Susie Essman on ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm,’ Larry David and More

The Last Laugh

The Daily Beast

Comedy Interviews, Comedy, Interviews, Tv & Film, Society & Culture, Tv, Movies, Film

4.6 • 661 Ratings

🗓️ 4 September 2024

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Susie Essman made a name for herself cursing out Larry David as her alter-ego Susie Greene on ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm.’ But as she reveals in this episode, in the 24 years since the show premiered—and nearly four decades since she met David in the New York comedy clubs—they have never once gotten into an actual fight. Essman opens up about David’s unique “genius” as a comedian, how ‘Curb’ gets away with being so politically incorrect, the unconscious inspiration for her character and the bizarro world in which she could have played Elaine on ‘Seinfeld.’ Plus, stories about roasting Donald Trump to his face at the Friar’s Club, her “horrible” late-night debut with Johnny Carson, and getting to portray Ilana Glazer’s mother on ‘Broad City.’

This episode was originally published on November 30, 2021.

Follow Matt Wilstein on Threads @mattwilstein

Follow The Last Laugh on Instagram @lastlaughpod and Threads @lastlaughpod

Highlights from this episode and others at The Daily Beast

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is the last laugh.
0:06.7	I'm Matt Wilstein from The Daily Beast.
0:09.1	Well, Emmy voting is over.
0:11.7	So instead of highlighting one of this year's nominees,
0:14.5	I thought we would take this Labor Day week
0:16.6	to revisit my conversation with a comedian and actor
0:20.1	who has somehow never been nominated at those
0:22.9	awards, Susie Esmond. I really thought it might happen for this past year's final season
0:29.0	of Curb Your Enthusiasm, but she couldn't make it pass some very tough competition, including
0:34.4	from Hack star Hannah Einbinder, who he had on this show a few weeks ago.
0:39.3	Susie, who played Larry David's nemesis and also very close friend Susie Green on Curb over the
0:45.5	course of 24 years, join me on this podcast during the show's 11th season in 2021.
0:52.1	It took another three years for the show to end up airing what Larry has insisted
0:56.0	will be its 12th and final season. During our conversation, which traced the full arc of
1:01.7	Susie's unconventional comedy career, she revealed to me that despite their contentious on-screen
1:07.0	relationship, she and Larry David have a real love for each other and have never
1:11.7	been in an actual argument off-screen.
1:14.7	That mutual appreciation even started to show up on Curb in recent years.
1:19.5	So before we get into the episode, here's a clip from the final season of Curb Your
1:23.4	Enthusiasm that shows just a hint of that love between Susie and Larry after 24 years
1:29.8	of screaming at each other.
1:31.9	Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Daily Beast, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Daily Beast and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.