Ted Danson Thought the ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Pilot ‘Sucked’

Curb Your Enthusiasm changed Ted Danson’s life. At least, that’s what he told Curb costar JB Smoove this week on the Where Everybody Knows Your Name podcast. Acting with Smoove and Larry David “reinvigorated my desire to be funny.” The irony? When Danson watched the show’s pilot episode, “I thought it sucked. I thought it absolutely sucked.”

Danson’s wife, Mary Steenburgen, liked the original episode but Danson only felt pity. “I felt sorry for my new friend, Larry David,” he explained. “So in trying to be encouraging, I said, ‘You know, if you ever need us to play ourselves, we'd be happy to. And in that sort of idiocy, I ended up being part of something that changed my life.” 

It’s not the first time Danson has told someone how much he believed Curb sucked. Then again, he wasn’t trusting his own comedy instincts at the time. “After 18 years of half-hour sitcoms, I felt I had stayed too long at that half-hour sitcom party and that other people were doing it way better than I was,” he told Sam Jones on Off Camera. “I was not finding myself funny.”

Then he and Steenburgen were invited to the Curb premiere party at Martha’s Vineyard. “It’s hot, and we’re all sweaty,” Danson remembered. “A couple of people actually fell asleep.” That’s when the couple offered to help “the poor sap” with a cameo. 

In the end, though, David was the one who helped Danson. “He turned half-hour (comedy) on its ear,” he said. “It also brought happiness — he brought a giggle back to my work. All of a sudden, I was enjoying going to work and I was laughing again.”

Smoove had similar feelings. The freedom of improvising on Curb “makes what we originally did better because now we’re in the moment,” he told Danson. While some sitcom scripts can make actors sound robotic, Smoove now gets “more leeway because of Curb. They give comedians more leeway because they know that they have a certain rhythm and timing that comes across very well and natural.”

Other comedies insist on actors performing the script exactly as is, while Smoove prefers a “take it and make it your own” approach, “which is a better way for anybody to work.”

Despite Danson’s gratitude, he told Smoove he’s afraid he won’t get to hang out with David anymore without the excuse of work. “I invited him onto the (Where Everybody Knows Your Name) show. I texted him. I said Woody Harrelson and I are doing this podcast. We’d love to have you on.”

“You and Woody, God, that sounds great,” David responded. 

So was he accepting that invitation? David offered a one-word response: “Nah.”