Jerry Seinfeld said the decline of comedy on television and rise of stand-up comedy was due to political correctness.
In promotion of his upcoming feature film Unfrosted, marking the comedian's directorial debut, Seinfeld discussed the craft of comedy in an exclusive interview with The New Yorker.
Host David Remnick asked the comedian about combining serious themes with comedy, to which Seinfeld noted "people always need it."
“They need it so badly and they don’t get it,” he continued. “It used to be, you would go home at the end of the day, most people would go, 'Oh, Cheers is on. Oh, M*A*S*H is on. Oh, Mary Tyler Moore is on. All in the Family is on.' You just expected, there’ll be some funny stuff we can watch on TV tonight.”
Seinfeld then noted a lack of comedic television in recent years.
“Where is it?" he asked. "This is the result of the extreme left and P.C. crap, and people worrying so much about offending other people."
“Now they’re going to see stand-up comics because we are not policed by anyone," Seinfeld continued. "The audience polices us. We know when we’re off track. We know instantly and we adjust to it instantly.”
“But when you write a script and it goes into four or five different hands, committees, groups — ‘Here’s our thought about this joke,'” he added. “Well, that’s the end of your comedy.”
The comedian then noted some jokes on his legendary sitcom Seinfeld would not be able to air for modern audiences.
Last week, Seinfeld suggested the film industry was "over." “They’re so dead serious! They don’t have any idea that the movie business is over. They have no idea," Seinfeld said of his experience in filmmaking with Unfrosted. "Film doesn’t occupy the pinnacle in the social, cultural hierarchy that it did for most of our lives. When a movie came out, if it was good, we all went to see it. We all discussed it. We quoted lines and scenes we liked. Now we’re walking through a fire hose of water, just trying to see.” Seinfeld then noted audiences were "flocking" to stand-up comedy because the art form is "something you can't fake."
“It’s like platform diving. You could say you’re a platform diver, but in two seconds we can see if you are or you aren’t. That’s what people like about stand-up. They can trust it. Everything else is fake," the comedian said.
Along with directing the upcoming film, Seinfeld stars as the fictional creator of Kellogg's Pop-Tart breakfast pastry.
Unfrosted debuts on Netflix on May 3.
