It was about two-and-a-half decades ago that Larry David: Curb Your Enthusiasm premiered as an HBO special, and from that one-time program spawned one of the greatest comedy shows of all time. Curb Your Enthusiasm began airing its first season in October 2000, and while it’s been what could be called an irregular small screen presence – with multiple years sometimes transpiring between runs – it has constantly delivered big laughs with a bold mix of outrageousness and awkwardness.
There is a great deal to love in all 12 seasons of the beloved HBO sitcom… but it can be said that some episodes are better and more hilarious than others, and that’s obviously the jumping off point for this feature. What are the funniest episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm? We’ve put together this ranking to address that very question.
12. "Shaq" (Season 2, Episode 8)
In a traditional sitcom, a protagonist would be left miserable if they were shunned by society after injuring a star athlete, but that’s just what makes Larry David so special. In “Shaq,” such an event plays out with Larry, but rather than being upset about alienating everyone in his life, he is blissful that he is no longer a target for favors or unwanted conversation. The end does feel a bit traditional, as he is able to make peace with Shaquille O’Neal by bringing Seinfeld tapes to his hospital room and it turns out that the injury isn’t so serious, but there is a nice snap back to darkness at the end with a doctor worrying about a spot on Larry’s neck.
11. "The Grand Opening"(Season 3, Episode 10)
Larry David is not a good person (as he is depicted in Curb Your Enthusiasm, obviously), but there are certain instances where he demonstrates positive instincts, and they still get big laughs. This is best exemplified in the Season 3 finale “The Grand Opening.” First, he hires a chef for the restaurant he co-owns because the guy is a Holocaust survivor (it turns out he’s not), and then when Larry learns that the chef has Tourette syndrome, he saves him from embarrassment on the restaurant’s opening night by joining him in screaming a volley of obscenities. Eventually, everyone in attendance gets involved, and the show arguably delivers its most heartwarming conclusion.
10. "The Terrorist Attack" (Season 3, Episode 5)
In Season 3’s “The Terrorist Attack,” Larry is given some top secret information about a potential threat to the city of Los Angeles – so does he use that information to primarily protect his loved ones and those to whom he is closest? Nope. He uses it as a relationship Band-Aid when he accidentally snubs Paul Reiser’s wife. This incredibly selfish act ends up with him getting heat from everybody in his life (including those he tells and those he doesn't) – but what makes this one of the funniest Curb Your Enthusiasm episodes is how Larry tries to repair the situation by sharing another closely guarded secret: the subject of Alanis Morissette’s “You Oughta Know."”
9. "Affirmative Action" (Season 1, Episode 9)
Phenomenal as Seinfeld is as a show, highlighting diversity in American society is not one of its strengths, and the way in which that subject is broached in Season 1’s “Affirmative Action” quickly established Curb Your Enthusiasm as one of the boldest comedies on television. An awful, race-based faux pas while talking with a dermatologist friend of the late great Richard Lewis’ ends up having spectacular farcical consequences – with Cheryl going nuts because of a rash and a lost prescription, and Larry squaring off with a Black woman who he didn’t hire as a producer for one of his movies.
8. "Larry vs. Michael J. Fox" (Season 8, Episode 10)
Thanks to his wonderful careers as both an actor and an activist, Michael J. Fox is beloved all around the globe… so of course, Larry David becomes the only person in the world to antagonize him. It’s never made totally clear if Fox is actually messing with him (stomping around his apartment one floor up and handing him shaken-up soda) or if he is truly suffering from Parkinson’s symptoms – but Larry’s lack of grace in any situation puts him permanently at a disadvantage. Season 8 ending with the protagonist basically being kicked out of New York City helps make it one of Curb Your Enthusiasm’s best finales.
7. "Trick Or Treat" (Season 2, Episode 3)
How old is too old to trick or treat? It’s a question that pops up every October, and while most people don’t make a big deal out of it, Larry David is certainly not “most people.” His confrontation with a pair of teen girls hunting for candy inspires an unforgettable backlash – getting “Bald Asshole” spray painted on his door – but this “Trick Or Treat” is also an episode where Larry gets some payback of his own. Not only is he able to get a small orchestra to play Richard Wagner's "Siegfried Idyll" for his wife as a sweet birthday present, he uses those same instruments to get revenge on one of the teen’s dad.
6. "The Table Read"(Season 7, Episode 9)
Curb Your Enthusiasm has dozens of great A-plots and dozens of great B-plots, but “The Table Read” is a special episode where both are in play. Having Michael Richards freaked out about a Groat’s Disease diagnosis leads to an amazing meeting with Leon Black, who pretends to be an acquaintance of Larry’s named Danny Duberstein, and the end result is a not-at-all-subtle callback to Richards’ controversial interaction with a heckler in 2006. Meanwhile, Larry gets in a genuinely awkward friendship with a co-worker’s daughter, and what plays out in a doctor’s office before the credits (With pre-fame Randall Park!) is perhaps the most shocking bit in Curb’s 120 episodes.
5. "The Therapists" (Season 6, Episode 9)
There is an awesome history of one-episode roles from notable actors in Curb Your Enthusiasm, but there is an argument to be made that what Steve Coogan does as Dr. Bright in “The Therapists” is as great as it gets. When he gives Larry terrible advice about how he can repair his relationship with Cheryl, he ends up getting involved in one of Larry’s most ridiculous schemes and paying extreme consequences for it. Larry’s wild attempts to get on the good side of Cheryl’s therapist is amazing by itself, but the way it backfires with Dr. Bright going to prison and then inadvertently seeking help from Cheryl’s therapist is textbook farce.
4. "The Black Swan" (Season 7, Episode 7)
What would happen if Larry David committed a homicide? That’s a story that Curb Your Enthusiasm would never touch for obvious reasons… but “The Black Swan” gets pretty close, and it’s just as funny as one would hope. He is said to induce a heart attack in a fellow golfer, and he beats the episode’s titular bird to death, but his main concern through all of it is not earning the vitriol of golf club owner, Mr. Takahashi, and having his membership revoked. The comeuppance is excellent, and ties back to an amazing opening bit about Larry’s dad trying to save money on a headstone engraving with bad grammar.
3. "Palestinian Chicken" (Season 8, Episode 3)
Nobody in modern television has perfected the art of selfishness and self-loathing like Larry David, and that particular comedic gold hits a beautiful crescendo in Curb Your Enthusiasm’s eighth season. “Palestinian Chicken” is the episode when he memorably declares himself a “social assassin” (and proceeds to botch two “hits”), but this is also when he both betrays a friend to help win a golf tournament and goes against his community to eat tasty chicken and have aggressive sex with an anti-Semitic Palestinian woman. The last shot of this one is an all-timer (as proven by the fact that it has become a popular meme).
2. "Seinfeld" (Season 7, Episode 10)
“Seinfeld” will long be considered a legendary episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm thanks to the way it successfully executes a reunion of the eponymous beloved sitcom, but it is independently worthy of distinction because of how funny it is. The idea of Cheryl falling for Jason Alexander as he gets deeper into character as George Costanza is inspired, as is the way it causes Larry to spin out (the cherry on top being his attempt at playing George after Jason quits).
Beyond that, this is where we witness the birth of his on-going war with Mocha Joe, and it brings “Do you respect wood?” into the show’s remarkable lexicon of memorable quotes. And, it thankfully doesn’t try to deliver a boiler plate happy ending, letting Larry’s eccentricities ruin any chance of getting back together with Cheryl.
1. "The Car Pool Lane" (Season 4, Episode 6)
Larry David comes up with a lot of special ideas – weird ways to circumnavigate the world’s annoyances – and a lot of them are stupid, rude, or both. What he comes up with in “The Car Pool Lane,” however, is ingenious: to get around highway traffic, he picks up a sex worker to sit in his passenger seat.
That is the brilliant core of this perfect episode, but the way the writing weaves in three terrific B-plots is amazing and they each result in hilarious conclusions: he accidentally gets Marty Funkhouser arrested at the airport, Larry’s dad’s eyesight improves to the point where he realizes he’s been spending the night chatting with “a hooker,” and Larry has the aforementioned sex worker help him prove to a judge that he’s not a racist. It’s Curb Your Enthusiasm at its very best.
Coming to an end after 12 seasons, all of Curb Your Enthusiasm is available to stream instantly with a Max subscription. Episodes can be purchased individually on digital platforms including Prime Video, Vudu, Google Play, and Apple, and the first 11 seasons are available for purchase on DVD (fingers are crossed there will eventually be a Complete Series Blu-ray boxset).
