Episode Commentary: 7.1: Funkhouser’s Crazy Sister

Larry David’s hysterical sitcom “Curb Your Enthusiasm” returns for a seventh season with the episode “Funkhouser’s Crazy Sister,” which is a smart, witty return into David’s dark sense of humor. What has made the show a joy to watch over the past six seasons is the fact that it focuses on the mundane subject matter everyone faces day-to-day, but that fodder is the springboard for David’s acerbic humor. He is not happy just accepting the norms of society, and is constantly annoying his friends, neighbors and family by saying what we all wish we could.

“Funkhouser’s Crazy Sister” starts off with a new problem for David, one that many might not find funny but is a great way to push the envelope. Loretta Black (Vivica A. Fox, “Kill Bill”) was his new girlfriend after Cheryl left him, and it seems that she may now have cancer. However, David wants to break off the relationship before the official test results come in, because you can’t dump a woman who has cancer.

That situation leads to another problem for him when the visiting doctor happens to help himself to a lemonade from David’s refrigerator. At a time when your girlfriend may have cancer, this might be overlooked by a normal person, but anybody that ever watched one episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” knows that an argument will ensue.

These are enough problems for any average person, but there is more involving the concept of an empty statement. People often freely throw around the term, “If there is anything I can do…” without really meaning it. When David says this to his friend Marty Funkhouser (Bob Einstein), he actually takes him up on the statement, asking him to visit with his mentally unstable sister to cheer her up. David tries to explain it is an empty gesture, which leads to yet another argument for our antisocial hero.

The sister, Bam Bam Funkhouser, is excellently played by SCTV alumni Catherine O’Hara (“After Hours” “Home Alone”), who is always a welcomed treat to any show. She is a vastly talented comedian that goes all out in this episode, providing one uniquely funny performance. David drags his pal Jeff Greene (Jeff Garlin) to come with him to hang out with Bam Bam, while David does something hypocritical to a previous argument in this episode.

Greene asks Bam Bam if there is anything he can do while David is in the “bathroom,” and that leads to something that is shockingly off-the-wall and very funny, which leads up to a dinner-party explosion. (That dinner party also creates a few new arguments for David.)

Also in this half-hour, David runs into his ex-wife Cheryl (Cheryl Hines), which proves this show knows how to pack a large amount of humor into a small time frame.

Will David be able to break things off before the cancer diagnosis comes in, and exactly how awful is the thing that Greene did are just two small reasons to watch this season-seven opener. With a promising start, one can only imagine where this season is headed and how dark the humor will get, but one thing you will know for sure is that Sunday nights will be a treat.

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