The Four Weirdest Moments in ‘Seinfeld’ History
Thanks to Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer, New York was a very strange place from 1989 to 1998.
Seinfeld has long been incorrectly labeled “a show about nothing.” The pitch George uses for his and Jerry’s in-universe attempt at TV stardom became the unofficial tagline for the series, even though Seinfeld is about so, so much more than just “nothing.” Seinfeld is a show about killer clowns who love opera. It’s a show about a hipster doofus who turns his apartment into the set of The Merv Griffin Show. It’s a show about laughter, love, horror, clowns and the human experience, which is one of the weirder experiences in the grand scheme of things.
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Despite its reputation for finding humor in the most mundane circumstances, Seinfeld still found a way to fly way off the rails and deliver some of the more absurd, bizarro and uncanny comedy in multicam sitcom history. Here are the four weirdest Seinfeld moments ever, starting with…
Kramer Turning His Apartment Into the Set of ‘The Merv Griffin Show’
Every episode featuring the inside of Cosmo Kramer’s domicile was deliriously strange, whether he was running a sauna/Japanese hostel, struggling with the lights of the Kenny Rogers Roaster sign, or, in the aptly titled Season Nine episode “The Merv Griffin Show,” running his room like it’s a talk show that was canceled almost three decades prior. Kramer keeps up the charade of the show so convincingly that it seems as if he truly believes he’s running a talk show that uses Jerry’s also-bizarre vintage toy roofie side plot to transition into a Jerry Springer type deal.
Jerry the Werewolf
Like so many of the strangest plot lines in Seinfeld, Jerry’s struggle with his own chest hair in the Season Eight episode “The Muffin Tops” was a parody of a film that no one in the modern era remembers. The bizarre closing scene of the episode, in which an itchy, hairy Jerry escapes into the misty woods to howl at the moon – or his own ingrown follicles – is an homage to the 1994 werewolf romance movie Wolf, starring Jack Nicholson. For as weird as this scene is, we can, actually, handle that truth.
Kramer’s Pigman
Even if the mythical half-pig, half-man chimera that Kramer claims to see in the Season Five episode “The Bris” turned out to just be a “fat little mental patient,” the mania it instills in the already manic Kramer creates one of the stranger storylines of the series. Kramer’s attempt to unravel the government conspiracy that led to the creation of hybrid monster men and the stealing of George’s car didn’t turn up anything supernatural, but, for a brief episode, it made Kramer (and George) believe in the impossible.
Everything Crazy Joe Davola
The late, great Peter Crombie perfectly played Seinfeld’s most upsetting antagonist and the source for absurdist plot lines that turn the series on its kicked head. Whether it’s the clown’s obsession with Elaine, his encouragement of intruders, the hairs on his tongue or any other one of his many bizarre quirks, the violently unmedicated opera enthusiast always introduced a new weird, unusual and upsetting element to the show with each appearance.