Jason Alexander discusses 'George Costanza' being based on Larry David- EMMYTVLEGENDS.ORG

They said you're George, that was the description. um, I had no idea that at the time he was some kind of alter ego for Larry David, it never would have occurred to me. um, I easily got through the first five, six, seven episodes of that. show with Woody Allen in the back of my mind, that's your guide, you know, he uses those sensitivities and perceptions and you'll get through this one of these days. I have to go back and try to figure out what episode it was, but it was in the first eight episodes where it's interesting, you know, some people think that Seinfeld rewrote the book on how to make a sitcom which is actually not true, most of the Elements of Seinfeld had been done before we had improvised them in a different way, but you know, Burns and Allen used to do the curtain call, just like Jer did the stand-up, so the ending of the book was there.

What was different about Seinfeld in its construction was that at that time comedy writing was very clean there was an a story and a b story and you prepared the a story in the prees then you passed your credits then you made a story about a with a mention of the scene B two was story B BL Blah Blah by the When you got to the next commercial break, you established the tense moments of story A and B, you come back, you finish story A, you go to commercial, you come back, you finish story B and You roll through the credits, that's how it happens in all comedies. it was done, these guys weren't writing like that, so they would start a story A, B, and C and B and C would never be resolved or a and C would never be resolved and only B would resolve um or it would be hard to find story a. which was just a series of events with no particular story, no particular conflict, nothing in particular, so at that moment, while we were all

being

greeted with these tokens, we were Julia and, well, certainly, Julia and I were scratching our head. and see, what's going on here, you know, this is really strange, they wrote me a conflict that got heated and they never resolved it and I went, I go, Larry, you have to solve this, he said it's not funny, after that I go, but you can not. the character and he was it's not about characters it's about funny and and that was like this guy is from another planet what do you mean it's not about characters I'm just playing a character I have to come back next time week, I have to have continuity no, no, he didn't care if there he didn't care if I did one thing this week and the polar opposite the next week if it was funny and for me, the trained actor, I go, you can't do it That, somewhere in those first eight episodes, they wrote a scenario where George got into a situation that I thought was completely improbable and then reacted in a way that I thought was for writing purposes just because no human

being

would do this. and I went. to Larry after reading the table and I said Larry please help me first of all this wouldn't happen to anyone but if it did happen no one would react like this and Larry looked at me and said what are you talking about?

This happened to me. exactly what I did and that's when the bell rang in my head and I said oh my gosh he's George he's George he's writing George that's when I was introduced to Larry David's notebooks where almost everything, some element of every story we did in Seinfeld was coming from something that happened to him and that's when Woody Allen left and I started focusing on what makes Larry Larry and incorporating everything I could into building that character, but that's when it all came together and I was one of These days I go back and look at the show titles and say it must have been that a lot of the comedy on Seinfeld happens between the lines and for George, the reason it happens is because my perception of Larry at the time was that for him he's constantly weighing whether someone just attacked him or diminished him, so first he has to weigh that and then he has to weigh whether or not a response is worth it and in that process of weighing he does something physically and If you've seen Curb, you see it all the time, the physical aspect is that he puts his tongue on the bottom of his bottom teeth and he and he makes this face and says that was my clue to George, so what would happen is there.

A lot of jokes were written in the script, but they were like Superman bullets, they were either absorbed or ricocheted, no one did anything, ah. You just shot, that sensibility of I see what you did, you shot me. You're supposed to be my friend and you just took a photo that became a big part of the Ensemble's energy in noticing those things, noticing that we were all supposedly friends with a comedian who would be doing things like that having that reality, um, the other. What was so extraordinary to me about Larry, I'd never seen anyone balance these things, was that Larry carried, I don't know if he still does, but he had at the same time an incredible sense of worthlessness, that he was just a horrible, useless human being. , talentless and unattractive along with him. more overinflated ego that everything he said and did was of utmost importance, meaning and value and that everything else was diminished in comparison, but those two things were side by side in the same package so that he could be declarative and abrasive in a second and then turn around and look too well, I'm an idiot, we actually did this on Seinfeld, but it's because Larry really did it, this is who he is and this is who, Georges, left Saturday Night Live as a writer on a volcanic eruption of obscenities.

The boss is going to stick things everywhere, you can stick things and you know, perform natural acts and just this horrible torrent of obscenity one Friday came to his apartment and said what have I done now? I have no job. I'm unemployed and he's talking to Ken Kramer, the real Kramer, and Kenny comes back to work on Monday and I go, what do you mean he comes back like nothing happened? He comes back, what happens when they say you know you quit? and Curse all this you just do what you think I was joking I was making a joke and that's what Larry did that ego that ability to stand on a soap box and curse the world and then literally crawl on your hands and on your knees under it Vin's thinly veiled lie on Monday morning saying "I was just joking, I was joking, that's George, that's George and the only difference I think between my George and Larry's George is that I think the balance was a little more on." The I". useless I have nothing to offer than the Soap Box uh and on the sidewalk Larry leans on the Soap Box because that show is about living in the land of the uncomfortable, but that's the only difference.