All about nothing

In one of the longest and most extensively publicised good-byes in television history, the final Seinfeld show was broadcast to an audience ...

In one of the longest and most extensively publicised good-byes in television history, the final Seinfeld show was broadcast to an audience estimated at up to 80 million people. The 75-minute show, whose plot was cloaked in secrecy during the preceding weeks of tidal-wave media coverage, ended the ninth Seinfeld season at the peak of the show8217;s popularity.

The passing of the sitcom that is famously about nothing became a national obsession, as Jerry, Elaine, George and Kramer beamed from newspapers, magazine covers and television newsmagazines that made the quartet of self-obsessed Manhattanites their top story.

Several hundred people gathered in Times Square in New York 8212; the city in which Seinfeld is set although it is shot in Los Angeles 8212; to watch the final episode on the giant screen, reading closed-captioned dialogue at the end of the screen.

8220;I8217;m in from Chicago strictly to be here to watch the show. There is nowhere else that I8217;d rather be,8221; said Mark Haworth, 33, agreeting card sales manager. 8220;I8217;m gonna cry with the end of the Seinfeld episode,8221; said another fan.

Internet chat rooms buzzed all day with exchanges about Seinfeld, led by Seinfeld.com, the show8217;s official site, which offered a Seinfeld trivia contest.A site run by NBC, which broadcasts the show, was titled Countdown to Nothing and featured a bulletin board for fans to post comments and America Online8217;s Seinfeld chatroom posted comments throughout the day.

The quintessential 8217;90s show, whose philosophy was summed up by creators Jerry Seinfeld, a former stand-up comedian, and Larry David as 8220;no hugging, no learning8221;, went out at the top of its ratings, one of only three US sitcoms to do so. Advertising rates for the final episode, soared to a record 1.7 million for a 30-second spot, and NBC is expected to rake in 40 million from the finale.

The final episode was prefaced by a 45-minute retrospective, introduced by Seinfeld, of clips from scenes thatSeinfeld devotees would remember instantly: George trying to break up with his fiancee, Kramer8217;s Mach 4 air conditioning system, Jerry8217;s consultation with priest in the confessional, Elaine8217;s frightening dancing style. The retrospective also reminded viewers of the show8217;s funny, unsentimental and politically incorrect treatment of the decade8217;s issues 8212; relationships, jobs, parents 8212; and treated them to outtakes in which performers were too convulsed by laughter to carry on.

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The last Seinfeld was never expected to match the ratings of the champion of good-bye episodes, MASH which pulled in a record of 106 million viewers when the finale aired in 1983. But the show8217;s impact has been apparent for years, as fans quote Seinfeld references 8212; the soup Nazi, the Urban Sombrero, George8217;s nude photos, Babu the Pakistani restaurateur 8212; as touchstones of day-to-day life in this ambivalent decade.