“Jerry Seinfeld returns to the stage. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” - Concert Review.

By Jason Tanamor

5 Stars:

When I first heard Jerry Seinfeld was coming back to the Adler, I was like, “Is he still master of his domain?” And then I started going through every pop culture phrase that came out of his hit series, “Seinfeld,” named after his father – just kidding.



Catch phrases like, “No soup for you,” and “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” started coming out of my mouth like I was watching the show itself. And how could I not be? The show is syndicated at least four times a night. I’ve personally seen each episode at least a dozen times, and I never get sick of them.

So, seeing Jerry Seinfeld live again (this is my fourth time) will totally make my night, as all of these feelings and emotions that have stirred into little bits of happiness from his show will find their way out live.

Anyone who has seen Seinfeld in concert knows that it’s an entirely different experience from his sitcom. He doesn’t reflect on the series, although there are always a couple people in the crowd that yell out for him to say, “Hello Newman.” I swear these people are groupies.

What Seinfeld does is give you an hour of some of the most polished, clever, and most of all, funniest material you will ever witness. Seinfeld is the perfect comedian in terms of delivery and timing. Yet, he can’t escape the show that was supposedly about nothing.



Even though it was marketed as a show about nothing, every time I tuned in, I saw something. Although that something was about nothing, the fact that there was something made it not nothing. And this gave Seinfeld its own thing. Imagine that, a show about nothing. Isn’t that something?

That’s what Seinfeld’s act is in a nutshell, a whole lot of something that, by the end of it, is really about nothing. That nothing is the everyday stuff we tend to overlook in our life, and for Seinfeld, they are the minutia of his flight into the area, his experience with the hotel concierge, and his dinner at a restaurant in which he had to wait for whatever reason.

Seinfeld, born in New York, came onto the scene as a young comic who made his fame on the “Tonight Show with Johnny Carson” in 1981, specifically with his clean material. From that performance, Seinfeld grew in popularity to a point he was earning more than $100 thousand dollars per performance.

He landed his first television role as Frankie on the hit show, “Benson,” but was abruptly fired after only four appearances. Seinfeld got his big break when, in 1989, NBC called him to create a sitcom for the network. The result was an astonishing dud, with what was known as “The Seinfeld Chronicles,” masterminded by Seinfeld and his good friend, comedian Larry David (“Curb Your Enthusiasm”). But, what the producers and fans didn’t realize at this time was that the show “Seinfeld” would end up being the greatest sitcom in the history of television, according to TV Guide.

So, don’t miss this opportunity to see, in my opinion, the greatest comedian to grace the stage. Who knows how much longer he will continue? And although this may be nothing to you, it’s definitely something to the fans that come out to see this iconic figure. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

The concert:

When Jerry Seinfeld ended his hit television show he vowed to retire all of his jokes and write a whole new batch of them. Gone are the use of catch phrases in everyday language. Ones such as “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” “But are you still master of your domain?” and “Yada, yada, yada,” have all been, seemingly at least, retired by the comedian. But thanks to syndication, the lines keep on swirling through society quicker than a George Costanza employment stay.

And there really is nothing wrong with that. But just in case you are one of those true Seinfeld fans who has followed his career, the meticulous comedian has come up with an entire new batch of jokes, observations and catch phrases. Phrases like, “My doctor says Cram It All,” and “Are you a newsman or a jack-in-the-box?” are just a couple new ones that Seinfeld delivered in his semantically infested joke fest.

When he first came out, Seinfeld was greeted with a much deserved standing ovation and an ongoing chant of “Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!” in which he began his set with how great it was to be back at the Adler Theatre.

During his hour plus long performance at the Adler in Davenport, Iowa, Seinfeld mesmerized the crowd with his style of humor that still is effective nearly 32 years after he first tried stand-up in 1976 at Catch a Rising Star in New York. From a young boy who collected Cosby records to a man who once said, “It took me ten years to become an overnight success,” the comedian still takes the time to perfect his craft by writing material that delves into the very minutia they originated from.

He said so long to the days where his material relates solely on airport security, grocery store shopping, talking to a toilet when you see it overflowing, and horses trotting very slowly to the finish line to avoid braking legs. Now, with a wife and three kids and more time to dream up new material, Seinfeld introduced a new set of smart observation, his jokes revolving around newscasts, fatherhood, marriage and his elderly mother’s new three wheeled walker with brakes. He said about the walker, “The old walkers were simple, they had just four legs that you propped in front of you. These new ones have three wheels and a brake. If you need a brake for your walker, then I think you’ve been misdiagnosed. How fast are these people walking?”



During various parts of the show, members of the nearly packed audience screamed out at Seinfeld, causing him to stop and reply. One woman yelled, “Jerry, I love you,” in which the comedian replied, “I love you too. These are the intimate relationships I like.”

Seinfeld was his usual self, dressed in a suit jacket, tie, pants, and black shoes. His jokes were their usual selves, very detailed, drawn out and about the littlest things in life that made members in the audience either laugh or shake their head. During one bit, Seinfeld compared how the words “great” and “sucks” are the only two descriptive words people need. “I hear the movie was great. It wasn’t, it sucks. But I heard that it was great. I know, I heard it too, but it’s not, it sucks.” He also added that the two words are actually not very far apart as they would indicate. “Say you have an ice cream cone and the ice cream falls to the ground. That sucks. Then, what’s the first word you say? Great!”

Even though Seinfeld professes that his once upon a time show and current stand-up act is about “nothing,” with the pop culture references, humor about suing an O’Henry candy bar heiress and jokes about his mother’s car having a cataract windshield, Seinfeld is actually a comedian whose act is about “everything.” Everything a person would never even think of.

Seinfeld joked about how he had to get his elderly mother who is still driving a prescription cataract windshield. “It’s a one inch thick, curved cataract windshield. If you look at the car from the outside, the huge heads make it look like a car filled with sports mascots.”

This was the fourth time I’ve seen Seinfeld live and I can honestly say that he was right on with the jokes and little observations that made him what he is today. Although he did hiccup a little by unretiring a couple jokes, one being “elderly people being in a minimum security prison,” his timing was impeccable, his composure was bar none and his concentration and preparation was consistent with previous performances. Of course, I could just be biased having seen every Seinfeld episode more than a dozen times each, but from the reaction of the crowd and the standing ovation, I’m sure I wasn’t the only one. There were bursts of laughter when he joked about irritating news tickers that people are forced to read at the bottom of newscasts. Seinfeld’s take being, “Don’t these producers know that we don’t want to read. That’s why we’re watching TV.”

If you ask me, I would say that Seinfeld is still master of his domain.



BYLINE:

Jason Tanamor is the Editor of Zoiks! Online. He is also the author of the novels, "Hello Lesbian!" and "Anonymous."