Elaine Benes
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Elaine Marie Benes | |
|---|---|
 |
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| First appearance | The Stakeout |
| Last appearance | The Finale, Part II |
| Statistics | |
| Gender | Female |
| Age | 30s |
| Family | Alton Benes (father) Brother Grandma Mimma (grandmother) |
| Relatives | Cousin Holly |
| Portrayed by | Julia Louis-Dreyfus |
| Created by | Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David. Based on comedian Carol Leifer and Monica Yates; Jerry and Larry's ex-girlfriends respectively. |
Elaine Marie Benes is a fictional character on the American television sitcom Seinfeld (1989–1998), played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Elaine remains close with her ex-boyfriend Jerry and is also friends with George Costanza and Cosmo Kramer.
Unlike her three close friends, Elaine was missing from the pilot episode (episode one). She first appeared in the second episode, "The Stakeout." NBC executives felt the show was too male-centric, and demanded that creators Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David add a woman to the cast as a condition for renewing the show.[citation needed]
Elaine is supposedly a composite based on comedian Carol Leifer, Seinfeld's real-life ex-girlfriend, and Monica Yates, Larry David's real-life ex-girlfriend.
Contents |
[edit] Character
Elaine is mostly a victim of fate. She may get caught up in the machinations of the other characters, or come into conflict with inadequate boyfriends or the arbitrary requirements of her eccentric employers. Many episodes end with Elaine ruining something for someone, such as Jerry's sitcom or the Soup Nazi's business.
[edit] Family
Unlike the families of Jerry and George, Elaine's relatives never had large parts on the show. Her father, gruff author Alton Benes (a character based on the novelist Richard Yates and played by Lawrence Tierney), was featured in the episode "The Jacket" and a cousin, Holly, was featured in "The Wink." In "The Wink," reference is made to Elaine's Grandma Mimma, from whom Holly inherited a fancy set of napkins.
"The Jacket" also revealed that Elaine has a sister in St. Louis (later called Gail in "The Pick"). In the same episode, Elaine's father asks how her mother is, suggesting her parents are divorced. She elaborates on this in "The Wait Out" when she reveals to David Lookner that her father left her and the rest of her family when she was nine years old. In "The Secret Code," she reveals that she has an uncle who worked in the Texas School Book Depository with Lee Harvey Oswald. In "The Pick," Elaine mentions she has a nephew. She also makes reference to a brother-in-law in "The Phone Message," although it is unclear if this brother-in-law is married to the aforementioned Gail or another sister.
Although in "The Jacket" her father asks how Elaine's mother is doing, in Season 7, Episode 11 ("The Gum"), she mentions that a one-of-a-kind button she has lost was her mother's. This implies that her mother died sometime between Season 2 and Season 7, although it is not mentioned in the series.
[edit] Background and education
Unlike the other characters, she was not a native of New York, having grown up in the upscale Baltimore suburb of Towson, Maryland. In "The Letter," she revealed herself to be a Baltimore Orioles fan, causing a disruption when she wore an Orioles cap while seated in the owner's box at a New York Yankees game. Elaine has an IQ of 151 and completed her undergraduate education at Tufts University. For comparison, Jerry and George attended Queens College, and Kramer's highest level of education was revealed to be a "high school equivalency" in "The Barber."
[edit] Employment
Elaine was one of the few characters who worked steady jobs throughout the show's entire run, mostly as a writer or editor.
- During the first five seasons, she worked at Pendant Publishing with her boss Mr. Lippman, where she served as a copy editor before losing her job at the end of the fifth season when the company went bankrupt, and a merger that would have saved the company was thwarted by a misunderstanding stemming from her own bumbling ("The Opposite").
- She then became a personal assistant to the eccentric and demanding Justin Pitt, starting in "The Chaperone", but later got fired when Mr. Pitt thought she and Jerry were conspiring to kill him. Her duties for Mr. Pitt included some of the most mundane and menial tasks, such as buying socks for him, or as featured in "The Mom & Pop Store", taking all of the salt off of his pretzels.
- She then met J. Peterman on the street ("The Understudy") and became an editor at his J. Peterman Catalog, where she would remain employed for the rest of the show's run. Starting in "The Foundation," she took charge of the catalog when Peterman suffered a nervous breakdown in Burma. But after a spending spree on the company account (she bought George an $8000 sable hat in "The Chicken Roaster"), she was later demoted back to her former position upon Peterman's return. She was also fired twice by Peterman: first when her penchant for poppy seed muffins led her to fail a drug test in "The Shower Head" and then in "The English Patient" when she expressed her hatred for the movie The English Patient (although by agreeing to temporarily live in a remote cave in the desert she was able to recover her job).
[edit] Romantic relationships
Elaine had a string of boyfriends, most appearing for only an episode or two. Like Jerry, Elaine's relationships usually ended over shallow, superficial reasons.
[edit] Jerry
- Elaine and Jerry had once dated (before the show began), and usually mention that things didn't work out. However, they twice slept together after breaking up: In season 2's "The Deal", they create a set of rules whereby they can sleep together but remain only friends. Their theory is ruined however when they starting squabbling too much (Elaine is furious when Jerry gives her $182 as a birthday gift). Then, in season 5's "The Mango", Jerry is so upset at learning that Elaine had faked her orgasms while they were together, that she agrees to give him another chance "to save the friendship".
- Elaine and Jerry still have feelings for each other and this occasionally comes up. In season 3's "The Tape", Elaine leaves a dirty message on Jerry's check tape which reignites Jerry's passion for Elaine (along with George and Kramer). In season 5's "The Raincoats, Part 1," when Jerry has a rare window of opportunity to have sex while his parents are away, but cannot contact his girlfriend Rachel, Elaine flirtaciously verbalizes her wish to help him out with his problem. In season 7's "The Cadillac, Part 1," Elaine realizes that Jerry has a lot of money and suddenly her love for him returns. In season 9's "The Serenity Now," an emotionally gushy Jerry expresses his true feelings for Elaine and asks her to marry him. Shocked, she makes an excuse and leaves. She returns later to accept his proposal but Jerry is "back to normal" and says "I don't see it happening." In "The Finale", when they think their plane is about to crash, Elaine says "Jerry, I gotta tell you something...I've always loved-" (but before she can finish, the plane steadies itself).
[edit] David Puddy
- Elaine's longest relationship was with David Puddy (Patrick Warburton), a somewhat slow-witted auto mechanic turned car salesman whom she dated starting in season six. Among Puddy's favorites things were eating at Arby's, giving "High Fives", and supporting the New Jersey Devils (sometimes with face and body paint). Elaine and Puddy were known to break-up and make-up repeatedly during their relationship and sometimes even during the course of one episode. For example in "The Butter Shave", they repeatedly split up and make up during the course of their plane trip back from Norway.
[edit] Men Entranced by Elaine
- Newman has a long-running crush on Elaine over the course of the series.
- In "The Tape", George, Jerry, and Kramer become attracted to Elaine after hearing a joke erotic message that she recorded on a tape on which Jerry was recording one of his live shows.
- In "The Serenity Now", Elaine attracts the romantic attentions of both Mr. Lippman and his 13-year old son. George tells her she has shiksappeal, the attraction Gentile women have over Jewish men ("Jewish men love the idea of meeting a woman that's not like their mother").
- In "The Cigar Store Indian", Elaine becomes the obssession of a nerd she meets on the subway, who shows up at the Costanzas' home with a paper bouquet for her which he made out of Frank Costanza's copy of TV Guide (which Elaine had accidentally left with the nerd). In "The Pie", it is revealed the nerd designed a mannequin in Elaine's likeness.
- In "The Big Salad", an office supply store clerk who has become obssessed with Elaine constantly calls Jerry about a pencil order she placed for Mr. Pitt.
- In "The Contest", John F. Kennedy Jr., who works out at the same gym as Elaine, lets her know through the countergirl, that he would like to meet her.
[edit] Some of Elaine's other notable boyfriends
- She dates baseball player (and Kramer and Newman's nemesis) Keith Hernandez in "The Boyfriend, Part 1" and "The Boyfriend, Part 2".
- Over several episodes in season 4, she dates "Crazy" Joe Davola, who is simultaneously stalking Jerry, unbeknownst to her until "The Opera".
- In "The Masseuse", she dates a man named Joel Rifkin, who shares the same name as a notorious serial killer.
- She dates NBC president Russell Dalrymple in "The Pitch". He wants to impress her so much that he joins Greenpeace on an ocean mission.
- In "The Bizarro Jerry", she dates Kevin, the nice, kind antithesis of Jerry whose friends Gene, Feldman and Vargus are polar opposites of George, Kramer and Newman, respectively, each described as coming from the backwards Bizarro World of Superman comics.
- In "The Stall", her good-looking but unintelligent boyfriend Tony, dubbed a male bimbo or "mimbo" by Jerry, becomes George's new idol.
- In "The Wallet" she dates her psychiatrist, Dr. Reston, who has such control over her she calls him her Svengali (but mispronounces it "Svenjolly").
- In "The Checks", her boyfriend Brett is so obsessed with the song "Desperado" that she feels ignored whenever the song comes on. She tries to find a song that they can share and comes up with "Witchy Woman", but it doesn't work.
- During a restaurant dinner with a married couple in "The Good Samaritan", Elaine makes up an elaborate story that she once dated a romantic matador from Spain named "Eduardo Corrochio", making his name up hesitantly on the spot. (Trivia: In reality, there is a famous person by the name of "Eduardo Corrochio"; he was a Spanish tap dancer in the late 1800s.)
- In "The Wizard", Elaine isn't sure if her boyfriend is African-American or not and gets mixed signals when she tries to find out.
[edit] Enemies/Foes
Elaine's quick temper has made her several enemies and gotten her into several confrontations over the years:
- She has a long-running hatred and inferiority complex for former schoolmate and candy-bar heiress Sue Ellen Mischke (who, Elaine reveals, had once stolen her boyfriend). Sue Ellen appears in four episodes: In "The Caddy", she struts down the street wearing a bra as a top, causing Kramer to crash his car and Elaine to invent the nickname "The Braless Wonder"; In "The Bottle Deposit", Elaine spends $20,000 on golf clubs for Mr. Peterman when she is caught in a vicious bidding war with Sue Ellen at an auction; In "The Abstinence", Elaine boasts to Sue Ellen about dating a doctor but then is made to look foolish when her doctor boyfriend proves himself completely useless during an emergency at the coffee shop; Finally, in "The Betrayal", Elaine is so angry at receiving an "Unvitation" (a super-last-minute invitation) to Sue Ellen's wedding, that she travels all the way to India just to show up.
- Her abortion argument with restauranteur Poppie gets him so angry that he loses control of his bladder in "The Couch" and again in "The Doorman".
- Elaine has come into conflict with Frank Costanza on a couple of occasions. In The Cigar Store Indian, she angers him first by taking his TV Guide without asking and then by spilling her gyro on it. Then, in The Little Kicks, she and Frank come to blows after George is arrested along with Elaine's co-worker Anna (Elaine: "I could drop you like a bag of dirt!" Frank: "You wanna piece of me? You got it!") It is suggested shortly afterward that Elaine soundly defeated Frank when she says, "He wrote the check, I cashed it."
- In "The Summer of George", Elaine makes enemies out of both her co-worker Sam (Molly Shannon) and Raquel Welch. First, when Elaine criticizes Sam's way of walking ("It's like she's carrying invisible suitcases"), Sam gets furious and threatens revenge. Then, Raquel Welch (who was recently fired from a musical for dancing without swinging her arms), sees Elaine describing the walk to the police and thinks that Elaine is making fun of her and attacks her. Both events end up arousing Jerry, Kramer, George and even the police, because as Jerry tells Elaine, men love "catfights".
- In "The Understudy", after she thinks her Korean manicurists are making fun of her, she angers them by bringing in Frank Costanza to eavesdrop on them.
- In "The Fire", Elaine hates her energetic and always-happy colleague Toby. Things turn worse for Elaine when Toby loses her pinky toe in an accident (caused by Jerry) and an outpouring of office sympathy leads Toby to a major promotion instead of the more-qualified Elaine.
- In "The Visa" she and Jerry anger Pakistani immigrant Babu after she fails to notice Babu's visa application among Jerry's mail that she is picking up for him.
- In "The Engagement", she is so incensed by a neighbour's barking dog that she hires Newman and Kramer to kidnap it.
- In "The Merv Griffin Show", Elaine is annoyed by her co-worker Lou who constantly "sidles" up behind her. But when she gives him a pack of Tic-Tacs so that she can always hear him coming, the sound drives Peterman crazy ("It reminds me of the Haitian Voodoo Rattle Torture!").
- In "The Friars Club", Elaine is positive that her co-worker Bob (Rob Schneider) is faking being deaf to get out of doing any work. But when she tries to test out his deafness by pretending to flirt with him, Peterman overhears, thinks it is real and sets them up on a date.
- Elaine has had run-ins with her co-worker Peggy on a couple of occasions. In "The Susie", Peggy tells Elaine, who she thinks is a woman named Susie, that Elaine Benes is a "dolt" and a "disaster". Later, in "The Apology", Peggy thinks Elaine has germs, and in retaliation Elaine deliberately coughs on Peggy's doorknob, rubs her stapler in her armpit and rubs her keyboard on her rear end.
[edit] Insecurities
- In The Andrea Doria, Elaine dates a "bad-breaker-upper" who makes her feel insecure about having a big head ("I'm a walking candy apple!").
- In The Burning, Elaine's boyfriend David Puddy makes her panic and feel guilty about going to hell because she's not as religious as he is ("David, I'm going to hell! The worst place in the world! With devils and those caves and the ragged clothing!"). Though actually Elaine wasn't upset about going to hell, she was upset because she thought that if Puddy loved her and if Puddy thought she was going to hell, then Puddy should be trying to save her.
- In The Smelly Car, Elaine's boyfriend is repulsed by her when her hair stinks of B.O. from riding in Jerry's car. She goes to extreme lengths to get the smell out ("I shampoo'ed! I rinsed! I repeated!") but nothing works, and he continues to be grossed out.
[edit] Influence/Effect on Others
Elaine has at times been able to exert a strong influence over the decisions of others, leading to predictably chaotic results. For example:
- In "The Chinese Woman", Jerry describes how Elaine has had a destructive effect on her relationship with her friend Noreen. It is revealed that over the course of their friendship, Elaine has convinced Noreen to: Join the army; go AWOL from the army; dump her "high talker" boyfriend; and dump her "long talker" boyfriend. Eventually, Kramer steps in and forbids Elaine to have any more contact with Noreen.
- In "The Muffin Tops", Elaine convinces her former boss Mr. Lippman to start his own business selling just "muffin tops". However, they soon run into problems when nobody will take the leftover stumps, and only by calling in "The Cleaner"(who turns out to be Newman) can they get rid of them.
[edit] Pet peeves
- In an early episode, Elaine expresses disdain with the world's interest in the Kennedy family, but in Season Four's "The Contest", Elaine crosses paths with John F. Kennedy, Jr. at her gym and becomes so infatuated with him (and the fantasy of becoming the next Mrs. Kennedy) that she loses her self-control as well as the contest. Elaine is crushed to learn JFK Jr. is dating Jerry's ex, Marla "the virgin" (Jane Leeves).
- Elaine does not hesitate voicing her strong positions on certain political issues. For example, in "The Couch," she broke up with her boyfriend after finding out that he was anti-abortion.
- In "The Stranded," she engages George's girlfriend in a heated argument regarding a fur coat. Although she presented a similar stand in other episodes, she also said "Anti-fur: I mean, who has the energy anymore?" in "The Reverse Peephole".).
- In The Puerto Rican Day, She was angry at: the sight of a dog with its ears flipped inside out; repeatedly at her slow moving taxicab (which invariably speeds up every time she gets off the cab to walk); the thought of missing her "sunday weekend wind down" (which includes "60 Minutes"); and being trapped under a set of bleachers while desperately trying to find her way out of streets blocked off for the parade.
- In The Boyfriend, Part 1 and 2, Elaine reveals her disgust for smokers, which helped lead to a break up with Keith Hernandez.
[edit] Physicality
- Elaine's signature move is expressing incredulity by frontally shoving people while yelling "Get out!". It sometimes causes the person to fall down or trip.
- She is also a notoriously poor dancer, as evidenced in the episode "The Little Kicks", in which she dances at a J. Peterman company party. George described her dancing as "a full-bodied dry heave set to music."
- She tested positive for opium after eating poppy seeds in the episode "The Shower Head".
[edit] Nicknames
- Jerry sometimes called her "Lanie".
- In "The Susie," she develops an alter-ego named Susie after being called that by a coworker.
- In "The Pick", Elaine is nicknamed "Nip" by her colleagues after her Christmas card picture, taken by Kramer, accidentally reveals one of her nipples.
- In "The Ex-Girlfriend", Jerry dubs Elaine "The Queen of Confrontation".
[edit] Notes
- Elaine was missing from "The Pilot", "The Trip, Part 1" and "The Trip, Part 2", (and had minimal roles in "The Pitch" and "The Ticket" due to maternity leave) making her the most absent of the four main characters.
[edit] External links
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
- Seinfeld at the Internet Movie Database
- Elaine on Seinfeldonline.com- Unofficial fan website.
| Seinfeld |
|---|
| Characters |
| Main Characters: Jerry Seinfeld | George Costanza | Elaine Benes | Cosmo Kramer |
| Related to Jerry: Helen Seinfeld | Morty Seinfeld | Uncle Leo | Kenny Bania | Sally Weaver | Dr. Tim Whatley |
| Related to George: Estelle Costanza | Frank Costanza | Susan Ross | Mr. Wilhelm | Mr. Kruger | Lloyd Braun | George Steinbrenner |
| Related to Elaine: J. Peterman | David Puddy | Mr. Lippman | Justin Pitt | Sue Ellen Mischke |
| Related to Kramer: Newman | Mickey Abbott | Jackie Chiles | Bob Sacamento | Babs Kramer | Lomez | Franklin Delano Romanowski |
| Other: Soup Nazi | "Crazy" Joe Davola | Minor characters in Seinfeld |
| Culture of the Seinfeld Universe |
| Festivus | Master of Your Domain | Regifting List of fictional films in Seinfeld | Coffee Table Book About Coffee Tables |
| Episodes |
| List of Seinfeld episodes | The Seinfeld Chronicles |
| Other |
| List of Seinfeld references to actual people | Running gags in Seinfeld |
