Why Jerry Seinfeld Thinks Fans Love The Festivus Episode So Much
"The Strike" (Season 9, Episode 10) might go down in history as one of the best "Seinfeld" episodes ever. Kramer (Michael Richards) makes bagels; Jerry (Jerry Seinfeld) dates a two-face; Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) gives out a fake number, and George (Jason Alexander) creates The Human Fund. But the real takeaway of "The Strike" is Festivus — a made-up holiday concocted by Frank Costanza (Jerry Stiller) to fight the commercialization that comes with Christmas.
The episode — which aired in December 1997 (via IMDb) — sparked a new holiday among fans, which many still celebrate over two decades later. Every year, fans flock to the "Seinfeld" subreddit to wish one another a "Happy Festivus," which is usually followed by the comments section flooding with everyone's airing of grievances. There's no way Seinfeld could ever have imagined Festivus would be the beloved tradition that it is today. He addressed this very thing when doing a Reddit AMA with fans and pointed out the specific reason he thinks it's become such a big deal.
Jerry Seinfeld thinks Festivus is so popular because of one signature phrase
In a 2014 Reddit AMA, Jerry Seinfeld answered a fan question about the Festivus episode of "Seinfeld." The Redditor asked Seinfeld if he was surprised at how Festivus had become an actual holiday to people after the episode aired. "I was very surprised by Festivus catching on, but I think people just like the line rhyming Festivus with 'rest of us' is 90% of it. And no presents, and you don't have to buy decorations, it's just an aluminum pole," the comedian wrote.
According to Time, Festivus is celebrated on December 23. The holiday was all too real to "Seinfeld" writer Dan O'Keefe whose father invited the holiday when he was eight years old. O'Keefe also admitted to the Daily Beast that he wasn't too keen on Festivus being portrayed on "Seinfeld," but when his co-workers heard the story and passed it along to Seinfeld himself, his hands were tied. O'Keefe remembered being told Seinfeld thought the story of the made-up holiday was hilarious, and if he didn't want to write the episode script, someone else would. It seems Seinfeld knew he had a winning story on his hands, but he had no idea the fandom was going to adopt Festivus as their own.