The Invitations

Infobox Television episode
Title = The Invitations
Series = Seinfeld


Caption = Susan licking the toxic envelopes.
Season = 7
Episode = 134
Airdate = May 16, 1996
Production = 724
Writer = Larry David
Director = Andy Ackerman
Guests = Janeane Garofalo & Stephen Root
Episode list = List of "Seinfeld" episodes
Season list = Infobox Seinfeld season 7 episode list
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"The Invitations" is the 24th and final episode of the seventh season of "Seinfeld" and the 134th overall episode. It originally aired on May 16, 1996. It is notable as being the last episode written by co-creator Larry David before he left the series at the end of this season. He did return, however, to write the series finale in 1998. This episode was directed by Andy Ackerman.

Plot

George and Susan go shopping for wedding invitations and George decides to buy a cheap brand. Meanwhile, Kramer tells Jerry that the bank will offer anyone $100 if they are not greeted with a "hello" by a teller when they enter the building. Jerry and Elaine realize that once George gets married, it will just be them and Kramer. However, Elaine tells Jerry that she's tired of being single and will probably leave "the group" after George gets married. As Jerry imagines a life with just him and Kramer, he is nearly hit by a car, but is saved by Jeannie Steinman (Janeane Garofalo), a woman who he discovers to be a lot like him. They both eat a lot of cereal, even at restaurants, have the same initials J.S., and enjoy reading Superman and Supergirl comic books.

Elaine wants to have a part in George's wedding, but Susan says no. Kramer, who was going to be an usher, is also told no after he calls Susan "Lily" when he bumps into her and George walking in the street. George can't believe he is actually going to go through with the wedding and desperately wants to find a way out of it without confronting Susan. Elaine suggests he try smoking in front of her, since she hates it. However, it doesn't work when George gets sick from the cigarettes. Kramer suggests a prenuptial agreement, but when George tries this, Susan laughs it off because she is wealthy and he is not. George realizes he is stuck.

Kramer goes to the bank and wants $100 after the teller says "Hey" instead of "Hello." He and the manager (Stephen Root) settle for $20 since he got a greeting that started with an "H". Jerry proposes to Jeannie and she accepts. He tells George that they are getting married on September 21 and that he kept his side of the pact that they originally made in the Season 7 opener, "The Engagement." Kramer, who originally didn't like Jeannie because she was too much like Jerry, has a change of heart and congratulates him, telling him he'll get to like her. Jerry starts having doubts, eventually telling Kramer "I can't marry someone who's just like me. I hate myself!".

George goes out as Susan stays home to get the invitations ready. As she is licking the envelopes, she notices they taste funny. The episode later cuts to a more worn-out Susan continuing to lick envelopes and finally passing out. George arrives home and finds her collapsed on the couch. He, Kramer, Jerry and Elaine all meet up at the hospital, where George is told by the doctor that Susan has died. The cause: toxic glue, as the doctor puts it, commonly found on cheap envelopes. He tells his friends, and they accept it and go to the coffee shop. Jerry, however, is now in George's role as the fiance who made the mistake of proposing before thinking. Now single again, George tries once more to start a relationship with Marisa Tomei, who is no longer interested after George says his weekend is wide open hours after Susan's funeral.

Reaction

There was a very mixed reception to the episode's ending -- it generated many letters to publications such as TV Guide as to the tastelessness of Susan's demise, and the characters' hollow reactions. "Seinfeld" mocked the backlash in the first scenes of the following season, where Jerry and George visit Susan's grave. The two only show any emotion when they start remembering the death of Spock in "".

Heidi Swedberg, who played Susan, has stated she enjoyed the fact her character was killed off and had no problem with it, adding in an interview with "Entertainment Weekly" that fans of the show liked that the main characters were not nice people who "express the things the rest of us think but don't want to admit". Fans expressed frustration and resentment to her when she was recognized on the street for months after the episode's broadcast. Similarly, Jason Alexander claims that the George fanbase has only ever turned on him in anger twice, one being because of the suggestion that George murdered Susan. The other was the instance of George eating an éclair out of a trash-can. ["Seinfeld: Volume 6 - The Complete 7th Season". Inside Look. "The Invitations"]

In retrospect, Larry David has commented that he "cannot believe" that he killed Susan in such a tasteless manner.

Trivia

* Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, long portrayed on "Seinfeld" by the voice of Larry David, filmed scenes for a guest appearance in this episode, but none of the footage made it to air. It was theorized that this was because Steinbrenner disapproved of the morbid plot twist in which Susan is killed; Steinbrenner has publicly stated his objections to the story several times. On the Roundtable disc in the Seinfeld full DVD set, Larry David says that he had to cut out the scenes because Steinbrenner wanted the scenes cut because he had thought that the character George (Costanza) had been named and modeled after him, to which Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld have said is not true. However, the Season Seven DVD release indicates that the scenes were cut simply for time. Although director Andy Ackerman indicated that he personally felt that it was a mistake to cast the real George Steinbrenner as the often used method of a look alike actor with Larry David's voice could no longer be used. Steinbrenner's scenes involved him taking Elaine out to dinner in anticipation of escorting her to George's wedding.
* Jerry and Jeannie mention that they are scheduled to be married on September 21. That would have occurred on September 21, 1996, exactly a year after the seventh season began and George proposed to Susan.
* The bank manager is played by Stephen Root, who was starring in "NewsRadio" (which also aired on NBC) during this time.
* George does not smoke American Spirits.
* This episode was temporarily pulled from syndication in the wake of the 2001 anthrax attacks in the United States. The episode returned to syndication in the summer of 2002.
* This is the last episode to feature Larry David as executive producer. He later returned to write the two part finale and continued to voice the character of George Steinbrenner for the remainder of the series.
*When Susan asks who she should invite to the wedding, she mentions "The Drake" who was seen in Season 4's "The Handicap Spot".

uperman reference

* During the montage, Jerry reads a Superman comic book while Jeannie reads a Supergirl comic book.

Reference List