Curb Your Enthusiasm is masterful at celebrity cameos and fans love to see them. There are really two types of celebrity cameos on the show. There are times celebrities play warped versions of themselves, such as Rosie O'Donnell, Ricky Gervais, Wanda Sykes, or Ted Danson. Then there are the celebrities who come on and play completely different characters, such as Elizabeth Banks, Stephen Colbert, or Jon Hamm. Both styles of celebrity cameos can either be one-offs or be recurring. But in the case of Xena: Warrior Princess star, Lucy Lawless, her cameo was a total one-off. Still, it was incredibly memorable. But was she actually happy working with the curmudgeonly co-creator of Seinfeld? In an interview with TV Emmy Legends, she shared exactly what her experience was and how she deeply insulted a few of the shows' writers...
Being Asked To Guest-Star On Curb Your Enthusiasm
So much of Larry David's real-life interactions and observations of the world are written into Curb Your Enthusiasm. Even his real-life love/hate relationship with Richard Lewis is a major part of the show. So, we wonder if his actual celebrity crushes are too?
We're not saying that Larry had a thing for Xena: Warrior Princess star, Lucy Lawless, but we wouldn't blame him if he did. However, in the Season 6 episode, "The TiVo Guy", Larry David's character (Larry David) crushed on Lucy Lawless hard... and it was hilarious.
While the episode may not be ranked among the best, according to IMDb, it had some memorable moments. This includes how Larry David asked Lucy Lawless out in the first place.
"Look, I'm not a cool guy, or anything, okay?" Larry David told her in the episode, not long after breaking up with his wife, Cheryl. "I haven't been on a date in twelve years. But I would love to waste your time for a couple of hours."
Now, that's just a hilarious way to ask someone out!
Then, of course, there was the whole thing about Larry having "long balls", and even the general banter between he and Lucy. There was chemistry there. But how did Lucy feel about it?
According to an interview by Emmy TV Legends, Lucy was thrilled when she was asked to come on and guest-star on Curb Your Enthusiasm.
"I love Larry David and I was a huge fan of the show," Lucy Lawless explained of her brief cameo in an episode in the sixth season.
She also said that her famous line about "Jews in New Zealand" was something that she ad-libbed. Of course, the near entirety of the dialogue in Curb Your Enthusiasm is unscripted. Larry writes outlines for each episode that contain rough scene breakdowns. In these scene breakdowns are the set-up, build, and the pay-off of the scene with all the essential context that needs to come out in the dialogue in order to move the story forward. However, the actors (most of whom are comedians and improvisers) have an opportunity to share that information any way they want.
While Lucy Lawless is a trained actor, she's no comedian. So, for her to get a few funny lines in that Larry really wanted to keep in the final edit is a massive accomplishment. After all, as Lucy said in her interview with Emmy TV Legends, Larry is very specific about what he ends up keeping on the show. He and his three main writers, David Mandel, Alec Berg, and Jeff Schaffer.
How Lucy Lawless Insulted The Curb Your Enthusiasm Writers And His Co-Star
While she was filming her episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Lucy went for lunch with Larry and his three main writers, Mandel, Berg, and Schaffer. During the lunch, the topic of Sacha Baron Cohen's Borat came up. Lucy told them how much she loved the movie but absolutely hated Sacha's follow-up, Bruno.
"I started going off about how I hated Bruno so much... not realizing, the whole time, that they wrote it," Lucy explained. "I was like, 'It set Gay rights back 25 years. My gay friend liked it. But I hated it!' And they'd laugh. They loved that. But then you just couldn't shut me up. I kept going back to all the reasons... 'I HATED THAT MOVIE!' Like, I was really insulting. And Larry's just sitting there loving it!"
Not only did Lucy insult Larry's writers but she also unintentionally insulted one of his co-stars...
In the episode (and in many other Curb episodes) Larry expressed his dislike of Ted Danson. This encouraged Lucy to do the same. But Ted didn't realize this until he saw a screening of the episode. According to Lucy, he was insulted and unhappy that she apparently didn't like him... even though it was only her character on the show.
Given the fact that Lucy spent so much time insulting people in and around Curb Your Enthusiasm, it's actually a surprise why she hasn't been asked back. After all, Larry loves a little insulting humor.
