The Massapequa native did his hometown proud. Below we list some crazy facts about Jerry Seinfeld.
Life and Early Comedy Success
- Jerry Seinfeld was born on April 29, 1954 in Brooklyn
- Seinfeld’s father was a sign painter
- Seinfeld grew up in Massapequa
- He attended Massapequa High School
- Seinfeld is an avid Mets fan
- He graduated from CUNY Queens College in 1976
- His first stand-up comedy gig was an open mic night in 1976 at Catch a Rising Star in Manhattan
- Seinfeld had a small role in the TV sitcom Benson in 1980
- He appeared on The Tonight Show for the first time in 1981
- He also appeared on Late Night with David letterman
- His net worth is estimated to be around $950 million
- Seinfeld is said to have a collection of more than 500 sneakers, although he has publicly disputed the number
- Seinfeld has been married twice and has three children
- When he did a standup show at Westbury Music Fair he called it “exciting” and said ''When you grow up on Long Island, Westbury is kind of like the Hollywood Palace''
- Seinfeld’s current wife, Jessica Sklar had just married a Broadway producer when they first met and the couple divorced after only a few months
- Seinfeld married Sklar in 1999
- The couple bought Billy Joel's house in Amagansett for $32 million
Photo: Shutterstock.
TV Show
- Seinfeld created and starred in the hit sitcom, airing from 1989 to 1998
- The show was originally called “Seinfeld Chronicles”
- The show was originally described in the New York Times before its premier as being about single life, combining situation comedy and stand-up bits
- The show's theme music was composed by Jonathan Wolff
- From a Huffington Post interview: “[Wolff] then recorded samples of lip pops, tongue noises and other ‘organic human sounds’ to create what he described as a ‘percolating rhythm, this New York groove’ to play around Seinfeld's dialogue
- The show had a strict "no hugging, no learning" policy, meaning that there would be no emotional moments or life lessons in the show
- The character of Elaine was not originally in the pilot episode
- The character of Kramer was based on a real person named Kenny Kramer
- George was based on show co-creator Larry David
- David’s favorite episode of Seinfeld is “The Contest”
- The show received ten Emmy awards and three Golden Globes
- The final episode of Seinfeld on May 14, 1998 was watched by 76 million viewers
- Jerry Seinfeld famously turned down an offer of $5 million per episode to continue the show for a tenth season
- There is a 24/7 AI-generated show based on Seinfeld called “Nothing Forever”
List of Funny Phrases Coined on Seinfeld
- Yada, yada, yada
- Not that there's anything wrong with that
- No soup for you!
- Spongeworthy
- Double-dipping
- Close talker
- Low talker
- Master of your domain
Photo: Shutterstock.
Bee Movie
- Seinfeld co-wrote the screenplay and voiced the main character Barry B. Benson
- Jeffrey Katzenberg wanted to get Seinfeld into a movie for over 12 years
- Seinfeld was inspired to write the script for this movie after his wife took up the hobby of beekeeping - IMDB
- According to Jerry Seinfeld, while having lunch at Steven Spielberg's house, he first mentioned the idea for the movie as a joke, but Spielberg loved the idea - IMDB
- To prepare for the role, Seinfeld visited a French bee keeper on Long Island
- The bees swarmed Seinfeld and one stung him on the nose
- The movie was release in 2007 to mixed reviews
- The Bee movie experienced a brief resurgence in popularity as an Internet meme in 2016
