Larry David revealed that Bruce Springsteen came up with a hilarious line on the spot during one of his guest appearances on the final season of Curb Your Enthusiasm.
The Curb”creator — who spoke at HBO & Tribeca Film’s An Evening With Larry David event on Friday — said the Boss “absolutely” improvised his “I didn’t make you out for a floor fucker” line in his cameo on the show last month.
“He made that up,” David said of the line.
Curb star Susie Essman, who appeared alongside David at the event, said the iconic rocker did “fantastic” on the show, according to People magazine.
“What you want from an improviser is they surprise you,” she said.
Springsteen, who made a brief appearance earlier in the final season, also made a cameo in the show’s penultimate episode titled “Ken/Kendra” where he gets COVID-19. The Boss points to David as the reason he got sick and cancels stops on his tour.
The plotline of the episode was written and Springsteen’s scene was shot in 2022, months before he postponed shows in real life “due to illness” and he along with his wife Patti Scialfa tested positive for COVID-19, The Hollywood Reporter noted.
The Boss would later postpone stops on his world tour in September after he announced that he was getting treated for symptoms of peptic ulcer disease.
“Bruce got sick and had to cancel his tour, and I just turned to Larry and said, ‘You have an amazing ability to manifest negative things. You are the supreme negative manifester,’” the show’s executive producer Jeff Schaffer told THR.
“I remember going, ‘Oh my God, it’s exactly what we did.’ In the show, we say he had complications so his health was really at risk. It played out just like we said — which I feel terrible about! The good news is he got better, and he was hilarious. Happy ending.”
Schaffer said that Springsteen, who is currently on the road with the E Street Band, “loved” his scenes.
“He’d seen the show, but a lot of people haven’t worked the way we do, where it’s not all scripted. Lots of things get said. And we kept telling him, ‘We’ll use the best stuff,’ so he could try everything,” Schaffer explained.
“And he played around. He knew the basic beats, but he was in there adding and slugging around. We showed him the scenes because we were so happy with how they turned out.”
HBO aired the final episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm on Sunday.