‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Finale Retries the ‘Seinfeld’ Ending, Just for Laughs
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[Editor’s Note: The following review contains spoilers for “Curb Your Enthusiasm” Season 12, Episode 10, “No Lessons Learned” — the series finale.]
Would you date the Bearded Lady? Midway through the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” finale, when Larry David is on the ropes — facing a loss in court for violating Georgia’s Election Integrity Act — and his old friend, Jerry Seinfeld, shows up for a last-second assist, that’s the hypothetical question the two men bat back and forth. She’s gorgeous, Larry says. She’s charming. She’s got it all. “The kind of woman you used to dream about as a teenager,” he says. But, you know… the beard. “Fly in the ointment,” Jerry says. “And this is a big fly. And he’s alive.” “What’s the worst that can happen?” Larry asks. “The worst that can happen is it’s a paper napkin,” Jerry says, “and she wipes her mouth, and part of it snags.”
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Larry can barely contain his laughter, even as he continues outlining the parameters of this utterly fictitious dilemma. Sure, he and Jerry could be dealing with serious issues, like: Is Larry going to end up in prison? Will Jerry take the stand to defend Larry’s honor? What will he say? What can he do? Will anything make a lick of difference in the face of all these witnesses coming forward to defame David’s already dubious reputation?
But they don’t talk about any of that. Their two-minute reunion doesn’t make any headway toward Larry’s ultimate fate. Why not? Because it doesn’t matter to Larry. He couldn’t care less, and he’s told us as much in a million different ways — in the finale, during Season 12, and across the preceding 110 episodes. But he does it again, and again, and again in the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” not-so-subtle finale, including in this critical scene. When Jerry first arrives, he’s worried. He hugs Larry. He defends Larry. He cares about Larry.
“So how are you getting through this?” Jerry says. “You’re sitting in court all day — what do you think about?”
And that’s when Larry asks him about the Bearded Lady. During the trial that’s captivated the nation, that’s what Larry’s been thinking about. As cable news talking heads are debating civil rights and Ted Danson is leading protesters outside the courthouse (“Don’t touch the hair”), Larry is sitting in front of a judge and jury, wondering in what scenario he (or Jerry, or anyone, really) would date a woman who has an extremely thick beard.
Everyone is up in arms. Even Jerry is concerned. But Larry doesn’t care.
OK, clearly, he cares a little bit. You don’t base an entire episode around the “Seinfeld” finale because you’ve moved on. But David’s primary goal isn’t rewriting history. While the episode references, follows, and reverses (at first blush) the oft-criticized “Seinfeld” ending — as many had predicted thanks to plenty of foreshadowing peppered throughout Season 12 — it’s not an apology for his vilified ending to the NBC sitcom. It’s not a mea culpa or a do-over. If anything, it’s David doubling down on what he did 25 years ago. It’s Larry being Larry, and we should love him for it.
When “Seinfeld” ended, the common complaints were that its closing notes were too harsh and not funny enough. From a certain vantage point, “Curb Your Enthusiasm’s” conclusion could be seen as amending both issues. Larry, in the end, is a free man, and the episode itself is very, very funny. Larry complaining about a squealer calling out his cell phone usage only to then squeal on Leon (J.B. Smoove) and Jeff (Jeff Garlin) for the same thing? Funny. Allison Janney blocking Larry from exiting the freeway by giving him the bird, and then denying it later? Funny. Larry catching her in a lie about suicide? I mean, come on. Classic Larry.
Episode 12 finds room for Larry’s beef with the beloved Ted Danson (his perfect foil), Greg Kinnear reviving his Atticus Finch way off Broadway, and Leon bingeing “Seinfeld” for the first time, complete with great quips on the show’s episodic format — “You never told me it was a show about weekly ass” — and a knowing reference to his own parallels to Kramer. (“He’s too much, man. All up in your fucking house, unannounced and shit?”) Not to be overwhelmed by another show, there are in-jokes for “Curb” super-fans, as well, whether it’s bringing back the little girl who hugged Larry at the wrong time or pointing out the courtroom doesn’t even provide coasters. “They want you to respect the law,” Larry says, “but the law doesn’t respect wood?”
Viewers’ mileage for meta comedy and nostalgic quips may vary, but the bigger picture painted by “No Lessons Learned” is still a winner. “Curb” may end with Larry on the plane, arguing with his best buds about who has the right to control an airplane’s window shade, but before that, the finale comes to the same conclusion as “Seinfeld”: Larry is guilty. He’s sentenced to a year in prison. The prosecution’s parade of character witnesses worked, from Mocha Joe (Saverio Guerra) and Mr. Takahashi (Dana Lee) to Bruce Springsteen (as himself) and Auntie Rae Black (Ellia English). The crowd outside turned on him (just as it embraced Ted). The world turned on him. He’s left alone in his cell.
…and he’s fine with it. Of course he is! Larry strikes up a conversation with a fellow inmate about that annoying “pants tent” plaguing khakis, and director Jeff Schaffer’s camera starts to pull back, just like it did when “Seinfeld” ended on Jerry, George (Jason Alexander), Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), and Kramer (Michael Richards) repeating one of their old conversations.
Then their lives proceeded accordingly. After all they went through, they were unchanged. And so is Larry.
The “Seinfeld” finale argues that these four friends are unfit for society. The “Curb” finale contends Larry doesn’t belong either. It’s only by the grace of his good friend Jerry — who spots a jury member violating his sequester, thus causing a mistrial in Larry’s case — that he’s a free man in the end. “You don’t want to end up like this,” Jerry says. “Nobody wants to see it.” And he’s right. We don’t. We didn’t then, with “Seinfeld,” because we loved those four mooks despite their flaws, and we don’t now, especially when Larry has been proven right so many times over during the episode. (It’s also fitting, realistically, that a rich and powerful guy like Larry could evade punishment, while the “Seinfeld” crew would have no such recourse.)
But that doesn’t mean Larry was wrong to end either series the way he did. “I’m 76 years old, and I’ve never learned a lesson in my entire life,” Larry bluntly tells a little boy near the start of Episode 12. Isn’t that what we want? Isn’t that why we love Larry? For standing by his opinions, no matter the public pressure? Prison would not have changed him, just as him ending up in prison wouldn’t have changed the ending of “Curb.” Whether in a jail cell or an airplane, he’s going to make a big deal out of the small things and make the small things feel big. Having Jerry spring him just provided an extra opportunity for what does matter to David: more jokes. He gets to crack jokes about Mexican food (what a call back to Cheryl’s complaint), jokes built into his “sequester” wordplay with Jerry, and, yes, the joke about how this should’ve been the ending of “Seinfeld.” Does he mean it? I don’t think so. But it’s a good joke, and that’s what matters. That’s what’s always mattered.
If the “Curb” finale is meant to rewrite the “Seinfeld” ending in any way, it’s during that first scene between Jerry and Larry. Their silly hypothetical about the Bearded Lady lets us see Larry and Jerry, the co-creators of “Seinfeld,” cracking each other up. They’re playing out the kind of scene they used to write for Jerry and George, and getting that silly, joyful spark between two TV legends — even for a moment — is pure bliss. Maybe that finale didn’t have enough of those moments for some of you, but this one sure does. And either way, Larry doesn’t give a shit. He’s just having a laugh.
Grade: B+
“Curb Your Enthusiasm” is available from HBO and can be streamed on Max.
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