The Analysis

[Circa July 1993 in case you were wondering]

What we have here are four of the most easily recognizable people on earth. Whether seen individually or all together Jerry Seinfeld will be recognized as himself, Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Elaine, Jason Alexander as George and Michael Richards as a racist.. I mean as Kramer. For nine seasons these four ruled prime time television and changed what it meant to be a sitcom. Hell its still in syndication 10 years later and has controlled FOX's 7:30pm slot for as long as I can remember. Seinfeld without a doubt was the greatest television program of all time. This holds fast for several reasons, the first being its consistency. Whether you're laughing at one of the four main characters, George's parents, Mr. Steinbrenner, Kenny Bania, Uncle Leo, Newman or Jackie Chiles, you're always laughing. It is impossible to find a bad episode of Seinfeld and even more difficult to choose a favorite. What separates great television shows from the good ones is whether or not you can pop in a DVD from any season set it on random and be completely content with whatever episode happens to play. What separates the legends from the greats is if while watching whatever episode the random function selects you laugh as if you've just heard the joke for the first time even though you knew it was coming. But what separates Seinfeld from the legends is the connection we feel with the characters as we laugh hysterically at the jokes we are already familair with. Seinfeld reigns supreme because it is relatable at every level. We all may not have friends exactly like Jerry Elaine Kramer and George. But we all have a friend who's the voice of reason, a friend who's superficial, a friend who's a bit wacky and a friend who dwells on their shortcomings. We all have that friend whose house or basement or room or garage is kind of like headquarters. The place where you go just to get out of the house, where you grab a soda or some chips without asking, the place people outside your immediate group of friends refer to when they say "all they do is sit at (insert name here)'s house and (insert activity here). But most of importantly it's that place where you feel safe. Its where you've probably had the most intelligent and stupidest conversations. The place where you've probably slept over after having had a few too many. The place where your always welcomed and treated as family. Thats what made Seinfeld, Seinfeld. We all felt comfortable in Jerry's living room because it reminded us of our "place" we all felt comfortable in the coffee shop because we all also have that place we go when we feel like leaving headquarters. Seinfeld was successful because it provided the viewer with a level of comfort, familiarity and detail that was and never will be seen on television before or again. I'm not clairvoyant but I'm certain that there will never be another show viewers can relate to on such an elementary level ever again because comedy as a whole has evolved. It aired from 1989-1998 a much more conservative decade than that which followed it. The show's simplicity speaks for the decade's conservatism. Simplicity gave Seinfeld its relatable characteristic. We didnt see one or more of the four dealing with a superpower. We instead saw an avid superman fan toil with the reason being seeing the woman he was dating in the same dress each time he saw her; making him assume it was the only dress she ever wore and most likely possessing a closet full of them as his child/adulthood hero. We never saw a character in a race against time to save the earth. We did however witness a group of friends make a bet to see who could sustain from masturbating the longest. It showed us the comedy behind everyday life. It didnt give us glitz and glamor. It gave us a continuous cycle of three men and a woman who spent most of their free time in a friend's living room analyzing and resolving hypothetical and actual situations. Who seemed to simply go to work and go home, though somehow along the way finding themselves in the middle of another situation that needed to be discussed or resolved; at which point they return to Jerry's or Monks to do so. Seinfeld took small aspects from actual encounters in daily life, a woman with "man hands", a "low talker" or an eccentric soup chef and comically elaborated on them. We laughed so hard because it poked fun at such believable characters. Todays comedy is composed of jokes about racial stereotypes and sexual experiences...oh and lets not forget drugs and alcohol. Simplicity is nonexistent in television because it has been deemed unrelatable and unexciting. People dont consider life simple anymore; though all that has changed is an increase of expensive devices whose purpose is to make our lives simpler and more pleasant. Today every protagonist has a weird quirk his character is based around or is centered around entirely fictional situations. Seinfeld's writing and storylines was always spot on. The writers had a tremendous understanding of the characters, no line was ever uncalled for. This attention to detail painted a picture of each character so vivid that even an episode which depicted Elaine befriend a different group of 3 men each strongly resembling George Jerry and Kramer but with opposite tendencies was made. Seinfeld set precedents. It showed us how we could react in certain quirky situations while reminding us of the comedy behind each one. It gave us seinlanguage such as "low talker", "regifter" and of course "shrinkage" and did so with unmatchable poise. Years from now our children will stumble upon this treasure asking us to tell them all we know of the show, our recollections and how it grew to be so popular. We'll probably reply "We'll these two comedians sat down and created a comedy about a few things that happened to one of them...it starred the other one annnddd yada yada yada it became the best show of all time." And one day they'll understand.




Learn your Seinlanguage



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