I'll mind the past and you... giddyup... to the future

My notes are so considerable for Seinfeld Season 4 I'm not sure where to start. Suffice to say I think it's my favorite season. At least it is until I watch Season 5 and decide it's better (and with episodes such as The Puffy Shirt, The Bris, The Barber, The Cigar Store Indian and The Marine Biologist... I think I've just changed my mind again...).

I must say I think the season gets off to a bad start with the two-parter The Trip. I acknowledge what many of the crew say on the extras that these episodes were taking a bold step with sitcoms, serialised stories that utilised multiple sets plus locations (Yee-gads!!). But surely, the evidence of never going back to it again during the show's run must mean it didn't work for them on an artistic level?

Otherwise, Season 4 was a benchmark year. The nervousness and clunkiness of the first year was gone and the writing had started to take on a circular sructural format that was often beautiful to watch (and IMHO peaked with The Marine Biologist the following year). The writers started to get bolder in their adventurousness and as Seinfeld points out in the extras: instances such as the references to orgasms and nipples and especially his remark about "slice this fat bastard up" would have never made it past Standards and Practices in previous years.

The cast also did their best work to date in this season, and while, as the sitcom within a sitcom pointed out - Jerry is no actor - the rest of the cast excelled themselves (and Jerry at least had his zingers). Jason Alexander showed tremendous courage baring the naked selfishness and biterness of George to the point of high comedy, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss spat her lines and pushed around characters like she was the Tasmanian Devil and Michael Richards, quite simply, owned Kramer to the point where he could do almost anything (including giving himself an enema and coming out happy as a daisy) and make it come alive with humour.


"You want a Christmas card? You want a Christmas card? Here's your Christmas card!"

Larry David and Seinfeld continued to plum the depths of our own lives and show us how intricately detailed (and how funny) our boring daily chores actually are. They would take aspects of our lives such as food (Pasta Premavera), drink (Snapple), therapy (both Elaine and George, plus Joe Davola of course), possible homosexuality (between Jerry and George), going to the movies (such as Checkmate, Ponce de Leon and Rochelle Rochelle), novelty nipple christmas cards, restaurant ettiquette and valet BO, and then mine the depths of comedy to show us what we are really like behind closed doors (or not as the case may be). So much of this became (at least temporarily) part of the lexicon - everything from Jerry's "Not that there's anything wrong with that" response to not being gay, Jerry trying to determine the name of his girlfriend: "Mulva?", "Dolores! Dolores!" (which was originally "Chloris! Chloris! Kitty?"), everyone loving Drake: "Gotta love the Drake", Elaine's method of dealing with attached smells: "Sauce me!", Kramer not dealing with a sauna: "It's like a sauna in here" and Kramer dealing with no toilet: "I missed my chance!" "You didn't go?" "No, and now I can't get it back!".


"He's obsessed... he's obsessed with breasts"

Season four continued to up the ante when it came to casting each episode: Fred Savage, Corbin Bernsen, George Wendt play themselves in Part One of The Trip; Bob Balaban almost stole the season throughout as the initially cold NBC executive Russell Dalrymple, who comes unstuck under the charms of Elaine; Heidi Swedberg made numerous appearances as George's on-again, off-again love interest, Susan (also an NBC executive), who was eventually driven to lesbianism by season's end (and then lost her girlfriend to Kramer!); Twin Peaks regulars Warren Frost and Grace Zabriskie as Susan's parents in The Cheever Letters; Jane Leeves, prior to Frasier as Marla, The Virgin; Denise Richards, in an eary brief appearance as Russell Dalrymple's daughter; Wayne Knight's ever increasing appearances as Newman; Teri Hatcher in the absolute classic The Implant; and Jeremy Piven, who plays George in The Pilot. Many of these characters would return in brief cameos in the final episode (The Pilot) echoing the final two ever episodes of Seinfeld, The Finale Parts One and Two when the bring many of the characters from the entire run back for guest appearances. And who could forget the parents of Jerry and George, Barney Martin and Liz Sheridan, and Jerry Stiller and Estelle Harris respectively. As the comprehensive extras on these DVD's make clear, however, John Randolph originated the role of Frank Costanza and was replaced by Jerry Stiller after Randolph passed away (the DVD even includes both versions of The Handicap Spot with both actors!). Several other important supporting characters returned from the previous season: Leo Lesser as Uncle Leo, Brian George as Babu and Ping Wu as Ping.




Larry David is the real heart of this show, and for evidence look no further than his own recent show, Curb Your Enthusiasm which takes the cynical, black humour of Seinfeld to a whole other level. In addition to writing and producing Seinfeld, David has also contributed a dazzingly array of voice characters and brief appearances - this season concludes with Russell Dalrymple volunteering for Greenpeace alongside Larry David and Larry Charles (and there's an Easter Egg of them flubbing their lines).

The DVD's are genuinely comprehensive and I cannot think of another show where this much care and thought has gone into everything. The commentaries are generally disappointing, partly because the directors can't seem to remember anything, partly because Richards, Alexander and Dreyfuss don't really have anything much to say at all and partly because Seinfeld comes across as a really smug so-and-so. I tended to switch on the Trivia Track while watching the episodes and they weren't too distracting as they provide a wealth of info on production stories and facts about many of the pop culture references. The only problem is that many of these stories are repeated in the Inside Looks interviews. These interviews are better than the commentaries, as people seem more willing to discuss the show (Seinfeld still comes across as a prick though). There are also such gems in amongst the extras such as specially shot promos for the Olympics, a Regis & Kathy Lee skit, Fran Drescher standing in for George's mother in a scene (prior to The Nanny) and many deleted and alternate scenes. There's several Easter Eggs if you can find 'em, including one which explains the whole Tom and Roseanne fiasco and another which includes Kramer's cameo appearance in an episode of Mad About You.