in no time....

Maybe that's what he's getting at and being a comedian, he's definitely pigeon-holed..

I'm certainly not going to write him off based off this article or his recent speech.

[senseandsensibility]

73. Saw him perform live on the eve of the Iraq invasion

Everyone was protesting in the very blue area I lived in, trying to stop the war. As we drove into the underground parking, there were a few dozen protestors and we gave them the thumbs up sign. I fully expected Seinfeld to say something because it was all over the news, and New York City, where he was from, had enormous protests. Also, I think celebrities were much more outspoken then, especially about this situation. All his peers were speaking out. But he said nothing. I commented to my husband that I was disappointed, but he didn't think it was a big deal. Ever since, I've had my suspicions, and now I see they were justified.