Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Complete Series
Starring Larry David, Jeff Garlin, Susie Essman, Cheryl Hines, JB Smoove, Richard Lewis, Ted Danson, and Bob Einstein.
SYNOPSIS:
All 12 seasons of Larry David’s hysterically funny series Curb Your Enthusiasm have arrived on Blu-ray in this 24-disc set, which also includes close to six hours of bonus features. Two caveats: previously released commentary tracks are missing, and the first six seasons are cropped in the 1.78:1 aspect ratio, rather than being window-boxed, which results in some poorly framed moments.
When I reviewed the Peanuts: 75th Anniversary Ultimate TV Specials Collection, I said that I thought Charlie Brown would always be my spirit animal. Well, my family would likely disagree with that notion and point to Larry David instead. And, yeah, they have a point there.
While I don’t think I could ever be friends with someone like Larry David (he reminds me of too many people I’ve been happy to leave in life’s rear-view mirror), I can appreciate his curmudgeonly view of the world. That feeling is even more pronounced these days, with all the ways the human race seems to be doing itself in.
Whereas Seinfeld made it easy for me to feel secure in the knowledge that awful people were in the minority, Curb Your Enthusiasm has reinforced my current notion that they’re very much in the majority these days. So I suppose I have come to share Larry David’s curmudgeonly outlook on life and people, at least in some ways. I still hold out a sliver of hope for humanity.
You’ll find all 12 seasons of Curb in this hefty box set, with two Blu-ray discs devoted to each season. Since there are only ten episodes per season, you’ll find just two on the second disc for each season, which offers room for a lot of bonus features. If you did the math with me, that adds up to 24 platters in this box set, with something like 3,600 minutes (60 hours) of episodes, plus another roughly 345 minutes, or nearly six hours, of bonus features.
Given the fact that it took nearly 24 years to produce 12 seasons of Curb, this is probably a perfect time to use this set to revisit the series. Its main character is a fictionalized version of the real Larry David, but not by a lot, as a friend of mine confirmed once when he told me a story about recognizing Larry David in an elevator: the comedian shook his head “No” and turned away to face the wall. He and I both found the incident very funny, since it was so on-brand for David.
Over 120 episodes, we follow this semi-fictional Larry David as he uses his manager, Jeff Greene (Jeff Garlin), as a sounding board for his trials and tribulations while constantly bickering with Jeff’s wife, Susie (Susie Essman). Cheryl Hines plays his long-suffering wife, Cheryl, who eventually becomes his ex-spouse, while eighty gazillion people pop in along the way to play themselves, including Richard Lewis, Ted Danson, Seinfeld cast members, and many more.
There’s also an ongoing series of guest roles played by notable actors, such as Bob Einstein and Vince Vaughn as Marty and Freddie Funkhouser, respectively; Bob Odenkirk as a porn star; Paul Mazursky as Norm; and J.B. Smoove as Leon, who lives with Larry in later seasons. I could go on forever listing more notable people who play themselves and fictional roles, but you get the idea.
I found Curb’s finale, with its callback to the controversial Seinfeld finale, to be the perfect way to end the series. Personally, I loved the Seinfeld ending, since it perfectly fit with the idea of a “show about nothing,” as it was called, and it only made sense for Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld to riff on the complaints about it during Curb’s ending.
This is my first time with Curb Your Enthusiasm on home video, so I’m not 100% sure about any missing bonus features here, although my understanding is that there were commentary tracks on past sets that didn’t make their way to this one. As I said earlier, you get nearly six hours of extras in this set, including the one-hour 1999 pilot episode that actually used the mockumentary format.
The rest of the extras serve up interviews with the cast; a focus on the Seinfeld reunion, including the work that went into recreating that show’s sets; some great bits with J.B. Smoove in character as Leon; and several what I’d call micro-featurettes that put the spotlight on the last day of shooting the show.
Finally, I should note that all of the episodes are shown in the 1.78:1 aspect ratio, despite the fact that the first six seasons were broadcast in the 1.33:1 aspect ratio. I’m not sure why they didn’t just windowbox those earlier seasons, since the reframing done here results in chunks of people’s heads being cut off and so forth.
Brad Cook
