"Seinfeld" DVDs

[Guy Berger]

I've been slowly working through the Seinfeld DVDs (renting them via Netflix). I only caught onto the show during its last season (though I've watched a lot of episodes in syndication) and it's a lot of fun to watch in sequence. The first episodes are kind of erratic* but by the second season they're really hitting their stride. The Chinese Restaurant, the Heart Attack, the Deal, and the Revenge... It's reminding me how much I love this show.

Guy

*Though that sequence in "The Stakeout" where Jerry and George discuss George's career in architecture is brilliant. "What do you design?" "Railroads." "I thought engineers do that?" "They can."

[Big Wheel]

I got seasons 1 and 2 as a gift awhile back but didn't start watching them until this month. I'm mostly familiar with the middle seasons, so there was a lot of new stuff for me. Very interesting was the last episode of season 2 where Jerry and Elaine start getting romantically involved again, not only because it never happened again in the series, but also for how that aspect of the story was pretty much gone entirely by the later seasons. You could watch all of season 5 or 6 and never realize that Jerry and Elaine had once been a serious couple.

[Guy Berger]

I got seasons 1 and 2 as a gift awhile back but didn't start watching them until this month. I'm mostly familiar with the middle seasons, so there was a lot of new stuff for me. Very interesting was the last episode of season 2 where Jerry and Elaine start getting romantically involved again, not only because it never happened again in the series, but also for how that aspect of the story was pretty much gone entirely by the later seasons. You could watch all of season 5 or 6 and never realize that Jerry and Elaine had once been a serious couple.

Larry David says in the commentary for the episode that he wrote it this way because he didn't think the show was coming back for another season and the NBC execs were pressuring him to bring in some romance. The weird part is that the 3rd season begins as if nothing ever happened, except for Jerry's conversation with his parents in "The Pen".

Guy

[GregK]

I've always enjoyed the earlier episodes- I think once Larry David left it became silly, unbelievable, formulaic. But the early years were great. I also wish they never dropped Jerry's stand-up intros and outros. It was nice how they tied into the episode's story.

[Big Wheel]

I got seasons 1 and 2 as a gift awhile back but didn't start watching them until this month. I'm mostly familiar with the middle seasons, so there was a lot of new stuff for me. Very interesting was the last episode of season 2 where Jerry and Elaine start getting romantically involved again, not only because it never happened again in the series, but also for how that aspect of the story was pretty much gone entirely by the later seasons. You could watch all of season 5 or 6 and never realize that Jerry and Elaine had once been a serious couple.

Larry David says in the commentary for the episode that he wrote it this way because he didn't think the show was coming back for another season and the NBC execs were pressuring him to bring in some romance. The weird part is that the 3rd season begins as if nothing ever happened, except for Jerry's conversation with his parents in "The Pen".

Guy

Yeah, I watched that part of the extras. You can tell that David was not at all comfortable with the idea. They did do a nice job adapting it to the general tone of the show with the "this, that, and the other" bit. Very well done.

[Guy Berger]

A question about "The Pez Dispenser": when Elaine, Jerry and George go to talk to George's girlfriend after the piano recital, her dressing room has a photo/painting of a jazz bassist. You can only see the headstock and upper part of the neck, as well as the bassist's head. Can anyone give more details about this painting/photo -- I'm sure I've seen it elsewhere.

Guy

[Free For All]

One thing I've noticed from watching the DVDs is how much they've cut from the syndicated versions. A few seconds here and there really does make a difference.

Also the DVD sound and picture are much better- one of the cable channels here that runs the show has really messed with the sound, compressed it or something.

Looking forward to procuring Season 4, the peak of the series.

[Guy Berger]

If you've never watched "The Contest" (series classic), it's on youtube.

Guy

[Guy Berger]

"The Marine Biologist"

the Keith Hernandez incident

Edited March 16, 2007 by Guy

[brownie]

One of the TV cable channels here reruns the various episodes every weekend on a yearlong basis!

Fun to watch even when you've seen them several times!

[Claude]

I've bought all the Seinfeld DVD sets when they were on 50% sale on Amazon.co.uk.

I had mostly seen the show with german or french translation before and the original is of course much better.

I've found the bonus material a bit slim, but I don't care much for that anyway. The most interesting are the deleted scenes (there are not that many). The picture and sound quality is very good.

[sal]

I've got seasons 3-6, and plan on getting season 7 sometime soon. Larry David left after season 7, and therefore seasons 8 and 9 suffered quite a bit from his loss. Probably won't be picking those up when they are released.

I don't find the episodes from season 1 or 2 to be very funny. They do have their moments though. Season 3 is where the show starts to get quite funny, though inconsistantly. Seasons 4-7 were definitely the peak years.

[7/4]

I'll wait until there aren't so many reruns on the tube. funny show!

same goes for a couple of other shows.

[mikelz777]

I was watching some episodes from season 3 on DVD the other day. One of my favorites is "The Library" where Jerry had an overdue book from when he was still back in high school and has to face the wrath of Mr. Bookman, the library cop. What a great character!

[Rosco]

I was watching some episodes from season 3 on DVD the other day. One of my favorites is "The Library" where Jerry had an overdue book from when he was still back in high school and has to face the wrath of Mr. Bookman, the library cop. What a great character!

Played by Philip Baker Hall, who also turns up in an episode of Curb.

[bertrand]

The Marine biologist is a classic.

Bertrand.

[Quincy]

I was watching some episodes from season 3 on DVD the other day. One of my favorites is "The Library" where Jerry had an overdue book from when he was still back in high school and has to face the wrath of Mr. Bookman, the library cop. What a great character!

Played by Philip Baker Hall, who also turns up in an episode of Curb.

Based on his library cop character it might not surprise you Hall can play a great Richard M. Nixon. He stars in what's more or less a one man play directed by Robert Altman called Secret Honor. It's Nixon with a bottle of Chivas Regal and a loaded pistol, swearing at the paintings on the walls and railing against his enemies. Hall is terrific and Criterion finally got it out on DVD a year or so ago.

[Guy Berger]

I am renting season 7 via Netflix and finally saw the entire Soup Nazi episode. A little disappointing, I must admit. (Though the Soup Nazi moving to Argentina was a VERY nice touch.)

However, "The Wink" is an alltime classic.

Guy

Edited May 22, 2007 by Guy

[sal]

I want to get the Season 7 DVD set, and that will likely be the last one I buy. Seasons 8 and 9 had their share of moments, but something was lost with Larry David's departure.

[Aggie87]

Caught an episode on tv last night - the one where Kramer is taking dog medicine for his cough, Elaine's current flame tells her she has a big head (and a bird even flies into it), Jerry agrees to help deliver Newman's backlog of mail in hopes of getting him to move to Hawaii, and George competes with an Andrea Doria survivor for a nice apartment.

Classic episode!!

[Quincy]

Caught an episode on tv last night - the one where Kramer is taking dog medicine for his cough, Elaine's current flame tells her she has a big head (and a bird even flies into it),

She's a walking candy apple! That episode had enough going on in it to make 3 shows.

[Free For All]

Caught an episode on tv last night - the one where Kramer is taking dog medicine for his cough, Elaine's current flame tells her she has a big head (and a bird even flies into it),

She's a walking candy apple! That episode had enough going on in it to make 3 shows.

"Never seen that before.......bird fly into a woman's head."

[Dan Gould]

I am renting season 7 via Netflix and finally saw the entire Soup Nazi episode. A little disappointing, I must admit. (Though the Soup Nazi moving to Argentina was a VERY nice touch.)

Guy

This I can't quite understand. A classic on all levels, imo.

I remember reading that the man who inspired the episode was franchising his soup shop, but I'm not sure where they might be available or the name of the company. But the Times piece certainly made him sound like a true "Soup Nazi".

Edited May 22, 2007 by Dan Gould

[Guy Berger]

I am renting season 7 via Netflix and finally saw the entire Soup Nazi episode. A little disappointing, I must admit. (Though the Soup Nazi moving to Argentina was a VERY nice touch.)

Guy

This I can't quite understand. A classic on all levels, imo.

Interestingly, in the DVD's special features Andy Ackerman (the director) mentions that he and (I think) Larry David thought the episode was pretty weak and were very surprised at the popular response.

I remember reading that the man who inspired the episode was franchising his soup shop, but I'm not sure where they might be available or the name of the company. But the Times piece certainly made him sound like a true "Soup Nazi".

Apparently, after this episode Jerry Seinfeld and a few of the writers were in New York and decided to go to this guy's soup shop. When the guy saw Jerry he totally flipped out and started screaming at him.

Guy

[7/4]

No Soup Franchise for You!

By GEORGE JAMES

Published: June 26, 2005

MOVE to the left. Have your money ready. And by the way, don't mention ''Seinfeld'' or ''the N word.''

The Soup Man, immortalized in pop-culture lore by ''Seinfeld'' as ''The Soup Nazi'' -- is opening takeout shops in Princeton and Ridgewood in the next couple of months to kick off a national rollout of franchises.

The company's logo features the unsmiling face of the Soup Man himself, Al Yeganeh, whose soup store on West 55th Street near Eighth Avenue in Manhattan, Soup Kitchen International, has attracted droves of customers since it opened in 1984.

Unfortunately, as far as Mr. Yeganeh is concerned, one of those customers was Jerry Seinfeld, whose television comedy had an episode in 1995 that featured a cranky, demanding soup-store owner based on Mr. Yeganeh called -- to his continuing dismay -- ''The Soup Nazi.''

''No soup for you,'' the character, played by Larry Thomas, would call out if a customer did not move or pay quickly enough.

By all accounts, Mr. Yeganeh loathes the nickname, despite the fame it has granted him. He has been quoted as saying that he was famous before ''Seinfeld,'' and that the episode ruined his personal life. When the final ''Seinfeld'' was televised, he told David Letterman that he was glad ''this clown'' was going off the air.

Yet, for all his protestations, Soup Kitchen International is doing something of a balancing act. Company officials say Mr. Yeganeh is sensitive to the Nazi reference; but the company mentions the ''Seinfeld'' connection in its literature and even on the packaging of its frozen-food line, which is scheduled to be sold in food markets in the next few months.

''We're very ginger about that whole thing,'' said John Bello, the chairman and chief executive officer of Soup Kitchen International, which will oversee the franchises, to be called ''The Original Soup Man.'' ''But the reality is, it was his soup and his store and the gestalt of the whole experience there that inspired the episode and, I think, drew a lot of attention to soup as a category and what Al was doing and took it to a new level.''

As Mr. Bello stood one recent day in the Rutgers Food Manufacturing Technology Facility here, the 31,000-square-foot building that has been serving as the company's temporary headquarters and production facility, he added, ''Would you be talking to us if that weren't out there?''

Mr. Yeganeh, who is in the process of writing a book, apparently finds such thoughts discomforting. In a rare interview for this article, primarily by e-mail messages with a brief follow-up phone call -- Mr. Yeganeh said that he had reprimanded a Toronto Globe and Mail reporter by e-mail for ''accusing'' Mr. Yeganeh in a news article of just such a thing: ''using Jerry Seinfeld to get publicity.''

Mr. Yeganeh has strict news media rules, which are in capital letters on the company's Web site, www.originalsoupman.com. Questions are to be sent by e-mail only. There are to be no follow-up questions and no mention of what he calls ''the N word.''

He has continued to avoid the news media even though he is starting a national business, letting Mr. Bello and other executives speak for the venture. For Mr. Yeganeh, it is the quality of his soup that matters most. He says that it will be made in only one facility, a plant in Indiana, under his supervision. ''Cleanliness for me is No.1,'' he said.

Julie Ruth, an associate professor of marketing in the School of Business at Rutgers University's Camden campus, said that Mr. Yeganeh may have had some prominence because of the quality of his soup before ''Seinfeld,'' but that the show only enhanced it. And, she said, despite the negative connotation of ''Nazi'' and the TV character's brusqueness, the character had an endearing quality for viewers, which company officials are now trying to tap. ''There's something about this guy,'' she said. ''He's fallible in a way that troubles but also generates some warmth. It's nice to have things in life that aren't perfectly packaged. There's a certain authenticity.''

''Given the number of people who watched 'Seinfeld,' and watch it now on repeats and on DVD's, it creates a continued buzz in the culture about that character,'' added Professor Ruth, an expert on how emotions play out in consumer behavior.

For all of that, Mr. Bello said that in the end it is about the product, and he believes he has a premier one. Zagat, he notes, gave the New York store a 27 rating on a 30-point scale. Mr. Bello, an entrepreneur and a former president of NFL Properties, approached Mr. Yeganeh two years ago with an offer to create the soup franchises. So far the company has raised $5 million from investors, including the Hall of Fame baseball player Reggie Jackson, and projects $6 million to $10 million in sales this year.

He expects to open 35 outlets by January with a goal of 1,000 in the United States and Canada within seven years. The first two, one on Chestnut Street in Ridgewood and another on Palmer Square in Princeton, are scheduled to open in September.

The Soup Man store in Ridgewood will be in a former dress shop next to the Christian Science Reading Room. One of the merchants on the street, Bob Parlegreco, owner of the Chestnut Deli, says he is not worried about the competition. He sells two soups a day in spring and summer, and three to four in the winter: 12 ounces for $2.50 and 16 ounces for $3. ''I've been here 17 years and I sell a lot of soup,'' Mr. Parlegreco said. ''And I hear his soups are high-priced.''

By comparison, the price for 12 ounces of the Soup Man's offerings will range from $5 to $7 and higher for soups like lobster bisque, said Seb Rametta, the company's executive vice president.

The soups will be sold mainly in kiosks in shopping malls, food courts, airports and other tourist destinations. New Jersey outlets, Mr. Bello said, will include Bridgewater Commons, Garden State Plaza in Paramus and the Willowbrook Mall in Wayne. ''You'll pick up your soup and get a piece of bread, your soda and a piece of chocolate in a way to replicate the experience you would have at Al's store in New York City,'' Mr. Bello added.

Next!