Julia Louis-Dreyfus doesn’t believe Seinfeld can be made today

You couldn’t do “Seinfeld” today. Because it’s already 2:30 and you said you were going to run to the supermarket to buy more butter and milk. Plus, you have to bring your dad his back medication, and he lives on the other side of town, and the traffic usually picks up at that time of day, so when you get home, it will be time for dinner. There simply isn’t enough time to produce 180 episodes of a hit comedy before bed.

Ha ha. That was fun.

In reality, “Seinfeld” couldn’t be made in 2024 because, like all shows, it was a product of its time. “Seinfeld” debuted in 1989, when Americans were growing tired of the wholesome, predictable sitcom tropes that had been repeated, ad nauseum, for decades. Some of the most popular sitcoms of the late ’80s served as works of deconstructionism, taking the bland integrity of classic American television and putting it on display. “Married… with Children” featured an ordinary suburban family, but the central joke of the show was that they were all unhappy, petty assholes who hated each other. “The Simpsons” saw the suburban American family as lower class, goofy, and strange looking (with their yellow flesh).

“Seinfeld” was invented as an antidote to the sentimental sensibility of traditional television shows. The show’s creators, Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, describe their series as “about nothing,” and demand that their characters not learn lessons or share hugs. Instead, the characters were meant to be shallow and petty, eternally trapped in their petty neuroses and pathetic self-interest. As for its laughs, “Seinfeld” had long legs. In terms of its attitudes, “Seinfeld” will forever be a relic of the ’90s.

In a recent interview with New York Time Magazine“Seinfeld” star Julia Louis-Dreyfus was asked about the show’s potential timelessness, and she, too, felt its magic could never be recaptured. In his view, however, the calcification of “Seinfeld” was not as big a problem as the risk-averse modern television market. In his opinion, no one would give “Seinfeld” a chance in 2024.

Louis-Dreyfus, like the rest of us, has survived the bitter Streaming Wars and recognizes that television is in a strange situation. Studios will overspend on some series with valuable IP attached, release them with little fanfare, and then pull them from the service after just a few months (see: “Willow”). During the 2023 writers’ strike it was also revealed that, generally speaking, companies care more about market value than ratings. There was no longer the possibility for a series to start small, gather an audience over time and remain on the air for years, becoming a cultural institution.

Louis-Dreyfus remembers the relaxed, “let’s make each other laugh” attitudes of the early seasons of “Seinfeld” and feels that vibe simply doesn’t exist anymore. All channels are risk averse and none seem willing to allocate a single cent to something that doesn’t immediately succeed. When asked if anything from “Seinfeld” could start in 2024, Louis-Dreyfus said:

“Probably not. I mean, what the hell is going on on network television? When ‘Seinfeld’ was made, it really wasn’t like anything that was out at the time. It was just a bunch of losers hanging out. Like that “I would say one main reason it wouldn’t be done now is because it’s hard to get something different recognized, especially nowadays, everyone’s a little scared.”

Louis-Dreyfus certainly knows about hit television shows. She won an Emmy for “Seinfeld” in 1996, an Emmy for “The New Adventures of Old Christine” in 2006 and nine Emmy Awards for her many years on “Veep,” which she helped executive produce. He will soon appear in the Marvel movie “Thunderbolts*.” She looks to the future, unconcerned with the structures of the past.