Seinfeld Reference: The Complete Encyclopedia (35 page)

Elaine is quite the world traveler.  She visited Tuscany, Italy with Maestro; England, as part of her employment with Mr. Pitt; Burma, seeking J. Peterman's approval on a business expenditure; Mexico, for six weeks; Europe, with David Puddy for one month; Hong Kong; and Kenya with J. Peterman to research the sandals of the Masai Bushmen.  Although fascinated with Greenland, Elaine never visited the country.

Footwear

Elaine had a pair of Botticelli shoes that became the topic of conversation for Jerry's ex-girlfriend, Gail Cunningham.  She told everyone that Elaine buys her shoes at Botticelli's.  Elaine was furious, and confronted Gail at her place of employment, Pfeiffer's restaurant.  Despite loving the shoes, Elaine eventually gave the pair to Gail for information that was essential to save Jerry's television pilot.

Elaine likes huaraches shoes, but refuses to purchase the footwear at Putumayo because of a rude salesperson, Gladys Mayo.  Instead Elaine visited Cinco de Mayo and flaunted her new wardrobe to the Putumayo sales clerk.  Elaine wanted to join forces with Cinco de Mayo to bankrupt Putumayo, but discovered that Gladys owns both stores.

Likes & Dislikes

Elaine dislikes people who do not recycle and refuses to associate with any person or business that opposes the legal right to abortion.  She despises people who use real furs to clothe humans because animals are innocent, defenseless creatures that are tortured for the sake of fashion.  Although Elaine is sensitive to the dolphins dying in the nets, she has been known to eat tuna.

Elaine dislikes using the limousine service at Pendant Publishing because the driver always tries to engage in petty conversations.  In one instance, she pretended to be deaf to avoid a conversation.  Elaine would have loved the stagecoach because the passenger never communicated with the driver.

In addition to being allergic to cats, Elaine has a dog phobia that she developed after being bitten in the left calf by a rottweiler at J & T Optical.  She was taken to the emergency room and received rabies shots.  Elaine is even afraid of Snowball, a puppy so harmless it is described as running on batteries.

Sports.
As a child, Elaine was a terrible baseball player and forced to play first base.  Nevertheless, she enjoys watching and attending professional baseball games, and is an avid Baltimore Orioles fan.  In fact, she skipped a bris to attend a Yankee-Oriole game, claiming that she had to visit her father in a Maryland hospital.  Inevitably, Elaine was physically removed from the Yankee box seats for failing to remove her Oriole cap.  A photograph of the ejection was printed on page two of
The New York Times
Sunday sports section.

Foods.
Elaine believes that restaurants should seat people according to whoever is the hungriest, and not first come, first serve.  Elaine is a vegetarian, but eats fish occasionally.  (However, in other episodes she ate hamburgers, roast beef, steak, and duck.)  Elaine hates health cookies and lima beans, and vitamins make her nauseous.

Elaine loves Chinese food but is unable to use chopsticks.  She craves the chicken cashew dish from Hop Sing's Chinese restaurant but was blacklisted after refusing to pay for a meal she did not order.  In another Chinese restaurant incident, Elaine ordered Supreme Flounder from China Panda, but they would not deliver on the south side of her street.  To solve the problem, she crossed the street to another apartment building and used the janitorial closet as her apartment so she could receive deliveries. 

Beverages.
Elaine's beverage preferences include: coffee, regular and decaf, tea (no sugar, with lemon), chocolate milk, Budweiser beer, Diet Coke, grape juice, Snapple, and peach schnapps.  Jerry told Elaine that she is not supposed to drink schnapps while harboring someone’s personal secrets because too many people know the combination to her vault.

Entertainment.
In the realm of entertainment, Elaine's favorite movie is
Shaft
, and she hates
Ponce de León
and
The English Patient
(it is too long and the sex scenes are lame--she wants sex scenes that are useful).  She rents movies at Champagne Video where her favorite selections are often recommended by Vincent, in the Employee Favorites section.  Elaine admires actors for their incredible skill, and loves Meryl Streep because she is so authentic.  Elaine's favorite television programs include "Melrose Place," "Murphy Brown" (she wrote a script for the show), and "60 Minutes," which is part of her weekly Sunday wind-down.  Elaine's musical preferences consist of Mel Torme, Gordon Lightfoot, The Eagles (especially the song "Witchy Woman"), and the Cup-of-Soup song from
Lion King
("Hakuna Matata").  Artistically, Elaine appreciates ballet and French Impressionist paintings.

Apartment

When Elaine first moved to New York her area code was 718 (and she cried every night).  It eventually changed to 212, but in 1998 it switched to 646 when she changed her telephone number to avoid receiving fax messages.  Fortunately, her neighbor, Mrs. Krantz, died, so Elaine usurped the elderly woman's telephone number to acquire her 212 area code.

In 1990, Elaine began subletting an apartment and became roommates with Tina Robbins, who the following year, sublet the apartment to Audrey.  Tina is a waitress/actress (an Ethel Merman without the talent) who took improv classes and appeared in the dinner theater production of
A Chorus Line
and
Carousel
.  She is obsessive about possessions, and keeps track of everything, including food in the refrigerator.  Tina has Epstein-Barr Syndrome and Lyme disease, which was acquired during an outdoor performance of
Hair
in Danbury, Connecticut.  In 1994 Elaine was evicted for numerous lease violations: buzzing up a jewel thief, then a week later buzzing up Jehovah's witnesses who would not leave the building, and finally, using Canadian quarters in the washing machine.

Elaine has a few memorable neighbors: Rabbi Kirschbaum is notorious for using his cable access program to reveal secrets told in confidence; his nephew (Alex) owns a successful flower store.  Across the hall is Judy, a single-parent mother, and Mr. Potato Guy, who makes the entire floor smell like starch.  Adjacent to Elaine is a neighbor who traveled to Paris and left the alarm set, which awoke Elaine early every morning.  Lastly, across the courtyard is a neighbor with an annoying dog (Roxy) that barks incessantly.  Elaine enlists Newman's assistance to dognap and deposit the mutt somewhere in the countryside halfway between New York City and Monticello, New York.  Unfortunately, Roxy found her way home and Elaine was convicted of dognapping.

As for Elaine's other residences: In 1992 she lived in apartment B on the upper west side, and the following year moved downtown.  In 1994 her apartment was located at 16 West 75th Street, Apt. 2G, and her last known address was 78 West 86th Street, Apt. 3E.  In 1990 Elaine contemplated renting an apartment directly above Jerry's for $400 a month but could not procure the necessary funds to secure the tenancy.

Friends

Elaine and George are friends-in-law because their mutual association is only the result of being friends with Jerry.  Although Elaine resists being alone with George, they have one common bond--laughing at Jerry's idiosyncrasies.  The first time they were alone in a one-on-one situation, they only felt comfortable when making fun of Jerry.  Despite being afraid of Elaine, George became sexually attracted to her after discovering that she left a seductive message on Jerry's tape recorder.  To no surprise, Elaine does not care for George because he is bald, a loser, and an idiot.

Elaine hates dining with married couples because all they do is talk about their married friends and married furniture, and try to prove that their life is so much better.  In response, Elaine fabricated an exciting romance with an ex-bullfighter, Eduardo Carrochio, whom she met in Switzerland.  Her other married friends--Gail, Lisa and Carol--have children and live in Long Island.  Carol and her attorney-husband Michael own a house in East Hampton that was designed by Mark Farbman.  They have two children, and the youngest (Adam) is described by his pediatrician, Ben Pfeffer, as breathtaking.  Michael's father worked as a lobsterman to help pay for his son's law school education.

Linda Van Brack and her husband invited Elaine to dinner, but the evening was disastrous when Elaine attempted to purchase wine and cake for the hosts.  She visited the Royal Bakery for a chocolate babka, but acquaintances, Barbara and David Benedict, whom Elaine met at Linda Van Brack's baby shower, ordered the last chocolate babka for the dinner party.  Elaine was forced to purchase a cinnamon babka, but additional delays occurred when she found a hair on the cake.

Despite only sitting with Myra to watch Stan play softball, Elaine was asked to be a godparent to their son, Steven.  Elaine's most important responsibility was finding a mohel (the person who performs the circumcision) for the ceremonial bris.  After hiring a hypersensitive mohel who circumcised Jerry's finger, Elaine was removed as godparent and replaced by Kramer.

In 1994 Noreen, whose brother had a political cartoon book published, was dating Dan, a high-talker who sounded exactly like Noreen.  When Elaine confused the voices, she accidentally told Dan that Noreen was flirting with Jerry Seinfeld.  After an argument, Noreen began dating Paul, a long-talker, who engaged in ten minutes of idle chit-chat every time he answered the telephone.  Elaine began hanging up when he answered, so naturally Paul became suspicious that Noreen was having an affair, which caused their breakup.  Elaine has a tremendous influence over Noreen.  In the past, she encouraged Noreen to join the army, and then go AWOL, as well as influencing her decision to break up with Dan and Paul.  However, when Noreen began dating Kramer, he forbade her to communicate with Elaine, and encouraged Noreen to reenlist in the army to receive the much-needed structure and discipline in her life.

Figure 11 Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) at the health club.

Sue Ellen Mischke, heiress to the O'Henry candy bar fortune, was Elaine's childhood friend; however, they became rivals in high school when Sue Ellen began stealing Elaine's boyfriends.  Elaine's high school boyfriend, Tom Cosley, was lured into the arms of Sue Ellen by her braless floozy outfit.  Sue Ellen moved to New York in 1995, and continued to have the distinction of never wearing a bra.  Elaine was obsessed with Sue Ellen's nonchalance--she is Elaine's Lex Luthor--so as a birthday prank, Elaine gave her a bra.  Sue Ellen converted it into a fashion statement by wearing the bra as a blouse.

In 1997 Sue Ellen became engaged to marry Elaine's former lover, Peter "Pinter" Ranawat.  When Elaine received an invitation one week before the wedding, she thought Sue Ellen did not want her to attend.  Out of spite, Elaine traveled to India and was asked to be Sue Ellen's maid of honor and best friend (even though they hate each other).  When Sue Ellen discovered that Elaine previously slept with Pinter, she canceled the wedding, and ripped out Elaine's nose ring.

Wendy, the delicate genius, is a physical therapist at Profitness Physical Therapy Center.  She charges $75 per appointment, and requires 24-hour advance notice for cancellations.  Wendy has an unflattering, old-fashioned hairdo--she looks like she just walked off the pages of an old high school yearbook.  She is also remembered for giving Jerry a “kiss hello” greeting every time they met.

College friend Leslie is married to Todd, who boasts familial ties to the Kennedy family as a third cousin by marriage.  He also blames the Chappaquiddick incident on bad directions.  They live in an apartment on Riverside Drive where Bernard Goetz' mother used to live.  Leslie was a performing artist before her pregnancy.  On March 20, 1991 at 9:00 a.m., she had a C-section scheduled because her therapist indicated that labor may cause psychotic behavior.  Elaine organized the baby shower because she is always looking for Leslie's approval.

Gillian writes for
L.L. Bean
catalogue, and is best remembered for having man hands.  Her favorite president is James Polk, and she had a serious boyfriend from 1992-95.

Vivian does not think Elaine is responsible enough to care for her son Jimmy; however, Elaine believes she could raise a child because she loves bossing people around.  Elaine was especially miffed when Vivian considered Kramer to be more trustworthy of responsible.  Elaine insisted upon being the chosen one, but soon regretted her quest for motherhood when Vivian was diagnosed with a potentially serious health problem.

Despite mentioning numerous female friends, Elaine claims she does not have any female friends.  The following is a list of her known female friends and their association to Elaine: Robin Sandusky married an insanely jealous man, Michael, and had an affair with George Costanza; Katy has arrhythmia, is friends with Marisa Tomei, and married a doctor (eye, ear, nose and throat specialist); Kim notified Elaine that Beth and David Lookner legally separated; Alyse loaned her car to Elaine for the weekend; Elaine attended Pamela's birthday party; Jeanette introduced Elaine to a man in the building who eventually stopped saying "hello;" Roxanne has an apartment on First Avenue with a perfect view of the New York City marathon; a friend in Chicago sells mannequins; Dana Foley is a therapist; Elaine was the best man at an unknown friend's lesbian wedding; Jill's father was hospitalized and Elaine made a health inquiry using a cellular phone; and finally, Joanne, Renee, and Winona (who is sensitive about her Native American nationality) are poker-playing friends.