Diary of a Curb Your Enthusiasm virgin – “Too saucy” is valid criticism

(Season 3, Episodes 1-2)

Season three is off and running, with Larry’s restaurant getting set to open. With investors like Larry David and Ted Danson, did anyone else find it disturbing that manager Jeff Greene has the cash to invest alongside them? Doesn’t it mean agents and managers are taking a little too much off the top if they can afford to invest alongside their clients?

3.1 “Chet’s Shirt”

I find it very ironic, in an amusing way, that Ted Danson’s on this show. Back on Seinfeld, Danson got a few mentions, always in some way connected to the pilot script that George and Jerry were writing. When negotiating their original deal, George refers to Danson’s Cheers salary as reason for NBC to cough up more money. And in the finale, when NBC gives the group one of its private jets, George laments that it’s not the plane Ted Danson gets to fly on. So it’s funny to see Danson alongside the guy who wrote those lines.

I guess it was inappropriate for Larry to ask Cheryl’s grieving friend where her dead husband had bought some shirt he was wearing in a picture, but really, what’s the crime in asking such a question? Of course, where it went from there…. From buying one for Ted Danson, to finding a hole in it, to ruining his own with blood from a pinata incident (his teeth did look bigger), to the grieving friend seeing her husband’s shirt everywhere, it was all very Larry.

How about his idea for waiter bells in the restaurant? Could he think of something less productive and useful? At least make it something that would sound funny, like kazoos. Or maybe a button that shocks the waiter in a certain place unique to each table. That might be cool, but it would call for some serious hazard pay.

3.2 “The Benadryl Brownie”

I was not surprised that Larry was getting his first cell phone in 2002. He seems the type to be behind the curve. But as much as phones can drop in and out, it’s hard to believe that Cheryl missed the whole thing about the peanut allergy.

It was really unprofessional to ask the chef from the restaurant to cater a dinner at his house. I know it shouldn’t be a big deal, but it just seems wrong to me. And beneath the chef. I’m surprised he said yes, although I suppose that before he had the chance to make the restaurant a success, he probably had little choice. How very Jeff to ask for ketchup on his steak.

The Christian Scientist prayer group was fun, especially that Larry was a part of it. And I loved how Larry rationalized slipping Benadryl into the brownies as being positive, because everyone would think that the prayer had worked. Too bad Jeff had stolen Susie’s brownies from his daughter in the first place — that guy has no conscience.

Who has a personal TV guy? Don’t we all just rely on the technicians from whatever company we get our cable from? Maybe it’s a Hollywood thing, but I’ve never heard of it before.

I loved Larry’s plea to Susie that he’s a secret keeper — I almost thought he was going to say something about his “vault,” which would not have been cool. Slick telling her that he might be losing a testicle. She didn’t seem surprised.

Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Aug 27, 2010 @ 12:00 EST5EDT