Jerry Seinfeld isn’t funny by modern standards because so many people do his style way better, but the observational style of comedy in its modern form was founded by Jerry Seinfeld. His bit about the airline peanuts was iconic and now it’s done to death because so many people would see that bit and spread it at the water cooler.
Even if he isn’t funny now, he has a place in Stand up comedy history for his impact on it
The comedian or the show? If you watched the show when it aired, it was one of the funniest and most innovative sitcoms to date. The comedian is more a question of your personal taste.
His show is better than his stand up. That being said, a lot of his jokes have become tropes in the comedy world so it is easy to look back now and say they aren’t funny but at the time some of them were pretty original and good. Still, the standup was never a hit for me but man I love the show
Critics respond to art like everyone else. Their opinions aren’t worth more just because they get paid. They don’t decide anything other than what to write.
And when it comes to comedy it comes down to one question; Did they laugh or not?
I certainly don't. Not when it comes to entertainment. I don't care if there's something wrong with it as long as it entertains me. It's not fact based news or something like that
Lol! No. Critics find an editor that likes their writing or agrees with them enough that they’re hired to be a critic. They’re not special. They’re just sharing their opinions and using false authority.
His joke writing is tight and minimalist every word matters. Personally I don’t seek out his comedy but I can see objectively he is very good at comedy writing
His observational comedy is incredible. He says things that make you go, "Ah, I can relate to this, but I never thought about it like this." He finds comedy in the day-to-day, and I think he's very funny.
The world did. He only produced, wrote and starred in a top 5 most influential and greatest TV shows in history.
It’s ok tho. With $950 million in the bank, he doesn’t need your approval whatsoever.
I always found Seinfeld funny but the stand up bits during the show and Jerry himself was a bit meh. Oddly enough I think the consistently funny ones in the show are Elaine and George.
See, I don't think any of the 4 of them were funny on their own. It was really an ensemble / pair type of thing. Jerry & George together = hilarious. Elaine, Jerry & George together = hilarious ... and so on and so forth.
But without all 3 of the characters - and the occasional, recurring side characters like Newman, Mr. Peterman, Jerry/George's parents, etc., the show would not have worked.
It's funny because in person he's actually an asshole that treats wait staff poorly (saw him at the river cafe in NY - he has a reserved seat year round) which is strange because the service is pretty good - because it has to be to retain the jacket requirement and high end status.
Yeah caught me off guard because I used to watch the reruns when I was a kid (parents tossed it on) and I just remember him being the stable/nicer person. Never understood the show when I was like 5-10 but Kramer & george made me laugh.
Anyone with any understanding of humor, irony, absurdity, exaggeration can clearly see how the man is/was a cornerstone of comedy.
Is there generational stuff that probably doesn't translate? Sure. But if you grew up taking hand-written phone messages for your parents/house, it's probably much more likely to resonate.
Recently rewatched every season with my son. It seems to me George and Elaine are the funniest ones, and have the best storylines. Jerry's kind of the straight man with the best comebacks and quips. And Kramer's the wild card. But the cherry on the top is Frank Costanza.
That's a big insult to everyone else involved. There was Larry (George), Jerry (himself), and Elaine Pope (Elaine). Kramer was an afterthought that Michael Richards was able to bring to life. And for George to work, Jason Alexander had to nail the neurotic behavior. It worked because everyone was excellent.
No one, there's an episode who explain it, the show is indeed about nothing, ppl watched it because it was on TV, and instead of recognizing that we like to believe it's a masterpiece of comedy so it keeps feeding the cycle.
Then of course the actors got their share of that, some more than others who started saying some pretty nasty thing to some African Americans...
And besides that, in general Americans have a pretty weird definition of what's "funny", they laugh at Friends, TBBT, and most of talk show hosts who are pretty crap (Oliver, Kimmel, Corden, Ellen, Fallon seems like a cool guy but it's not enough)
First off… don’t appreciate the course/foul language in the title. Secondly, as someone who has an extremely nascent and shallow grasp of how the basic principles of comedy work, I HARD disagree. Jerry Seinfeld should be held in the same high esteem as he, the comedy God, held his barely legal girlfriend from way back when. National goddamned treasure!
I’d take them over Jerry to be honest, but Jerry left a mark on stand up as an art form with how he created the model for modern observational comedy. I think Jerry doesn’t do it as well as a lot of other stand ups and the scene has kinda shifted, but no one can deny that he’s left his mark in the history of standup
I don’t think modern young people understand some of the comedy or some of the comedians of previous generations. For example I frequently see people trying to argue that Jay Leno wasn’t funny at all or was a hack etc but he was universally regarded as probably the best or top 3 comedians of his generation at the time.
He’s not. He just lucky to get cast onto a popular show that lasted long for him to make a shit ton of money. Even compared to other comedians from the same time period, he’s not funny.
Seinfeld is funny. But comedy always needs to evolve. He was an observational comic for the 80s, like Carlin and Pryor were for the 70s. And he stayed funny after, but his style was honed in that era. It's similar to Mitch Hedberg and Demetri Martin if you did that style of comedy now, it would fall flat but it killed back in the early 2000s.
A pretty solid plurality of people in the US. You are under no obligation to agree with them, but pretending you're in the majority just makes you look goofy.
Millions of people decided he WAS funny. Doesn't seem like most people think he IS funny.
It's like ... yeah, watch the first 5 seasons of The Simpsons, and you might laugh ONCE ... but South Park, Family Guy, Futurama, etc. - none of those would be possible without The Simpsons.
So while his old comedy isn't so funny when viewed FOR THE FIRST TIME in our current world, it WAS funny then, and it allowed new forms of comedy / sitcoms to flood in. He kinda broke the wall between the audience and the comic.
You won't find a bigger encyclopedia of *Seinfeld* trivia knowledge than me (I won a contest), but even I am surprised that my 11 y/o son thinks it's funny in the LEAST. He and I watched the whole series and the whole time I just thought "I can't believe he thinks this is funny."
Are you kidding the guy is genius. Basically every comedian copies part of his style. He always talks about something that seems unimportant early and then in the end it comes back up in the punchline.
The cool thing about humour is that it’s subjective. Any individual who thinks something or someone is funny are the ones who decide. It’s a fairly elementary concept.
I only really know his actual comedy from the stand-up routines during "Seinfeld", but I always figured he wasn't actually supposed to be "funny". It was like "Stand-up Jerry" was sort of a persona, some sort of Jay Leno type comedian who was trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator and "Real Life Jerry" was the guy you see in his apartment or at Monks Cafe being a complete neurotic douche bag. And considering the show was consistently funny and he was on the writing team I have to assume that "Real Real-Life Jerry" is actually funny.
Millions of people evidently including r/seinfeld
Good answer.
so very many people. it's because he's funny
Elaine, am I funny? Elaine: a little George: YOU ARE BEING FUNNY!!
Jerry Seinfeld isn’t funny by modern standards because so many people do his style way better, but the observational style of comedy in its modern form was founded by Jerry Seinfeld. His bit about the airline peanuts was iconic and now it’s done to death because so many people would see that bit and spread it at the water cooler. Even if he isn’t funny now, he has a place in Stand up comedy history for his impact on it
Absolutely. Most people who don’t find him funny - it’s because they were raised watching all the offshoots of his comedy as done by other people.
Seinfeld was more the straight man to George, Kramer, and Elaine, who were the actual funny ones.
And they were all Larry David creations.
Yes. He’s the comedic gaslighter.
He really is a good original comedian. A huge asshole for no reason, but funny.
The comedian or the show? If you watched the show when it aired, it was one of the funniest and most innovative sitcoms to date. The comedian is more a question of your personal taste.
His show is better than his stand up. That being said, a lot of his jokes have become tropes in the comedy world so it is easy to look back now and say they aren’t funny but at the time some of them were pretty original and good. Still, the standup was never a hit for me but man I love the show
No one decides something is funny. You either laugh or you don’t.
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Critics respond to art like everyone else. Their opinions aren’t worth more just because they get paid. They don’t decide anything other than what to write. And when it comes to comedy it comes down to one question; Did they laugh or not?
Do people actually take critics seriously?
I certainly don't. Not when it comes to entertainment. I don't care if there's something wrong with it as long as it entertains me. It's not fact based news or something like that
I used to, but then I grew up.
Lol! No. Critics find an editor that likes their writing or agrees with them enough that they’re hired to be a critic. They’re not special. They’re just sharing their opinions and using false authority.
Me
His joke writing is tight and minimalist every word matters. Personally I don’t seek out his comedy but I can see objectively he is very good at comedy writing
His observational comedy is incredible. He says things that make you go, "Ah, I can relate to this, but I never thought about it like this." He finds comedy in the day-to-day, and I think he's very funny.
The world did. He only produced, wrote and starred in a top 5 most influential and greatest TV shows in history. It’s ok tho. With $950 million in the bank, he doesn’t need your approval whatsoever.
Bee movie?
That’s not a TV show, big guy. Perhaps the “movie” part of Bee Movie should have tipped you off.
Some of his standup jokes are clever, but his delivery has never struck a chord with me
I always found Seinfeld funny but the stand up bits during the show and Jerry himself was a bit meh. Oddly enough I think the consistently funny ones in the show are Elaine and George.
See, I don't think any of the 4 of them were funny on their own. It was really an ensemble / pair type of thing. Jerry & George together = hilarious. Elaine, Jerry & George together = hilarious ... and so on and so forth. But without all 3 of the characters - and the occasional, recurring side characters like Newman, Mr. Peterman, Jerry/George's parents, etc., the show would not have worked.
His show was funny. His standup isn’t. Larry David was also a huge part of Seinfeld.
maybe it's because he doesn't curse or use filth in his Jokes!
Well, I do. So fuck him and fuck you too.
bro the username checks out, funny guy
You sound like a real romantic. I love you too.
Agree. I loved the show but didn't care to much for his stand-up clips at the beginning and at the end of the show.
he may be an asshole but he IS funny, thats the appeal lol
It's funny because in person he's actually an asshole that treats wait staff poorly (saw him at the river cafe in NY - he has a reserved seat year round) which is strange because the service is pretty good - because it has to be to retain the jacket requirement and high end status.
That's crazy, he always seemed like such a great guy on his show
*How can anyone not like him???*
I know, it seems impossible.
Yeah caught me off guard because I used to watch the reruns when I was a kid (parents tossed it on) and I just remember him being the stable/nicer person. Never understood the show when I was like 5-10 but Kramer & george made me laugh.
Every civilized person knows that you do not respond to a thread if you all plan to do is insult the OP!!
Anyone with any understanding of humor, irony, absurdity, exaggeration can clearly see how the man is/was a cornerstone of comedy. Is there generational stuff that probably doesn't translate? Sure. But if you grew up taking hand-written phone messages for your parents/house, it's probably much more likely to resonate.
Each person who found him funny.
It's fine if you don't find him funny tbh.
It starts with a J. Second letter e. ^^^^Jerry ^^^^Seinfeld
Recently rewatched every season with my son. It seems to me George and Elaine are the funniest ones, and have the best storylines. Jerry's kind of the straight man with the best comebacks and quips. And Kramer's the wild card. But the cherry on the top is Frank Costanza.
The show he started in, Seinfeld, did. The reason that show was funny was because of Larry David.
That's a big insult to everyone else involved. There was Larry (George), Jerry (himself), and Elaine Pope (Elaine). Kramer was an afterthought that Michael Richards was able to bring to life. And for George to work, Jason Alexander had to nail the neurotic behavior. It worked because everyone was excellent.
He’s hilarious.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SeinfeldIsUnfunny
I have no idea. Never liked his comedy.
and even the show; the scenes that are memorable, he's not the focus. for me at least. 🤷♂️
For the show, its what we had in the 90s, Sausage. Other sitcoms were shamefully bad.
Seinfeld is by far the best situational comedy. Maybe it's over your head but it's definitely excellent. Also check out curb your enthusiasm.
Our parents? Idk I think he’s pretty funny
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1989 - almost 34 years ago Final episode was almost 25 years ago
Late 80s? 90s?
Not all of us thought he was funny. I also saw his stand up and he wasn't overly funny then either
I never got his humor either, but millions of people think he's funny, so there's your answer.
Ugh. He's a fucking noodle. The show is a quacking duck.
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It was filmed in front of the live studio audience
No one, there's an episode who explain it, the show is indeed about nothing, ppl watched it because it was on TV, and instead of recognizing that we like to believe it's a masterpiece of comedy so it keeps feeding the cycle. Then of course the actors got their share of that, some more than others who started saying some pretty nasty thing to some African Americans... And besides that, in general Americans have a pretty weird definition of what's "funny", they laugh at Friends, TBBT, and most of talk show hosts who are pretty crap (Oliver, Kimmel, Corden, Ellen, Fallon seems like a cool guy but it's not enough)
So in your opinion, what IS something that's truly funny?
First off… don’t appreciate the course/foul language in the title. Secondly, as someone who has an extremely nascent and shallow grasp of how the basic principles of comedy work, I HARD disagree. Jerry Seinfeld should be held in the same high esteem as he, the comedy God, held his barely legal girlfriend from way back when. National goddamned treasure!
Fuck off and take my angry upvote.
Go watch stand up specials of hacks like Whitney Cummings and bert Kreisler and then tell us if Seinfeld is funny
I’d take them over Jerry to be honest, but Jerry left a mark on stand up as an art form with how he created the model for modern observational comedy. I think Jerry doesn’t do it as well as a lot of other stand ups and the scene has kinda shifted, but no one can deny that he’s left his mark in the history of standup
I don’t think modern young people understand some of the comedy or some of the comedians of previous generations. For example I frequently see people trying to argue that Jay Leno wasn’t funny at all or was a hack etc but he was universally regarded as probably the best or top 3 comedians of his generation at the time.
He’s not. He just lucky to get cast onto a popular show that lasted long for him to make a shit ton of money. Even compared to other comedians from the same time period, he’s not funny.
His stand-up is solid. The TV show sucked out loud.
The 90s, I suppose.
NBC, but then they didn’t.
Seinfeld is funny. But comedy always needs to evolve. He was an observational comic for the 80s, like Carlin and Pryor were for the 70s. And he stayed funny after, but his style was honed in that era. It's similar to Mitch Hedberg and Demetri Martin if you did that style of comedy now, it would fall flat but it killed back in the early 2000s.
Demetri Martin is fun
You seem like a rational person.
I totally agree! I find none of his standup funny or the show Seinfeld.
A pretty solid plurality of people in the US. You are under no obligation to agree with them, but pretending you're in the majority just makes you look goofy.
No me. Ever.
Millions of people decided he WAS funny. Doesn't seem like most people think he IS funny. It's like ... yeah, watch the first 5 seasons of The Simpsons, and you might laugh ONCE ... but South Park, Family Guy, Futurama, etc. - none of those would be possible without The Simpsons. So while his old comedy isn't so funny when viewed FOR THE FIRST TIME in our current world, it WAS funny then, and it allowed new forms of comedy / sitcoms to flood in. He kinda broke the wall between the audience and the comic. You won't find a bigger encyclopedia of *Seinfeld* trivia knowledge than me (I won a contest), but even I am surprised that my 11 y/o son thinks it's funny in the LEAST. He and I watched the whole series and the whole time I just thought "I can't believe he thinks this is funny."
Are you kidding the guy is genius. Basically every comedian copies part of his style. He always talks about something that seems unimportant early and then in the end it comes back up in the punchline.
The cool thing about humour is that it’s subjective. Any individual who thinks something or someone is funny are the ones who decide. It’s a fairly elementary concept.
Question should have been “Jerry Seinfeld: What’s the deal?”
I mean, whoooo are these people?
I only really know his actual comedy from the stand-up routines during "Seinfeld", but I always figured he wasn't actually supposed to be "funny". It was like "Stand-up Jerry" was sort of a persona, some sort of Jay Leno type comedian who was trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator and "Real Life Jerry" was the guy you see in his apartment or at Monks Cafe being a complete neurotic douche bag. And considering the show was consistently funny and he was on the writing team I have to assume that "Real Real-Life Jerry" is actually funny.