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My Week on Seinfeld

10 Things I Took Away

By Blaire BaronPublished 3 years ago 4 min read
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Me and Kramer's butt. (Courtesy Castle Rock Television)

I write this memoir because people love Seinfeld. This is my bug’s eye view inside my one week on the show.

First. Tragedy struck my life when my very active, much beloved grandmother had a massive stroke. I packed my suitcase and relocated to Laguna Beach to be nearby, when I got a call the same day. I had booked a week on Seinfeld. Something to do with Calvin Klein and Kramer…. I first said no. But my family had me call my agent back. “Are you insane? She (my grandmother) would murder you if she thought you turned down a television show for something as minor as a stroke.” They were right. My grandmother, a Christian Scientist, didn’t believe in illness. To her, none of this is real. It’s true, she would be angry if I didn’t take the offer. And thank God I made the call in time. My week on Seinfeld is one of the highlights in my life — I got away from the crazy people surrounding my grandmother’s stroke and threw myself at the kindness of strangers. I mean Jerry. The star of Seinfeld actually saved my sanity that particular week.

courtesty Castle Rock Television

10 Take Aways From My Week on Seinfeld.

1. Jerry is friendly, a flirt, likes cereal and cared about my grandmother!*

2. Jason felt the famous Source Restaurant was unsanitary. **

3. Kramer is Kramer is Michael Richards. And he must be handled.***

4. Julia is a stable, grounded, total human being.****

5. Wayne (Newman) keeps the green room laughing. Even at 12am.

6. Every 10th friend of mine has guest-starred on Seinfeld.

7. There are mistakes happening all the time and no one cares.*****

10. But if your grandmother is dying, they care.

Footnotes:

*In other words, this guy is a regular human being. In the workplace, Jerry was friendly and accessible. He listened, eating cereal as I told him how my grandmother was just taken off a feeding tube and now we were waiting for her to die. This was my response to “How are you today, Blaire?” Jerry not only listened, he spread the news. The crew and cast asked me every day how my grandmother was. After my week on Seinfeld I ran into Jerry about seven times in random places all over L.A. From Hugo’s Restaurant, to Morton’s to jogging in the hills, to walking on Sunset Blvd. I was getting more and more embarrased with each encounter, sure he must think I was stalking him.” He broke the ice with a running joke every time…“Still married?”

**What this really means is Jason Alexander (George) will talk about anything. From the creepiness of the Source Restaurant (see the doc about the cult guy behind it) to how I looked like a woman Jerry had recently dated — and so if people are staring at me, it’s because everyone was asked to look at me and compare me to actress Tawny Kitaen. No comment.

***There was something askew here. His energetic field was a little wild and unwieldy, like Kramer. I stayed about 8 feet away. He’s a genius and then some, but not accessible. I was hired on The Michael Richards Show a few years later and though there was no shortage of drama, he couldn’t have been sweeter (to me). The night of that taping, network came in and cancelled the show on the spot.

****She was a young mom at the time and she would push her son around in his stroller on the lot. During the taping she helped me get new nylons when she saw mind were totally ripped. She wasn’t in our scenes but I remember her watching by the camera — that’s when she noticed the rip in my nylons. She noticed more little mistakes than Tom our director.

*****It was funny to see little mistakes that the director and producers ignored. The most memorable — in my scene, when Kramer, in white briefs, did this sliding pratfall down the side of the wall in “Calvin Klein’s office” his body make-up smeared along the wall right before your eyes. The first person to point it out was Julia LD…. no one cared. At all. Part of the genius and humanity about this show and the people in it:

We’re flawed and not ashamed of it.

That’s an awesome mindset. So the real take-away is…I am forever glad I said yes.

If I make speak for her, my grandmother is too.

Courtesy Castle Rock Television

"He’s sexual, athletic, and without a trace of self consciousness. His buttocks are sublime.”

Workplace
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About the Creator

Blaire Baron

Llifelong actor, playwright, theatre director; Blaire is Artistic Director of Shakespeare Youth Festival in Los Angeles and launches bi-lingual writing and theatrre programs in South L.A., Africa and Mexico, all with and for young people.

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