\n
It\u2019s prettyyyy, prettyyyy, prettyyyy bad.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Watching Larry David\u2019s unfortunate new HBO tribute to America\u2019s 250th anniversary, \u201cLife, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness,\u201d made me want to secede.<\/p>\n
Because, like Pavlov\u2019s dogs, viewers have been conditioned for decades to roar whenever they so much as see David, the ingenious co-creator of \u201cSeinfeld\u201d and curmudgeonly star of \u201cCurb Your Enthusiasm.\u201d<\/p>\nLarry David plays historical figures in \u201cLife, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness\u201d on HBO.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThis time, though, the model for George Costanza is met with total silence. Abruptly, the laugh affair ends with David\u2019s shaky seven-episode series, produced by comedy icons Barack and Michelle Obama.<\/p>\n
During the first chapter of \u201cUnhappiness,\u201d which pursues unhappiness all right, I didn\u2019t so much as half smile. Frowned, glowered, scowled, sure. My patriotic anthem: And the critic\u2019s red glare! The jokes bursting on air! <\/em>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\nThe show\u2019s shtick is that it plops David and his usually hilarious modern gripes and grievances into major moments in American history: the writing of the Declaration of Independence, the trenches of World War I.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
\n
\n\t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJohnny Oleksinski<\/span>In one scene, he plays telephone inventor Alexander Graham Bell as he first demonstrates his device. But the chatty guy on the other end, played by Richard Kind, is so annoying that Bell hangs up.<\/p>\n
Another imagines Rosa Parks (Jurnee Smollett) on an earlier bus ride than the pivotal one that sparked a movement. She sits next to David\u2019s character Murray, who jabbers on so much that she voluntarily moves to the back to shake him.<\/p>\n
The skits are more amusing when described than viewed because a synopsis takes 10 seconds, not five minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Onscreen, the segments arrive at their obvious destination fast and then linger there far too long \u2014 a personal quality that \u201cCurb\u201d Larry would surely not approve of.\u00a0<\/p>\nDavid\u2019s latest project is nowhere near as funny as \u201cCurb Your Enthusiasm\u201d was.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nIt also does the vignettes no favors that they are all borderline identical and, unlike in a great \u201cCurb\u201d episode, don\u2019t add up to a big payoff.<\/p>\n
I can understand why David signed onto this. The series was the brainchild of stand-up-comic legend President Obama. It\u2019s hard to say \u201cno\u201d to a previous commander in chief (who\u2019s embarked on a weird Hollywood career), even when you play a character beloved for saying \u201cno\u201d to pretty much everybody else.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Also, one of David\u2019s biggest inspirations early in his career was Mel Brooks. Maybe he thought that \u201cUnhappiness\u201d would be his very own \u201cHistory of the World: Part I.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Well, he wound up with something closer to Brooks\u2019 2023 Hulu show, \u201cHistory of the World: Part II\u201d \u2014 hated by the few people who actually watched it.<\/p>\nThe actor plays his grouchy \u201cCurb\u201d persona once again.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nHow depressing. To my mind, David is just about the funniest man on the planet. This feels like a kidnapping.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And if he was so intent on making more semi-improvisational TV that takes advantage of his grouchy persona \u2014 using the same bits from \u201cCurb,\u201d by the way \u2014 he should\u2019ve just made another season of \u201cCurb.\u201d That series\u2019 worst episode is ten times better than this.<\/p>\n
David had an unique path to celebrity. He made his fortune with \u201cSeinfeld\u201d behind the scenes and then became famous playing a fictionalized version of himself for an impressive 24 years. In the minds of audiences, he and his TV double have merged.\u00a0<\/p>\n\u201cUnhappiness\u201d was the brainchild of President Obama.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nSo, wherever he goes, he always portrays amped-up \u201cLarry David\u201d \u2014 his Bernie Sanders on \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d was that with hiked-up shoulders \u2014 because that\u2019s what he knows and what people want.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet, as his disappointing latest HBO effort proves, Larry\u2019s bitter, picky antics don\u2019t fit in everywhere. Really, I\u2019m convinced 2024\u2019s terrific finale of \u201cCurb\u201d should have marked the end of them.<\/p>\n
Alas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For David\u2019s sake, let\u2019s hope that \u201cLife, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness\u201d winds up a footnote in his own history.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s prettyyyy, prettyyyy, prettyyyy bad.\u00a0 Watching Larry David\u2019s unfortunate new HBO tribute to America\u2019s 250th anniversary, \u201cLife, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness,\u201d made me want to secede. Because, like Pavlov\u2019s dogs, viewers have been conditioned for decades to roar whenever they so much as see David, the ingenious co-creator of \u201cSeinfeld\u201d and curmudgeonly star […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2478518,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25174],"tags":[21741,309839,313544,21913],"class_list":["post-2478517","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gossip","tag-entertainment","tag-hbo-max","tag-larry-david","tag-tv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Larry-David-should-give-it-a-rest-\u2014-his-new.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2478517"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2478519,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478517\/revisions\/2478519"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2478518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2478517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2478517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2478517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![](\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F2%2F2026%2F06%2Fcrop-39818899.jpg?quality%3D90%26strip%3Dall\")
<\/p>\n