Review: Jerry Seinfeld played the hits - and not much more

By Chris Schulz

Review - He whined. He complained. He moaned. He griped. He ranted about phones, railed against artificial intelligence, refused to enjoy golf. He slammed TV streaming services. Same with vacations. His teenage children are leaving home soon and thank god for that. "By now, we know," said Jerry Seinfeld in Auckland last night, "that everything sucks all of the time".

This is, of course, Seinfeld's entire mission statement. Hating the minutiae of life has been the 70-year-old's reason for being since he fused stand-up comedy within the sitcom format and created his juggernaut TV show Seinfeld in 1989, a series that still gets quoted, repeated, memed and TikTok-ed 35 years later.

He clearly sees no reason to switch up a winning formula after that long. So, at Spark Arena last night, Seinfeld played the hits, and not much more. If his 90-minute show felt over-rehearsed, that's because it consisted entirely of things he's been discussing for decades. "I don't have a plan when I get up here," Seinfeld admitted. "I just make it up."

That meant a grab-bag show cherry-picking from tried-and-true material. If you want to look like a loser, drive a golf cart. Coffee is great, so what's the point of tea? Why would anyone want to go and see the Titanic when it already sank? And why do we still use the "horsepower" to measure things? After the show, a mate messaged to say that bit is at least 20 years old.

This would usually be fine. It was that way in 2017 when Seinfeld last played here to rave reviews. The problem was the major elephant in the room. At two recent Australian shows, protesters angered by Seinfeld's pro-Israel stance interrupted his set to heckle him about it, forcing Seinfeld to confront the topic.

Last night, about 20 protesters gathered outside Spark Arena, waving Palestinian flags while holding a giant sign that said: "Murder Machine." They passed out flyers detailing grisly war statistics. "Jerry has been vocal about his support for Israel and Zionism," it said. "Attending his show is an indirect way of giving his actions the thumbs up."

About 20 protesters gathered outside Spark Arena when Jerry Seinfeld was performing there. Photo: Supplied

That's an awkward start for a comedy show. Inside, things were also strange. On the floor, sitting in a section where tickets cost $475 when they went on sale last year, the man sitting on my left admitted he'd got in for free. The seat on my right was empty, but two men over said they hadn't paid for their tickets either.

That's weird considering the sky-high prices Seinfeld was charging for the night. Some had paid up to $850 to be there, a price believed to be among the highest charged for a night of entertainment in Aotearoa. And yet, in the days leading up to the show, tickets were heavily discounted, with some going for just $50. Even then chunks of seats in the stands remained empty. (Seinfeld later said he was playing to 10,000; Spark's capacity is closer to 12,000.)

With those behind-the-scenes issues bubbling away, Seinfeld needed a safe haven, so he played it safe. The crowd got what they expected. No hecklers purchased those $50 tickets, so the night played out uninterrupted. Most of the show's second-half was an extended riff on relationships that played heavily into stereotypes, yet received plenty of laughs. "Never ask your wife a question," was Seinfeld's advice for a happy marriage.

The night's best bits came in the rare moments when Seinfeld went off script. When he asked the crowd to guess his favourite TV show, he riffed, hilariously, on Magnum PI for several minutes. When someone yelled out "Seinfeld," he shook his head, eyeballed the crowd and said: "Would you stare into a mirror and say, 'Yeah, this show's great'."

Aside from a bad gag about chipped phone cases looking like they came from a bombed Ukrainian mall kiosk, Seinfeld didn't mention the war. Given the chance, neither did the crowd. After the finale, Seinfeld returned for a quickfire Q&A that could have been a risky move, considering what was happening outside the venue.

Instead of questioning any of that, or asking Seinfeld to explain his recent comments about wokeness, or how he feels about his movie flop Unfrosted, a fan asked him to reveal his favourite car brand. Someone else just yelled: "Rudy Giuliani."

For the final question, Seinfeld got another softball: "What were your favourite Seinfeld moments?" He admitted he hadn't watched the show since he finished it, but said he often thought about key plot points, like Kramer hitting a golf ball into a whale's blowhole, George's wife dying from toxic envelope glue, and when he wrestled an older woman over a loaf of rye bread.

It was a riff that got the night's biggest applause, showing exactly why fans had paid up to $850 to be there. This was the equivalent of a Vegas showman delivering the hits to a crowd that expected nothing else. Looks like Seinfeld's yada yada'd his way out of trouble yet again.