Clint Howard Had ‘Good Day’ As Serial Killer on ‘Seinfeld’
Cosmo Kramer is under arrest! Nah, he’s not really the Smog Strangler, but the cops don’t know he’s not the real serial killer. That’s Tobias Lehigh Nagy, the guy who the police pick up for breaking into a car. The thief shares a backseat in the squad car with Jerry and George, who are trying to prove Kramer’s innocence. And thanks to Jerry and George forgetting to close the door on the police car, the real Smog Strangler gets away.
Clint Howard, brother of director and sitcom royalty Ron Howard, is convincingly creepy as Nagy. And he had a charmed day of filming Seinfeld, he told People. Why was his experience better than any other? Howard revealed why the cast was in an especially good mood that day.
“The day that I did ‘The Smog Strangler’ — the one day that I worked on Seinfeld — it was the day after they found out, it was announced that Seinfeld had gotten picked up for another season,” he explained.
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Howard appeared in Part Two of “The Trip,” an episode that aired early in Season Four. Seinfeld was just ascending into television’s most popular show, and big paydays were relatively new to the cast. No wonder they were celebrating. “We were shooting outdoors, normally it’s an indoor show. It was about 75 degrees in February in Los Angeles, it was a beautiful day. The boom guy had his shirt off,” Howard remembered. “And everybody was talking about what kind of car they were going to buy. So I caught the group on a good day, and creatively, they were all awesome.”
People still approach Howard about the episode, he told another interviewer. “They laugh and they go, ‘You're the Smog Strangler!’” he said. “I’ve had people tell me about tipping chambermaids, which was a joke in the episode. It’s amazing how much people pay attention to that show.”
“The Trip” is full of Easter eggs and trivia for Seinfeld fans who pay attention. Check out the scene in which cops confront Kramer in his L.A. apartment. That’s Larry David as part of the crowd watching the arrest:
The cop riding shotgun in the squad car? That’s Marty Rackham, the same actor who played Elaine’s boyfriend Jake Jarmel in several Seinfeld episodes.
And speaking of Elaine, “The Trip” is one of the only episodes in which the character doesn’t appear. The reason Elaine didn’t make the West Coast trip with Jerry, George and Kramer? Julia Louis-Dreyfus was on maternity leave.
Despite Elaine’s absence, Howard still believed he picked the perfect day to appear on the show. Hanging out with the gang right after they learned they’d be getting fat paychecks? “Kismet,” he said.
