Earlier this year, Jerry Seinfeld proclaimed Netflix and its chief content officer Ted Sarandos “have the same enthusiasm for the art of stand-up comedy as I do.” Now, we will see just how funny the combination will be with Jerry Seinfeld’s Netflix stand-up special, Jerry Before Seinfeld, featuring him telling jokes of his from more than 40 years ago.
Jerry Before Seinfeld will have footage from Seinfeld’s personal archive, previously unreleased material, and “an intimate performance at the Comic Strip in New York City,” according to Netflix. To get deeper into the man who mined gold out of daily minutia, Jerry Before Seinfeld will showcase “a library of legal pads with every joke he’s written since 1975.”
In promotion of Jerry Before Seinfeld, Netflix flooded its new Netflix Comedy account on Instagram with photos and audio clips and pictures of Seinfeld’s decades-spanning trove of jokes. Very serious insights scribbled on the yellow pages include socks hating their lives, cotton ball preferences between men and women, and Cookie Crisp.
In one of the few audio clip previews from Jerry Before Seinfeld, the legendary Seinfeld co-creator explains his gripes with the negative connotations associated with anything “left.” “You go to a party and there’s nobody there,” Seinfeld began. “‘Where did they go?’ They left.” These are the types of jokes that landed him a reported $100 million from Netflix.
Seinfeld is not just helping us end the year with a look back at his comedy past. He is also bringing two dozen new episodes of his Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee series, as well the series’ full 59-episode library, to Netflix. Hopefully, Netflix will make all of this Seinfeld goodness available to stream offline, for those who do not let an internet connection preclude their binging.
You can prepare yourself for Seinfeld’s return to the Comic Strip Live comedy club in New York City in Jerry Before Seinfeld by checking out grainy, yet hilarious footage of a set of his at the club back in his pre-Seinfeld heyday on YouTube. The hair is bigger, but the jokes are just as funny as what you have come to expect from Seinfeld.
Netflix’s Jerry Before Seinfeld is set to start streaming on September 19.
