Preston Knight

Larry David is one of America’s unlikeliest icons, and one of history’s purest founders. In our latest profile, Correspondent-at-Large @blakejharrisNYC—who spent six years talking to Larry for his new book—explains what makes Larry so special, and why it took him so long to break through. Larry was a mediocre student with a middling social life. His first two jobs—selling bras and driving cabs—ended quickly. At 25, he called his mother from a hotel room: “Ma, nothing good is ever gonna happen to me.” She urged him to become a mailman. Soon after, he found what he thought would be his calling: stand-up comedy. His material was funny, but he rarely finished a set. If somebody in the audience looked at their watch, or didn’t laugh when he thought they should, Larry stormed off. 14 years later, aged 39, he got a break. He was asked to write his first sitcom script for a big new Showtime series. Only an eighth of what he wrote survived the edit, but the episode was still his. He was broke, and the writing credit could have sparked his career. But Larry refused to put his name on it. Even with Seinfeld, Larry nearly hit self-destruct. The pilot performed worse than almost any other show NBC had ever tested. Still, the network ordered four episodes, one of the smallest orders in TV history. Larry barely made it through them. When the studio installed a showrunner to oversee the scripts, Larry endured the man’s notes, then said “NO. I’m not doing one thing,” and walked out. In the summer of 1991, with the show finally starting to work, NBC wanted Jerry and Elaine to get married and have a baby. Larry quit in the parking lot and wished everyone good luck. Jerry stood with Larry, and NBC caved. Larry’s friend and comedian Bill Scheft put it this way: “He doesn’t [act this way now] because he has fuck-you money. It’s the opposite. He has the fuck-you money because he’s always acted this way.” Read the full profile by Blake, author of Emperor of Nothing: The Making of Larry David. colossus.com/article/many-fa…