Curb Your Enthusiasm

You'd like to buy a Harley, kick-start the Hog and head for the open road. But Harley-Davidson knows that you might hesitate to do so because Harley riders can be so enthusiastic about their bikes and the bike culture that it scares you and other potential riders away. So they're trying to curb their enthusiasm and attract more buyers. The disciples of Jesus faced a similar problem when they wandered outside the national borders and encountered a woman who would not be put off. 

Larry David is thoroughly disagreeable. You might even call him "enthusiasm-impaired."

That's what makes him so funny on the HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm -- he's completely incapable of expressing any excitement about everyday earthly existence. Tall, thin, and dour, this co-creator of the old Seinfeld series is self-centered, whiny and fixated on the minutiae of life -- in one episode, Larry decides not to reach down and return an errant golf ball simply because he's put off by the chin strap on its owner's sun hat.

Of course, it is this sort of curmudgeonly behavior that made Curb Your Enthusiasm so deliciously perverse and so true to the impeccable nastiness of Seinfeld, notes critic Joyce Millman. For those who have been making do with syndicated Seinfeld reruns, Curb Your Enthusiasm is a real hoot.

The disciples of Jesus sometimes seem like extras on the set of Curb Your Enthusiasm. They tend to exhibit this same curmudgeonly attitude, acting cranky and obstreperous as they...