STORY MAPS: Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 4

(created by Larry David)

I love the use of the unspoken Central Dramatic Question over the course of the fourth season of this hilarious show.

This is the season in which Larry David gets hired by Mel Brooks to play one of the leads in "The Producers" on Broadway. 

The obvious question is “Why would Mel Brooks cast Larry David, who couldn't sing or dance to save his life, in his hit play?"

But after a while, we just accept it, it seems to be REAL.  Hey, it’s a quirky comedy, anything goes, right?

So we forget about it. 

Until the final episode of the season when Larry premieres in the show...and forgets his lines in the middle of a scene with co-star David Schwimmer.  The audience is dumbstruck as the play comes to a screeching halt.

Cut to the lobby bar, where Mel Brooks and wife Anne Bancroft toast to the destruction of the little show that became a huge pain-in-the-ass, “The Producers.”  Brooks’ plan all along was for Larry David to sabotage the show with his lack of talent! 

A surprising, and very funny, answer, to the CDQ, and in true comedic fashion the plan backfires when Larry recovers on stage with some improvised stand-up bits and the audience loves him for it.


-Daniel Calvisi
www.actfourscreenplays.com
copyright © Daniel Calvisi 2005-2006

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