There’s something else about the Pop-Tart subject matter that Seinfeld cribbed from Shepherd — the connection to being a kid, “the recall of childhood that so many comedic minds seem to have. Most comedians I know are able to not leave their childhood behind. I think that’s essential if you want to work in comedy. It’s a self-absorbed freedom that children have, which makes them fun to be around. Comedians never leave it behind.”
There’s one final element to Shepherd’s radio performances that influenced Seinfeld’s approach to stand-up, and that’s “access to a tap of genuine enthusiasm.” “As a comedian, you can become quite polished,” Seinfeld told Carter. “I can do bits from my show which you can take as recordings and you can type them over each other and there would be a millisecond of difference in how the routine is performed. But the enthusiasm behind it has to be genuine.”
That’s the art of stand-up, says Seinfeld. “The routine itself has a metronomic precision; the enthusiasm behind it is completely innocent and pure.” And if that enthusiasm seems fake? The same routine, performed in exactly the same cadence, dies in the water.
Hearing Seinfeld talk about Shepherd is almost like listening to him marvel at a mentor. It’s probably not a coincidence that Seinfeld’s youngest son is named “Shepherd.” During the DVD commentary of Season Six’s “The Gymnast,” Seinfeld talks about actress Lois Nettleton, who appears in a scene: “She was married to Jean Shepherd. He’s the guy who invented talk radio and really formed my entire comedic sensibility. Yes, I learned how to do comedy from Jean Shepherd.”
And it all started with those columns in Car and Driver. “That’s the kind of comedy I love. I don’t know if it was something in me and he brought it out. It excited me, it propelled me creatively,” he says in the Shepherd documentary. “This is how you live life. This is how you find joy in life.”