Main Cast: Jerry Seinfeld as Jerry, Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Elaine, Michael Richards as Kramer, Jason Alexander as George
Regular Director and Producer: Tom Cherones
Producer: Larry David
Producer: Fred Barron
Story supervisor: Jerry Seinfeld
Programme Consultant: Matt Goldman
Director of Photography: Bon Berry
Music: Jonathan Wolff
Executive Producers: George Shapiro and Howard West Associate
Producer: Tim Kaiser
Executive Producer: Jeffrey Stott
Edited by Bob Souders
Casting by Marc Hirschfeld
Production design by David Sackeroff
As mentioned, having tested badly in 1989, the show was axed. The cast and crew went back to their normal lives. Glenn Padnick at Castle Rock even pitched the show to Fox, who passed. It was, seemingly, over. But the show had a big fan in NBC executive Rick Ludwin, and in the end, he decided to commit two hours of his ‘specials’ budget to four (count em!) shows to be broadcast in the late spring of 1990 on a Wednesday night, between repeats ofCheers andLA Law. The shows that finally aired were very different from the pilot. First
of all, the garish clothes and sets had gone to be replaced by a pastel– indeed
more realistic– color palate. While Jason Alexander and Michael Richards returned– albeit in subtle variations on the characters that had appeared in the pilot– Lee Garlington was replaced by a far more central and important female character, one who could be placed in the same situations as the men, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus joined the cast as Elaine. Julia had appeared onSaturday Night Live for four years, including the one year that Larry David was on the writing staff, which certainly helped in her casting. She could be attractive, while still staying ‘one of the boys.’
Seinfeld was still not quite the show that the public came to love. There were only hints at the quality that was to arrive as early as season two. The shows are slow-paced, and far too reliant on the stand-up segments that the acted sequences were meant to illustrate. Better was certainly to come. Yet ratings were decent and the new team gelled. This including director/ producer Tom Cherones, a safe pair of hands who took a while to ‘get’ thetone of the show, but gave it his all anyway. Composer Jonathan Wolff brought his quirky, percussive slap bass theme – although the bass line was played via a sample on a keyboard. Having brought in veteran producer Fred Barron to act as showrunner, and to ‘look after’ David and Seinfeld, it quickly became apparent to the relieved executives at Castle Rock that Larry David, despite his inexperience, would make a perfectly dece
