9 Actors Who Have Starred In Both Seinfeld And Curb Your Enthusiasm

Not only was Seinfeld a show that changed TV in many ways, but it was a platform for a ton of upcoming comedians to show off their abilities too. Over the show’s nine seasons, it introduced a lot of newcomers who are now considered some of comedy’s finest performers, as well as some genuinely great dramatic actors too.

With Curb Your Enthusiasm being the spiritual successor to Seinfeld, just with added profanities, Larry David hasn’t been shy about picking at some of Seinfeld’s best guest stars. Though it’s a privilege for the stars to feature in two of the most influential shows of all time, they turn in some incredible performances that the shows have become known for.

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9 Bryan Cranston

Being one of the best guest stars on Seinfeld, in which he plays a dentist who converts to Judaism just so that he can tell jokes about Jews, Bryan Cranston was proving his comedy prowess long before Malcolm In The Middle.

And always being the jokester of the cast according to his Breaking Bad pals, a guest feature on Curb was always inevitable. Funnily enough, though Cranston is now a movie star, he still plays a fictional character, being one of Larry’s many therapists.

8 Anita Barone

Anita Barone is an actor who seems almost typecast in the two shows, but each time she comes off hilarious, playing a fiery partner to the protagonists who calls them out on their idiotic behavior.

In Curb, Anita plays a character called Denise Handicapped, or at least, that’s what Larry has her saved as on his phone, and in Seinfeld, she plays Gail Cunningham, who refused to kiss Jerry after going on three dates with him.

7 Bob Odenkirk

Cranston isn’t the only actor from the ABC drama who has starred in both comedies. Being one of the guest stars fans want to see return, Bob Odenkirk appeared in the very first season of Curb Your Enthusiasm as a former pornstar, which is now more than 20 years ago, long before Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

And even before then, the actor featured on Seinfeld as a doctor who finds himself in a relationship, albeit a very brief one, with Elaine.

6 Kathy Griffin

Kathy Griffin stole the show when she appeared on Seinfeld. She first appeared in “The Doll,” but after the real-life Jerry Seinfeld heard Griffin’s jokes about him on her HBO special, Jerry wrote all of her jokes into the show for the even better episode “The Cartoon,” though it is one of the Seinfeld subplots that weren’t wrapped up.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t have as big of a role on Curb, as it’s more of a typical celebrity cameo in the first season.

5 Melanie Smith

Being yet another one of Jerry’s girlfriends, Melanie Smith played Rachel in Seinfeld and was actually one of Jerry’s longest-running girlfriends in the show.

She starred in one of the most famous episodes of the show, “The Hamptons,” in which she catches a glimpse of George naked. In Curb, Smith plays an incest survivor and persuades Larry to go to a therapy session with her, which leads to him making up a terrible story.

4 Salman Rushdie

With a Fatwa landing on Larry’s head being the crux of season nine of Curb, he seeks advice from somebody who has been in his situation before, the award-winning author Salman Rushdie.

Rushdie is one of the more unorthodox and surprising guest spots of the show, but it’s surprising none the less. Not only that, but Rushdie was a character on Seinfeld too. Though Salman Rushdie doesn’t appear as himself in the episode, he is played by an actor who looks a lot like him, and it ended up being one of the storylines of Seinfeld that wasn’t resolved.

3 Patrick Bristow

Patrick Bristow seems to have also been typecast in the world of Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm, as in both shows he plays a camp savant of either fashion or dance.

In Seinfeld, the comedian plays the Wig Master, who supplies Kramer with Joseph’s Technicolor Dreamcoat. Then, years later in Curb, Bristow reappears as Larry’s dance coach when he’s rehearsing for The Producers.

2 Lauren Graham

With there being a 20+ year gap between her appearance in Seinfeld and her prominent feature in Curb, it’d be easy to miss Lauren Graham’s connection. Graham is a love interest to both Jerry and Larry in their respective shows.

Firstly, Jerry and Graham’s character of Valerie run into problems when the comedian finds out Valerie’s step mom has him on speed dial. Then, in season 9 of Curb, the actress has her own arc, as she starts a serious relationship with Larry, that is until her son gets in the way.

1 The Seinfeld Cast

Of course, most obviously, the entire Seinfeld cast have heavily featured throughout the 10 seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Michael Richards, who played Kramer in Seinfeld, has featured the least, as he only returned for the season seven-story arc in which Larry creates a Seinfeld reunion.

Jerry pops up infrequently, but Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander have featured throughout Curb the most, clashing with Larry over who should visit who and whether or not he respects wood.