“Curb Your Enthusiasm” star says Anne Bancroft was 'incapable' of improvising for cameo

Susie Essman revealed that the legendary actress had to ask Larry David what to say for her appearance on a 2004 episode.

Big-screen legend Anne Bancroft had a little trouble with small-screen improvising, according to Larry David's Curb Your Enthusiasm costar Susie Essman.

"Generally, Larry likes to cast comedians, so comedians are used to improvising. We do that on stage all the time," Essman said of the show's creator-star during Friday's installment of The View's Behind the Table podcast, upon which she appeared opposite her longtime friend Joy Behar.

When View producer Brian Teta asked if any notable guest stars on the HBO comedy have struggled with the program's improvisational nature in the past, Essman made a stunning reveal.

"Some actors are intimidated. Anne Bancroft, interesting, brilliant actress, and married to one of the great improvisers of the entire world," she said, referencing Mel Brooks, who was married to Bancroft until the Oscar winner's death in 2005. "She could not improvise on Curb. She said to Larry, 'Tell me what to say. I can't do this. Just tell me what to say.' So, she was incapable of it, a brilliant actress like her."

Behar also stepped in to praise the star of The Graduate, who was also a friend of hers.

"I knew her, too. She told me one time, 'I was petrified doing Curb Your Enthusiasm,'" Behar added. "But also, when you spoke to her, she was quite fun and funny."

EW has reached out to representatives for Curb Your Enthusiasm for comment.

Bancroft, who won Best Actress at the 1963 Oscars for her performance in The Miracle Worker, appeared as herself alongside Brooks in season 4, episode 10 of Curb, titled "Opening Night." The cameo, filmed a year before her death, would mark her final onscreen appearance.

Listen to Essman and Behar discuss Bancroft in the podcast above.

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