SEINFELD - Season 5, Episode 12 - The Stall

“The Stall”

First Script Read:  Thursday, December 2, 1993

Filmed: Wednesday, December 8, 1993

Aired: 9:00pm, January 6, 1994

Nielsen rating: 22.5

Audience share: 33 (highest rating of season 5)

Directed: Tom Cherones

Writer: Larry Charles

There are plenty of interesting social dynamics to explore in this episode. Let's see if I can tie them together by the end of this post. They revolve around the gang's interactions with Jerry's girlfriend, Jane (Jami Gertz of Twister and Still Standing, among others) and Elaine's boyfriend, Tony (Dan Cortese, who you probably don't know, but I felt bad crediting Gertz and not Cortese).

Elaine coincidentally ends up in the stall next to Jane at the movies. Elaine realizes too late that her stall is out of toilet paper, but Jane refuses to share even a single ply. The two haven't met, and they never see each other, so they don't realize their connection until the end of the episode. Maybe I'm too nice, and maybe I don't understand the women's bathroom dynamic, but I have to side with Elaine in this case, who calls Jane "insane" for her unwillingness to help. Jane explains to Jerry, "A person needs a certain amount of toilet paper to be covered. I simply could not spare it. This woman just didn't get it. She kept harassing me." Jane doth protest too much. She seemed too uncomfortable with the stall-to-stall interaction to pass toilet paper under the stall. I can understand feeling uncomfortable if the person requesting the toilet paper were acting sketchy in some way, but Elaine is a fairly respectable-sounding person and was very polite. Jane finished up and left the bathroom still claiming she couldn't spare a square, NOT that there were no sheets left after she finished. Also, what are the odds both stalls ran out of paper at the same moment?
VERDICT: Jane is insane.

Meanwhile, Kramer is messing around with phone sex lines. His interest is less erotic than playful, similar to his curiosity towards Penthouse Forum in the following episode, "The Dinner Party." In this case, he tells Jerry he thinks the calls are "hilarious." Elaine and Jerry overhear Kramer using Jerry's phone for one such call:
WOMAN'S VOICE: ...then we'll get a cab and we'll do it in the back seat. How's that Andre?
KRAMER'S VOICE: What about the driver? We could get an accident.
WOMAN'S VOICE: So what?
KRAMER'S VOICE: That wouldn't be very good.
JERRY: Hey Andre! Get the hell off the phone!

Kramer is acting more like a silly teenage boy looking for a laugh than a lonely 30-something man seeking sexual gratification. The revelation that the woman is Jane is more shocking than Kramer's behavior. Jane manages to hide this secret from Jerry and Kramer until the final scene, when she tells both of them not to call her. The audience is left to make their own moral judgment about Jane's occupation, but apparently the type of person who refuses to offer a scrap of toilet paper to another woman in a public restroom is also the type of person who would work on a phone sex line.

VERDICT: Kramer has never been one to take sexual topics too seriously and has a sophomoric but harmless sense of humor. Jane's back story that led her to the phone sex business and formed her to be so unkind in bathrooms could be, one can only imagine, the backbone of a fascinating Hallmark Channel original movie.

Jerry accuses Elaine of dating Tony solely because he is attractive:

ELAINE: Okay, Jerry, I would be going out with him no matter what he looked like

JERRY: Of course you would.

ELAINE: Oh yeah. Oh, like you're one to talk.

JERRY: Elaine…

ELAINE: What?

JERRY: It's different for a man.

ELAINE: Huh?

JERRY: We're expected to be superficial.

ELAINE: I'm not being superficial

JERRY: Elaine, he's a…he's a male bimbo. He's a mimbo.

ELAINE: He's not a mimbo. He's an exciting, charismatic man. He just happens to have a perfect face.

JERRY: And that's why you're going out with him.

ELAINE: No, it is not.

When Tony injures his face rock climbing with George and Kramer, Elaine is forced to admit her interest in Tony was purely superficial. Not for the first or last time, Elaine hits a higher mark on the "looks" category on the female xGbDI than might be expected. There is a double-standard that makes it more acceptable for a male to make romantic decisions based on appearance than for a female. Jerry is unembarrassed about his superficiality, but mocks Elaine when she dates Tony because he is good looking.

VERDICT: Elaine is superficial in her interests in a mate. In the Seinfeld universe, she is just as superficial as the males, but more superficial than women are expected to be.

George, actually, is more attracted to Tony for his personality:

JERRY: Yeah, yeah. What is it with you and Tony? What are you, like his sidekick now?

GEORGE: Yeah, that's right. I like it. He's such a cool guy.

JERRY: Cool guy? What are you, in 8th grade?

GEORGE: He's the first cool guy I've ever been friends with in my whole life. You know, it's a different world when you're with a cool guy. He's not afraid of anybody. You should hear the way he talks to waitresses. He gets free pie!

[...]

GEORGE: Hey nice move today!

KRAMER: What?

GEORGE: Horning in on my rock climbing trip. It's just supposed to be me and Tony!

KRAMER: He asked me.

GEORGE: You put him on the spot.

KRAMER: You know I think you're in love with him.

GEORGE: What? That's ridiculous!

KRAMER: No, no, no. I don't think so. You love him.

When Tony refuses to see him after the accident, George is devastated by the loss. Elaine, meanwhile, will probably dump Tony's mangled face at the first opportunity.

VERDICT: George is a bit childish, but he really does love Tony is a more meaningful way than Elaine ever could.

In Larry Charles' penultimate Seinfeld script, the women come off a bit worse than the men. The guys are all rather childish, but this allows them to be more honest and laid back about the world. Kramer innocently messes around with a phone sex line. Jerry can admit his own superficiality. George stops short of admitting his love for Tony, but does go far in revealing some of the depth of his feelings for his new pal. Elaine, by contrast, admits her own shallowness at the end. However, she is trapped by a double standard. It is okay for Kramer and George to act childish, and for Jerry to be superficial because they are men. It is thus understandable that Jane, who is so uptight in the women's bathroom, will find success in an occupation where she can feel some control over men, regaining some of the ground her gender has lost to society.

SEINFELD - Season 5, Episode 11 - The Conversion

“The Conversion”

First Script Read:  Saturday, November 20, 1993

Filmed: Tuesday, November 23, 1993

Aired: 9:00pm, December 16, 1993

Nielsen rating: 18.4

Audience share: 29

Directed: Tom Cherones

Writer: Bruce Kirschbaum (Wrote for Fridays from 1981-82 with Larry David, Larry Charles, and Michael Richards. Conceived the story for season 4's “The Old Man” and wrote “The Switch” for season 6)

While Jerry tries to figure out why his new girlfriend has a bottle of fungicide in her bathroom, George does something far more drastic for love. His girlfriend, Sasha, breaks up with him because her parents won't allow her to be with a man who is not Latvian Orthodox. (Writer Bruce Kirschbaum invented the religion for this episode, or so he thought until the real Latvian Orthodox church got in touch with him to thank him for drawing attention to their small denomination.) Devastated, George nonchalantly raises the idea of converting. When Elaine suggests it would be romantic, George begins to take the idea seriously. Relatively seriously, at least. "Why not? What do I care?" he muses, adding, "You know what? I could probably do this. What's the difference?" Elaine backs down, and she and Jerry try to dissuade him. George, like the other characters, believes in almost nothing outside of helping himself. But compared to Elaine and Jerry, George is far more willing to lie, cheat, and circumvent his way to care for his own desires. It is not that he doesn't care about the social consequences, it is just that he incorrectly thinks he can get away with it without anyone noticing. He tells Jerry, for example, that he isn't going to tell his parents about his conversion. They find out anyway, and, not surprisingly, they disapprove.

The episode isn't offensive in any specific ways; after all, the real Latvian Orthodox church liked the episode. It does treat religion in general as silly. George's attempts to appear earnest are hilarious because the audience knows he isn't earnest. The joke is on the priests, who, in their own earnestness, strive to take George seriously:

OLDER PRIEST: Why do you want to accept the Latvian Orthodox faith?

GEORGE: Ahem… in this age of uncertainty and confusion, a man begins to ask himself certain questions. How can one even begin to put into words something so um…

OLDER PRIEST: Enigmatic?

GEORGE: No.

OLDER PRIEST: Vast?

GEORGE: No, not vast.

OLDER PRIEST: Well, whatever it is, basically you like the religion.

GEORGE: Yes.

YOUNGER PRIEST: Is there one aspect of the faith that you find particularly attractive?

GEORGE: I think the hats. The hats convey that solemn religious look you want in a faith. Very pious.

OLDER PRIEST: Are you familiar with Orthodox theology?

GEORGE: Well perhaps, not to the extent that you are. But I know the basic plot. Yeah.

George does get away with his conversion, getting a high score on his conversion test and bumbling his way through the ceremony. Unfortunately, Sasha is going to stay in Latvia for a year so their relationship ends anyway.

Meanwhile, Kramer finds that a Latvian Orthodox novice is considering abandoning her faith so she can be with him. He asks the priest for advice, and the religious man instructs him to go through an elaborate cleansing that will rid him of the curse that makes him irresistible to women. Delving into something like witchcraft (It works, by the way.), the Latvian Orthodox church begins to look less like a Christian sect. For this episode, Latvian Orthodox serves as an amalgamation of both religion and superstition. Later this season, when Jerry is busted by his girlfriend's father for making out at Schindler's List, Judaism will be significant as a cultural identity. In this episode religion begins as an important marker of identity for Sasha's family, but it ultimately appears to be nothing but silly beliefs and traditions. In either case, religion is a hindrance to the gang's pursuit of their own happiness.

SEINFELD - Season 5, Episode 10 - The Cigar Store Indian

“The Cigar Store Indian”

First Script Read:  November 11, 1993

Filmed: November 16, 1993

Aired: 9:00pm, December 9, 1993

Nielsen rating: 19.9

Audience share: 30

Directed: Tom Cherones

Writer: Tom Gammill and Max Pross

Jerry buys a Cigar Store Indian as a gift for Elaine, partly to apologize for making Elaine take the subway home while he and George take Estelle Costanza's coffee table to be refinished after Jerry fails to use a coaster, and partly to impress Winona, Elaine's attractive friend. Winona turns out to be Native American and extremely sensitive about her heritage. The Cigar Store Indian, coupled with Jerry's over-the-top use of Indian stereotypes, offends Winona. Jerry spends the rest of the episode trying to smooth things over while avoiding any other potentially offensive terms. At first, Jerry's behavior is clearly offensive, but Winona's position, and the politically correct sensibility in general, seem increasingly ridiculous as Jerry continues to consciously modify his behavior. He is even hesitant to use the phrase "reservation" to explain how he secured a table at an exclusive restaurant. Later, he stops himself from using the more problematic phrase, "Indian giver," but not soon enough to keep from offending Winona. She flips out and leaves him, ending their brief relationship. Not for the first time Seinfeld suggests Jerry shouldn't have to make exhaustive efforts to be polite. After all, he clearly isn't a racist.

The real social outcast of the episode is Ricky (Sam Lloyd), the weirdo Elaine meets on the subway. He pursues Elaine, turning the TV Guide she borrowed from the Costanza's house and left behind on the subway car into a paper bouquet. Frank's TV Guide collection is yet another line on his own list of eccentricities, but even he is more "normal" than Ricky. The balding, creepily-voiced Ricky might also collect TV Guides, as he shows an interest and understanding in Frank's collection when he shows up unannounced at the Cosanza's, but his mannerisms and his inability to read Elaine's disinterest mark him as the most socially abnormal character in the scene, and one of the most abnormal on Seinfeld's long list of zany characters. He will pop up again five episodes later in "The Pie" as the mysterious creator behind the mannequins that look exactly like Elaine. But that is the sort of person the characters are liable to encounter in the public spaces of Seinfeld's New York City setting. Ricky's creepy affection for Elaine is the real price she pays for not getting a ride home with Jerry.

SEINFELD - Season 5, Episode 9 - The Masseuse

“The Masseuse”

First Script Read: October 30, 1993

Filmed: November 3, 1993

Aired: 9:00pm, November 18, 1993

Nielsen rating: 19.1

Audience share: 28

Directed: Tom Cherones

Writer: Peter Mehlman

And we're back! I have to say, it was supposed to be a vacation, but wandering around Europe for a month really helped my thinking about 1990s popular culture. For example, I went to to the Baroque master Peter Paul Rubens' (1577-1640) house in Antwerp and was intrigued at how the idea of intellectual property has changed. (I was also amazed that, four years after his first wife's death, the 53-year-old Rubens married a 16-year-old. Their age discrepancy created quite a stir even back then, but, other than royalty, Rubens was pretty much the biggest celebrity in Flemland. Is that where Flemish people lived? Flemland? That doesn't sound right... But I digress.) 

One of the paintings Rubens owned was done by a prominent Flemish artist a few generations older than Rubens. P-squared decided he could improve the painting, so he just painted over certain parts of it, changing the clothes on a woman here, and painting over a guy there. Can you imagine the scandal if, say, Jackson Pollack bought a Monet and decided to "improve" it? Or if the Coen Brothers got the rights to a John Wayne movie and "remade" it? Seriously, though, I suppose those examples show how, in the last couple centuries, western society has come to value the material object of an original painting, while the ability to mechanically reproduce a book or a film or a photograph makes the value of the original more or less worthless.

Rubens and his school reminds me of the Seinfeld writing staff. Like so many artists before him, P-P had a studio with a bunch of younger artists who not only studied under the master but worked on his paintings. Actually, that's quite similar to the way television shows are produced. Auteurs like Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld (or David Simon of The Wire, or Matthew Weiner of Mad Men) control the overarching vision while a team of underlings manage the details of the creative process. For an episode like "The Marine Biologist," which I'll cover a few posts from now, the auteur Larry David didn't even take a writing credit even though he came up with the idea of tying Kramer's golfing to George's whale encounter in the finale monologue, the very piece that made that episode an all-timer.

One of the students in Rubens' studio, Anthony van Dyck, became quite famous in his own right, almost pulling a Darth Vader to Rubens' Obi Wan. There are dozens of American TV equivalents to the Rubens-van Dyck relationship. Before David Chase created The Sopranos he literally cut his teeth on Northern Exposure under Joshua Brand and John Falsey. Before Vince Gilligan made Breaking Bad he learned the trade under Chris Carter at The X-Files. And before Peter Mehlman created It's Like, You Know he wrote for Seinfeld. Well, I guess Mehlman is no van Dyck.

Poor Peter Mehlman! He really is a fine writer, but I just keep measuring him against the other Seinfeld writers. "The Masseuse" is another solid Mehlman episode, but it could just as easily be credited as coming from "The School of Larry David." The comedy rests on a Larry David-esque twist; Jerry's desire to get a massage from his masseuse girlfriend (played by the great Jennifer Coolidge) works as a parody for date rape:

JODI: So, where do you want to go? (SHE PUTS HER HAND ON JERRY’S SHOULDER.)
JERRY: Go? Why go anywhere? (HE PLACES HIS HAND OVER HER’S. SHE STARTS TO MASSAGE HIS SHOULDERS.) Ah, that feels good. Yeah. That's, ah... That's good. (HE GRABS HER HANDS AS HE LIES DOWN ON THE MASSAGE TABLE.) Yeah, that's nice. That's very nice.

JODI: (SHE STOPS MASSAGING) No. No, this isn't good. I can't do this.
JERRY: Why, what's wrong? (HE TRIES TO FORCE HER TO KEEP HER HANDS ON HIS SHOULDERS.)

JODI: I can't (SHE TRIES TO PULL AWAY.)

 JERRY: No! Yes you can. (HE HANGS ON.)
JODI: No, I can't!
JERRY: Come on! I know it's something you want to do! (SHE PULLS AWAY AND HE FALLS OFF THE TABLE.)

As if the date rape parody wasn't sneakily offensive enough, Mehlman also wrote this absurd line for Kramer, prompted by Elaine dating a man who unfortunately shares a name with New York City serial killer, Joel Rifkin:

KRAMER: You know why Rifkin was a serial killer? Because he was adopted. Just like Son of Sam was adopted. So apparently adoption leads to serial killing.

Yikes! CBS received a number of complaints for this line, while no one seemed to mind Jerry mimicking the behavior of a date rapist in his pressure on his girlfriend for a massage. Speaking of date rape, how about Rubens marrying a girl 37 years younger than him?!? And so we've come full circle, connecting the threads. That's something the master, Larry David, would approve of.