Larry David’s Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness gave Barack Obama the perfect cover to go after Donald Trump.
The new seven-episode limited series, which David wrote with his longtime Curb Your Enthusiasm co-creator and showrunner Jeff Schaffer, was executive produced by Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground Productions. Schaffer told Obsessed: The Podcast that the historical comedy, which takes on pivotal moments in American history from David’s perspective, came about after an “incredible” meeting with the former president.
“We met with President Obama, and that meeting—it is just incredible,” Schaffer said. “I’ve never met the president. He and I don’t travel in the same circles… he introduced himself to me, and the first thing he says is, ‘You play golf?’ And I go, ‘Not really.’ And he looks at Larry, and he goes, ‘This guy’s a better golfer than you think he’d be from looking at him, but he wears so much sunscreen… It’s like you’re playing with a mime.”
David and Obama have riffed in their banter while promoting the show, but Schaffer said the pair are even funnier together than the public has seen.
“Obama’s just s---ting on Larry in the funniest way,” he continued, “And Larry’s just like, ‘I’m sorry, my dad’s not from Kenya.’ And like, this is minute one. And so my immediate thing is, my job is to get these two together on screen because they’re so fun together.”
Obama and David performed together for a promotional spot for Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness last month, in which the former president roasts David for not having any “friends.” But the most brutal roasting came in the series itself, when David, with the help of the late legendary director Rob Reiner, used the show’s July 3 episode to rip Trump directly.
Reiner plays outgoing President George Washington in a scene in which he tells a crowd he will not seek a third presidential term, and David’s spectator character wonders what would happen if an “insecure, lying a--hole” president in the future refused to do the same.
Reiner’s Washington scoffs at the idea that such a thing could ever happen, giving David the opportunity to add that this hypothetical, obviously Trump president would be “a deeply corrupt con man,” “a pathological liar who preys upon people’s prejudices,” and “would even cheat at golf.”
“I love that in this weird way, Rob gets the last word,” Schaffer told Obsessed. “We wanted to cover 250 years of the American experience, you know, warts and all,” he said. “And right now there’s a saggy orange wart that I’d like to see removed as quickly as possible. Larry too.”
President Obama contributed creatively to the series, which sometimes caused him to bump heads with David. Schaffer recalled that during one disagreement, “Obama just goes, ‘I see how this is gonna be.’ Larry’s like, ‘What?’ And the president goes, ‘I spent 20 minutes talking about how great everything is. I give you one note, and you get into a defensive crouch.’”
“And then the president says, ‘You know, when I was in the Oval Office, I like to think that I took advice and I took notes from the people around me, and I was president of the United States.’ And Larry just goes, ‘Yeah, but I’m president of this.’”
Despite David apparently putting his foot down, Schaffer said Obama was a worthwhile collaborator on the show, even improvising one great joke in a sketch that will air as part of the series finale.
“The president was very game, as you’ll see in this series as we go forward,” Schaffer said. “He’s even doing a big sketch with Larry later. And he’s really funny.”
Schaffer, who directed all seven episodes, added, “He’s not ‘good for a former president.’ He’s good. His timing is great. He’s got great rapport with Larry. He came up with lines, the improv, his own stuff that were like, ‘That’s hilarious. That’s going in.’ And in fact, we’re gonna build on that. He was fantastic.”
While many of the satirical jabs in the series are relatively subtle, Schaffer said he thinks the George Washington sketch could get under the current president’s skin. That’s why they decided to include that sketch in the episode that ran the night before America’s 250th birthday. “If we spoil a sad octogenarian’s weekend, so be it,” Schaffer joked.
But Schaffer also admits that the obvious criticism might go over Trump’s head—the same way it did in 2020 when Larry David’s character on Curb Your Enthusiasm started wearing a red MAGA hat to avoid having to engage with strangers in L.A.
At the time, Trump appeared to miss the point of the joke, pinning a clip from the show to the top of his Twitter page as some sort of badge of honor.
“When we did the MAGA hat episode of Curb, I mean, he’s so unfathomably dumb that he posted it!” Schaffer remarked in disbelief.
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