HELEN FREEZES OVER
Hey, Jerry.
Hey, George.
So I heard the news.
Yeah.
Your mother, and my mother, both dead in two weeks. Whoda thunk it?
Life works in strange ways, George. *pause* You know, the last thing she said on her deathbed was “I’m coming, James”…
Who’s this James? *pause* You think it was anyone famous like when I dated Marisa Tomei?
Eh, probably not.
Yep, the Seinfeld gang is all orphaned now with Liz Sheridan, who portrayed Jerry’s adoring mother Helen, quickly joining Estelle Harris shortly after her 93rd birthday. Her career began as a nightclub dancer, typically working in the Caribbean, and she was the squeeze of James Dean for a year before his Hollywood trajectory put the kibosh on it. After numerous minor roles in the 80s, she gained her first recurring role as eavesdropping neighbour Raquel Ochmonek in ALF, who was among the recurring threats to the titular cat-munching alien’s safety.
On Seinfeld, Helen Seinfeld was a voice of reason by Seinfeld standards whose own overbearing, rose-tinted attitude towards Jerry prevented her from actually succeeding. Sheridan was the only non-main cast member to appear in all nine seasons, which also meant she had the misfortune to appear in the first season. The show found its mojo soon thereafter, and together with Barney Martin’s irritable Morty, the Seinfeld parents created a memorable recurring presence through both their visits to Jerry in New York and their own escapades in their Florida retirement communities.
Although the more outrageous Costanzas were the better of the Seinfeld parents, the Seinfelds’ own storylines proved good entertainment, and Sheridan did her part ably in making the doting nature of her character work with the show’s eccentric world. Her own moments of note include deploying Jerry’s trademark “Hello, Newman” groan when greeting her son’s nemesis, and being hurriedly begged by Elaine to provide a urine sample as the latter needs to pass a drug test that poppy seeds keep hampering.
A highlight Seinfeld parents-centric story sees Morty, president of his retirement community, undergo an impeachment trial after nemesis Jack Klompus alleges embezzlement regarding a new Cadillac actually gifted by Jerry. After the impeachment succeeds thanks to one of the board members (played by vintage “how the fuck did they not QO” Frances Bay, fact fans) remembering a negative encounter with Jerry from an earlier episode, the three Seinfelds dramatically ride away in their Cadillac. Now that Sheridan is riding another Cadillac into the great beyond, Death Is International and and I Couldn’t Eat Another Bite benefit. Let’s just hope James Dean isn’t her angel chauffeur!
Liz Sheridan
10 April 1929 – 15 April 2022, aged 93
2 TEAMS (💀💀💀💀💀 5 POINTS)