Larry David/USA/2002; R4 (2-disc)
Warner Bros, NZ$49.95 | Reviewed by Alexander Bisley

Lumičre Associate Editor Alexander Bisley’s weekly DVD column, ending its run in The Dominion Post today, continues on The Lumičre Reader.

A SIGN of Curb Your Enthusiasm’s mana is the talent that sign up to satirise themselves. In Season Three Larry David goes to New York to be in a pastiche of a Martin Scorsese New York gangster movie. The real Scorsese appears with his lively rat-a-tat-tat. While he’s away from LA, Larry’s mother dies. When he gets back his dad says everyone was at the funeral but they didn’t want to disturb him. Larry is understandably upset, but soon uses the bereavement to avoid social engagements he doesn’t want; which are most of them. Shameless as ever, he uses the situation to get his long-suffering wife Cheryl to be intimate with him.

Later Larry has a hilarious conversation about intimacy with rapper Krazee-Eyez Killa who’s dating his friend Wanda. Larry then becomes paranoid Krazee will bust him for snitching. The series is cleverly structured around the various crises that arise when Larry becomes a partner in a new restaurant. Susie, the partner of Larry’s manager/close friend Jeff doesn’t appreciate it when he turns up with a feast of sponge cakes. “Larry, he’s fat enough as it is... He’s gonna explode.” Other explosively funny episodes include topical The Terrorist Attack, throat-tickling Mary, Joseph and Larry and The Grand Opening.


TEN EPISODES are accompanied by two complimentary featurettes, both filmed at the annual HBO Comedy Arts Festival. Susie Essman, Jeff Garlin, Larry David, Richard Lewis, and series producer/director Larry Charles chew the fat on making Curb Your Enthusiasm, before each introducing their favourite scenes.