Larry David Cuts Loose Promoting Season 6 of Curb Your Enthusiasm

Actually, David seemed to be fully revitalized, creatively speaking. It was clear early on that he was in fine form when an eager reporter attempted to ask him more than one question.

After asking David if he felt "personally responsible for The Producers finally closing on Broadway" -- a reference to a story arc in Season 3 of Curb -- and after David laughed and said that the Producers storyline was "the most fun I've ever had in my life," the reporter pressed on.

"One last question," he began.

"Fuck this guy!" David interrupted, sounding every bit like his semi-autobiographical character on Curb, whom some people refer to as TV Larry. "There are a lot of people here. Shut up. That's enough from you!"

When the resultant laughter subsided, another reporter asked David why he had decided to do a sixth season of the show (set to begin September 9) when it had appeared for so long that Season 5 was going to be the end.

"Well, the season ended, and I went into my office, and I was sitting at my desk, and I went, 'Jeez, I don't have anything to do! What am I going to do now? This is very uncomfortable. I better do another season,'" Real Larry replied. "So I did!"

You could hardly hear him over the laughter that tore through the ballroom here at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

David was seriously funny, in marked contrast to some of his previous TCA appearances, when it seemed he would rather be eating glass than sitting in a room with all of us.

The merriment continued as another critic asked, "Why are you so willing to portray yourself as…?"

"Careful, careful …," David interrupted.

"As such a schmuck?" the critic continued.

"I'm portraying you, schmuck-o!" David blasted.

Referring to two classic television series centered on eccentric and funny older men, the critic added, "I mean, Jack Benny was cheap, and George Burns had a crazy wife, but it was all sort of real."

"Uh-huh," was David's flat reply.

"But you're portraying yourself!" the critic continued.

And then David got the biggest laugh of the day.

"I'm Jesus Christ!" he cried. "I'm sacrificing myself for the sake of humanity!"

"Will you do anything for a laugh?" the critic asked.

"No," David answered. "Where did you get that impression?"

Miffed at one point that nobody was asking questions of his co-stars, Cheryl Hines and Jeff Garlin, who flanked him on the ballroom stage, David said he wouldn't answer another question until somebody asked one of either of them. One critic stepped up and got a laugh almost as big as those David was getting.

"Jeff, you got a new hairstyle?" the critic asked Garlin.

"Oh, shit, that's what they came up with?" Garlin replied. (It turns out his new short cut is for a film role.)

Another critic asked David how his Jewish identity informs his comedy.

"Oh, Jesus," Garlin gasped.

David replied, "I don't know. I'm not one of those guys that goes, 'Hey, I'm a Jew! I'm a Jew! I'm a Jew! I don't do that."

It was hard to hear what David said next because the critics were laughing so hard. (Perhaps we were all overtired, but David had us in the palm of his hand.) He explained that all of his comedy stems from his "lower middle class upbringing" in a "very tiny apartment" in Brooklyn "with neighbors on top of me who could hear everything that happened in my house.

"I guess I have a lot of experiences as a Jew that sometimes find their way into the show, but I don't think the show is for Jews just as I don't think that Seinfeld was for Jews. I think everybody can appreciate it if they have a sense of humor."

At this point the critics were so comfortable with David that one asked, "Larry, what are you worth, like $10 billion now? Can you buy HBO at this point?"

"My worth has just been cut in half," David deadpanned as another explosion of laughter ripped through the room. "It's not that much anymore." (He was referring to the end of his marriage to environmental activist Laurie David.)

Another critic seized on the subject. "I never would have brought this up until you mentioned being cut in half," he said. "In the show this year it appears that Cheryl's activism is going to become an issue in your marriage. Is that a coincidence?"

"No, no, she's been that way throughout," David replied.

"If you do come back for a seventh season, since there is such a thin line between TV Larry and Real Larry, would you and Cheryl have marital problems?" another critic asked.

David turned to Hines.

"Too bad you're off the show," he said. "What a shame."

"What a way to find out!" Hines cried.

"That's a good idea for a seventh season, by the way," David said to the critic.

Will there be a seventh season? David revealed that the final episode of Season 6 "was sort of written as a could-be-the-last-show ending or might-not-be-the-last-show ending.

"We'll just see when I get back to my desk in October if I want to do it again," David teased. "It's possible."