Jerry Seinfeld has reflected on the past days of ‘dominant masculinity’, and how much he likes ‘real men’.
The actor, most known for his efforts in acclaimed sitcom Seinfeld, has suggested that the wave of nostalgia in Hollywood at the moment is due to the ‘hierarchy’ from previous years that has been ‘absolutely vaporized’ in current day.
During an appearance on the Honestly with Bari Weiss podcast, the 70-year-old, who recently released Unfrosted – a film about the invention of Pop-Tarts in the 60s – spoke of why he went back in time for the Netflix flick.
‘There’s another element there that I think is the key element, and that is an agreed upon hierarchy, which I think is absolutely vaporized in today’s moment,’ he told the host.
‘I think that is why people lean on the horn and drive in the crazy way that they drive, because we have no sense of hierarchy. And as humans, we don’t really feel comfortable like that.
‘If you want to talk about nostalgia, that is part of what makes that moment attractive looking back.’
‘As a man… You can go all the way down the line – that’s a real man – I want to be like that someday. Well, no. I never really grew up,’ he continued, before noting the names he believed to be ‘real men’.
‘When I was in that era, again, it was JFK, Muhammad Ali, Sean Connery, Howard Cosell, that’s a real man. I want to be like that someday.
‘I never really grew up… You don’t want to, as a comedian, because it’s a childish pursuit. But I miss dominant masculinity. Yeah, I get the [toxic masculinity] but still, I like a real man.’
Jerry’s comments didn’t go down well with fans, who flocked to social media and branded him an ‘ick’.
Unpacking the chat on Reddit, FluorescentSky fumed: ‘He’s so boring and predictable. To me this comes across as an attempt to remain in the conversation/headlines, and not a very good one.’
Already-asleep agreed: ‘I wonder if it has ever occurred to him that he could just stop talking.’
Waywardgirl25 penned: ‘As if I need more reasons to dislike this man.’
As _ALoverOfTheLight added: ‘This is so tired. If you are more masculine fine but this push for men needing to be masculine is so ick.’
Jerry is no stranger to expressing his mind in interviews, and recently made headlines when he slammed the ‘extreme left’ for ruining comedy with ‘PC crap’.
The comic, who fronted Seinfeld for nearly a decade between 1989 – 1998, spoke out against current shows, claiming that the state of the world doesn’t really ‘affect’ the genre.
‘Nothing really affects comedy. People always need it. They need it so badly and they don’t get it,’ he told the New Yorker. ‘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.
‘Well, guess what – where is it? This is the result of the extreme left and PC crap, and people worrying so much about offending other people. Now they’re going to see standup comics because we are not policed by anyone.
‘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.” Well, that’s the end of your comedy.’
He also suggested that certain episodes of Seinfeld wouldn’t go down well today, despite being met with huge applause at the time.
‘We did an episode of the series in the nineties where Kramer decides to start a business of having homeless people pull rickshaws because, as he says, “They’re outside anyway”. Do you think I could get that episode on the air today?’
Rob McElhenney – who created and stars in It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia – effortlessly proved him wrong on social media.
Quoting a tweet about Jerry’s comments, Rob, who plays Mac in the sitcom, shared a picture of Matthew ‘Rickety Cricket’ Mara (David Hornsby) from the show, beside the word, ‘Probably’.
Viewers will know that Rickety Cricket begins the show as a priest but over the course of multiple seasons he goes on a downward spiral, ending up as a homeless drug addict after getting caught up with the Gang.
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