The best episodes of “Seinfeld” are woven into the very fabric of pop culture, and the sitcom as a whole is widely regarded as one of the best TV shows of all time. Meanwhile, Danny DeVito is one of the greatest comic actors out there and has established himself as an integral part of another badly behaving sitcom gang as Frank Reynolds of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” fame. However, if things had gone a little differently, DeVito might very well have been a member of TV’s original men-and-a-woman-behaving-badly crew.
Yes, Danny DeVito was once in the discussion to play a starring role on “Seinfeld” — and yes, said role is the one you probably suspect. Jason Alexander, who plays George Costanza on the show and absolutely owns the character, once told Howard Stern (via E! Online) that DeVito was a serious contender for the part. According to Alexander, Chris Rock was also considered to play George before the role went to the man who made it famous. As the actor recalls the story, DeVito turned down the role, one that could have changed his career trajectory.
“I think in the case of Danny he probably didn’t want to be — his career, when we started ‘Seinfeld,’ would’ve been at its apex, so he probably didn’t want to do a sidekick role,” said Alexander. “Why Chris wouldn’t do it? I don’t know, maybe it didn’t get to an offer stage. I don’t know.”
Even without the George Costanza role, Danny DeVito is a sitcom legend
While it would have been interesting to see Danny DeVito’s take on the petty and insecure George Costanza, this might be a rare case of a project actually being better without DeVito than it would have been with him. This is because not only does Jason Alexander do just about the best imaginable job playing George, but DeVito indeed really didn’t need the role.
DeVito was, after all, already a member of sitcom royalty well before “Seinfeld” (let alone the twisted tales of “Always Sunny”) came about. From 1978 to 1983, he was part of the cast of the notorious ABC (later NBC) sitcom “Taxi,” where he played the thoroughly amoral Sunshine Cab Company supervisor, Louie De Palma. Pretty much immediately after the show ended, DeVito started getting roles in a long string of movies that further elevated his status, and, as Alexander noted in the podcast appearance, said string was arguably at its zenith around the time “Seinfeld” premiered in 1989.
Had DeVito — who had just starred in “Twins” (1988) with Arnold Schwarzenegger at the time — agreed to the “Seinfeld” role, he might not have found the time to appear in films like “The War of the Roses” (1989) or “Batman Returns” (1992), to name just a couple of projects. Knowing this, it’s pretty easy to conclude that both Alexander and DeVito managed to come out on top in the great George Costanza casting game.