Jerry Before Seinfeld

If you've seen Jerry Seinfeld's Web series, Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, you can ascertain three things about him: he likes cars, he likes talking about comedy, and he's incredibly nostalgic (the bittersweet episode with Garry Shandling just before he died is a case in point). His new Netflix special, Jerry Before Seinfeld, is dripping with nostalgia. He performed at the Comic Strip, a New York club where he made his first appearance, shows the house he grew up in, and even has a pair of his own Superman bookends on stage.

As a stand-up Seinfeld is a pro, almost a machine. What's most interesting about him is that he doesn't seem to be neurotic, which most comedians are. For the most part, he seems a normal human being. He tells us that he really doesn't care if the audience likes him or not. Of course, that's easy to say when you're a multi-millionaire.

Seinfeld carries the nostalgia to the point of doing the material he did at the Comic Strip forty years ago. I'm interested in what comedians think about doing old material. I've heard some say that once they do an act on television, they retire it forever. But some comedians, like Stephen Wright or Andrew Dice Clay, haul out old jokes like the Rolling Stones haul out "Satisfaction." Most of the material Seinfeld did in this special I hadn't heard, but a few things, like his joke about policeman beating up suspects and then making sure they don't hit their head on the top of the door I've heard before.

He begins the act with an amusing riff on the prepositions used living in New York. You live in the City, but on Long Island. You get on and off the train, but in and out of a cab. He's updated the bit to add Uber--you take it. He also, predictably, does a long riff on cereal. It's part of a longer bit on how growing up in the '60s was a wild time--no helmets, no seat belts. Parents didn't know where kids were, and he ate 100% sugar. He speaks of the cereal Cookie Crisp, which was actually chocolate chip cookies in milk.

Seinfeld also jokes about women's bathrooms and how come they have so many cotton balls when he's never bought one? Or how his parents moved to Florida, because it's the law. Another bit I had heard was his one about rooting for sports teams--we don't really root for the players, we root for the clothes. A player can leave and go to another team, wearing another shirt and suddenly he's the enemy.

We also get an insight into Seinfeld's almost scientific approach to comedy. He has kept all his notes from 1975 in an accordion folder (I don't believe he has the same folder, I had one that eventually dissolved). When all the notes are taken out, they seem to cover an area the size of a football field.

Seinfeld has suggested he is on the autism spectrum, which may explain his obsession with comedy and comedians. Nevertheless, he's done pretty well for himself. But, he does note he had a very normal childhood. "Would I have been a better comedian had I grown up in Peoria raised by prostitutes?" he asks, referencing Richard Pryor. "Definitely."