Jerry Seinfeld takes back comments about ‘extreme left’ suppressing comedy

Jerry Seinfeld has addressed his previous comments about the state of comedy – and he admits he’s sorry for his words.

Jerry Seinfeld sorry for controversial comments.

Jerry Seinfeld is addressing his previous comments about the current state of comedy — and he admits he’s sorry for his words.

During a recent sit-down on Breaking Bread with Tom Papa, the Seinfeld star confessed, “There were two things that I have to say I regret saying and that I have to take back,” per Deadline.

“One of them I didn’t say, but people think I did, so just the same. I said I don’t play colleges because the kids are too PC and you can’t do comedy for them,” he shared. “Not true. First of all, I never said it, but if you think I said it, it’s not true. I play colleges all the time. I have no problem with kids, performing for them. In fact, I was just at the University of Indiana, Kentucky, we did UT. I do colleges all the time.”

Jerry Seinfeld opens up about his regrets on the Breaking Bread with Tom Papa podcast.

Seinfeld then addressed his interview with The New Yorker, in which he called out the current state of comedy as “the result of the extreme left, and PC crap, and people worrying so much about offending other people.”

He told host Tom Papa in Tuesday’s Breaking Bread episode that he “said that the extreme left has suppressed the art of comedy.”

The comedian says his is sorry for saying comedy is dead because of the “extreme left”.

“I did say that,” he admitted. “That’s not true. It’s not true… If you’re Lindsey Vonn, if you’re a champion skier, you can put the gates anywhere you want on the mountain. She’s going to make the gate. That’s comedy. Whatever the culture is, we make the gate. You don’t make the gate, you’re out of the game. The game is where is the gate, how do I make the gate, and get down the hill the way I want to.”

He continued, “Does culture change and are there things I used to say that I can’t say that everybody’s always moving? Yes, but that’s the biggest and easiest target. You can’t say certain words, you know, whatever they are, about certain groups. So what?”

Seinfeld performing onstage at Carnegie Hall in New York in October 2023. Picture: Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images

Seinfeld noted that “the accuracy of your observation has to be 100 times finer than that just to be a comedian.”

The comments Seinfeld was addressing were made during his promotional tour of Netflix’s Unfrosted, his directorial debut. In an interview with GQ published in April, he also claimed that “the movie business is over.”

“Film doesn’t occupy the pinnacle in the social, cultural hierarchy that it did for most of our lives,” he lamented. “When a movie came out, if it was good, we all went to see it. We all discussed it. We quoted lines and scenes we liked. Now we’re walking through a fire hose of water, just trying to see.”

This article originally appeared in Decider and was reproduced with permission

Originally published as Jerry Seinfeld takes back comments about ‘extreme left’ suppressing comedy