Larry David, the inspiration for the "George Costanza" character in Seinfeld, rescued a faltering comedy-writing career when he went to work with comedian Jerry Seinfeld on the creation of his hit TV series. David, a former standup comedian, was a cast member for ABC's Fridays television series from 1980 to 1982. He wrote for NBC's Saturday Night Live from 1984 to 1985, but during his entire season with them, David only got one sketch included in the show, and it was the last sketch of the night (where the weaker sketches are usually scheduled).
In 1989, David teamed up with Jerry Seinfeld to create The Seinfeld Chronicles for NBC. The show, which was retitled Seinfeld went on to make television history, as one of the industry's most successful sitcoms ever. David appeared on the show many times as minor characters, including the voice of George Costanza's boss, George Steinbrenner.
In 2000, David started his own show for the HBO cable television channel, entitled Curb Your Enthusiasm, based on his own life and using a unique improvisational acting style. He has received six Emmy Award nominations with the show.
Larry David is the creator and star of the cable television comedy Curb Your Enthusiasm. A former stand-up comedian from New York, he struggled through the 1970s and '80s, working occasionally in television (including a two-year stint on the ABC sketch series Fridays, 1980-82). With fellow comedian Jerry Seinfeld he developed the sitcom Seinfeld (1990-98), and for seven seasons he worked as head writer and executive producer. The success of Seinfeld led to an HBO special for David in 1999, which was then turned into the series Curb Your Enthusiasm the next year. In the show David plays Larry David, a successful sitcom producer. Shot in a "mockumentary" style and reliant on improvisation, Curb Your Enthusiasm depicts David as a graceless sourpuss, a characterization he claims is an improvement on his real self.
The Seinfeld character George Costanza, played by Jason Alexander, is said to be inspired by David... David was married to producer Laurie David (neé Lennard) from 1993 to 2007 (she produced the 2006 Al Gore movie An Inconvenient Truth)... Joining David on ABC's Fridays in the early '80s was Michael Richards, who went on to co-star in Seinfeld... David worked as a writer for Saturday Night Live in 1983, where he met future Seinfeld co-star Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
Career Highlights: Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Whatever Works
First Major Screen Credit: Seinfeld (1989)
Biography
The reigning curmudgeon of TV comedy, Emmy-winning Larry David is a rare case of lightning striking twice on the small screen. Not only did he make television history with Seinfeld -- one of the most popular sitcoms to ever grace the airwaves -- but two years after the series ended, David made a stellar return with the hit HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm. A New York City native raised in the Brooklyn, David has often claimed that his carefree childhood made for a rough transition into a miserable adulthood. He began his career as a standup comic in the early to mid-'70s, with middling results at best, a period during which he also met another, albeit more successful, comedian, Jerry Seinfeld, who would also become a lifelong friend. A few years later, success was still eluding David, though, in 1979, he got his first taste of fame as a writer and performer for the Saturday Night Live knock-off Fridays. Television definitely seemed to provide a better vehicle for David's unique brand of humor, and he later got a job as a writer for Saturday Night Live during its 1984-1985 season. The blessing became a curse, however, when David failed to gel with the SNL crew, his brief tenure on the show yielding only one on-air sketch, which was relegated to the evening's final segment.
David spent much of the rest of the '80s appearing in small roles in such films as Radio Days (1987) and New York Stories (1989). As the decade drew to a close, Seinfeld was in negotiations to develop a pilot for NBC, and he turned to his old friend David for inspiration, thus giving birth to the wildly popular "show about nothing." Starring Seinfeld, Michael Richards, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and Jason Alexander as a quartet of self-involved New Yorkers, Seinfeld debuted in 1990 (after its 1989 pilot episode) and remained on the air for nine seasons. In addition to serving as one of the driving creative forces of the show, David was also the inspiration for the George Constanza character (Alexander) and frequently provided voice-over work. In 1996, David took a sabbatical from the series in order to try his hand at writing and directing a feature film. Though Sour Grapes didn't exactly strike gold at the box office, it did offer a healthy dose of David's trademark acerbic humor and eventually found a second life on the home video market. David returned to Seinfeld in 1998 to craft its final episode.
Although he initially opposed returning to the rigors of television, 1999 saw the airing of the HBO special Larry David: Curb Your Enthusiasm, which, told in mockumentary style, echoed the comedian's past by weaving the tale of a failed former standup comic whose bid to return to the spotlight yielded predictably disastrous results. The show was a hit and prompted HBO to offer David his own series. Beginning its fourth season in 2004, the Emmy-nominated Curb Your Enthusiasm continued to detail David's day-to-day strife in an unrestrained fashion that had network censors blushing and audiences laughing. That same year, David served as a co-screenwriter and executive producer of the Barry Levinson film Envy, a black comedy starring Ben Stiller and Jack Black. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
Lawrence Gene "Larry" David (born July 2, 1947) is an American actor, writer, comedian, producer, and film director. David is the co-creator and producer of two successful television comedies, Seinfeld (1989-1998) and Curb Your Enthusiasm (2000-2009).
Formerly a standup comedian, David went into television comedy, writing and starring in ABC's Fridays, as well as writing briefly for Saturday Night Live. He was voted by other comedians the 23rd-greatest comedian of all time in British Channel 4's poll The Comedians' Comedian.[2]
David married Laurie Lennard on March 31, 1993. They have two daughters, Cazzie and Romy, and lived in Pacific Palisades, California.[5] Like her counterpart in Curb Your Enthusiasm, Cheryl David (played by Cheryl Hines), Laurie is an environmental activist. From May 2005, both Larry and Laurie were contributing bloggers at The Huffington Post.[6][7] On June 5, 2007, the couple announced their intention to amicably separate.[8] Laurie David filed for divorce on July 19, 2007, citing irreconcilable differences and seeking joint custody of the couple's two daughters.[9]
Career
Early work
While a stand-up comedian, David also worked as a store clerk, limousine driver, and television repairman to pay his bills. He lived in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan across the hall from Kenny Kramer, the inspiration for the Cosmo Kramer character in Seinfeld.[10] David then became a writer for and cast member of ABC's Fridays from 1980 to 1982, and a writer for NBC's Saturday Night Live (SNL) from 1984 to 1985.[11] During his time at SNL, he was able to get only one sketch on the show, which aired at 12:50 AM, the last time slot on the show.[12] David quit his writing job at SNL midseason, only to show up to work a few days later acting as though nothing had happened. That plot inspired a second-season episode of Seinfeld entitled "The Revenge."[13] David met his future Seinfeld stars during that early stage of his career: He worked with Michael Richards (Kramer) on Fridays[11] and with Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Elaine)[12] during his one-year stint as a writer on SNL.[14][15] He can be heard heckling Michael McKean when McKean hosted the show in 1984, and he can be seen in the sketch "The Run, Throw, and Catch Like a Girl Olympics" when Howard Cosell hosted the season finale in 1985.[16]
In 1989, David teamed up with comedianJerry Seinfeld to create NBC's The Seinfeld Chronicles. Later retitled Seinfeld, the program became the most successful show in United States television history[17], reaching the top on TV Guide's list 50 greatest TV shows of all time and Entertainment Weekly ranked it as the 3rd Best TV shows of All Time, the highest sitcom in that list.[citation needed] David occasionally appeared (uncredited) on the show, playing roles such as Frank Costanza's cape-wearing lawyer and providing the voice of George Steinbrenner. He was also the primary inspiration for the show's George Costanza character.[18] David left Seinfeld on amicable terms after the seventh season but returned to write the series finale in 1998, two years later.[19] He also continued to provide the voice for the character of George Steinbrenner.[20]
As well as re-writing and re-working all of the show's scripts with Seinfeld during the first seven seasons, David wrote or co-wrote 57 of the 180 episodes of the series.[citation needed]
Syndication of Seinfeld earned David an estimated US$250 million in 1998 alone. This amount has been steadily decreasing each year, but payments will continue until the full $1.7 billion from the original deal has been paid in full. In 2008 David made $55 million from Seinfeld syndication, DVD sales, and Curb Your Enthusiasm.[21][22] He was nominated for an Emmy award 19 times for Seinfeld, winning twice—once for best comedy and once for writing.[23]
It revisits many of the themes first brought up in Seinfeld.[25] The show is improvised, with the actors receiving a synopsis of their scene for them to act out. David has commented that his character in the show, which is a fictionalized version of himself, is what he would be like in real life if he lacked social awareness and sensitivity.[26] Fictional Larry's numerous and frequent social faux pas and misunderstandings are the basis of much of the show's comedy and have led to the expression "Larry David moment", meaning inadvertently creating a socially awkward situation".[27]
The basis of the show is Larry's life now that he has earned a fortune and has very little to do in semi-retirement.[28] Alongside David is his wife Cheryl (played by Cheryl Hines), his manager and best friend Jeff (played by Jeff Garlin), and Jeff's wife Susie (played by Susie Essman). Celebrities including comedians Bob Einstein, Wanda Sykes, and Richard Lewis, appear on the show regularly. Actors Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen have had recurring roles as themselves.[28]
The show is critically acclaimed and has been nominated for thirty Primetime Emmy Awards, with one win, as well as one Golden Globe win.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander appeared in several episodes of the first six seasons, and Jerry Seinfeld made a cameo. In season seven, the cast of Seinfeld, including Michael Richards, returned in a story arc involving Larry's attempt to organize a Seinfeld reunion special.
In October 2009, the episode The Bare Midriff was the focus of some criticism when Fox News reported that Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, criticized the episode, in which David's character inadvertently splatters urine on a picture of Jesus, causing a woman to believe the picture shows Jesus crying. HBO responded to the criticism stating "The humor is always playful and certainly never malicious."[29]
Other projects
Apart from David's major roles in creating Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm, he has also been involved in other films and television series. David wrote and directed the 1998 filmSour Grapes, about two cousins who feud over a casino jackpot.[24] It was neither a commercial nor a critical success.[30][31] He has appeared in minor parts in two Woody Allen films – Radio Days and New York Stories[32] – more recently taking the leading role in Allen's New York-based comedy film Whatever Works.[33] Because his daughters are Hannah Montana fans, David, along with them, guest-starred in the episode "My Best Friend's Boyfriend" as themselves. In this episode, they are waiting to get a table at a fancy restaurant.[24] David also had a cameo appearance on the HBO series Entourage as a client of Ari Gold.
