Production
The episode was written by series co-creators Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld and directed by Tom Cherones. [3] [4] David based the story on a personal experience of his, when he gave a ride home to a woman who had recently dated a friend of his. [2] He would frequently come up with the idea for an episode and make it into a teleplay with Seinfeld's help; in a 1991 interview with the Los Angeles Times , Seinfeld stated: "Most of the stories are from [David's] life. He just has a tremendous wellspring of ideas. I mean, he just fills notebooks with ideas and I try to help him, but Larry is really the designer of the show." [2] [5] David Sims of The A.V. Club commented, "Seinfeld started its second season, its first real season after a four-episode test run, very strongly with "The Ex-Girlfriend", and it is the first time we really see George as the character we know and love, that weird dark shadow of Larry David's mind who behaves as no functioning human being honestly could." [6]
Among the actresses who auditioned for the part of Marlene were Amy Yasbeck; Jeri Ryan, who would go on to star in Star Trek: Voyager; and Heidi Swedberg. Swedberg was later cast as Susan Ross for Seinfeld's fourth season. Tracy Kolis, who at the time was known for her appearance in the soap opera All My Children , was eventually cast for the part. [2] She reappeared later in the season six episode "The Soup", in which she portrayed a waitress named Kelly. [2] [7] Norman Brenner, who worked as Michael Richards' stand-in on the show for all nine seasons, [8] appears as an extra during the second scene, walking by twice in different clothing. [2]
The first table read of the episode took place on October 17, 1990. It was filmed in front of a studio audience six days later, on October 23. Seinfeld's stand-up performances were filmed on October 29, 1990, along with the performances used in "The Pony Remark" and "The Busboy". Filming of the episode took place on stage 19 of the CBS Studio Center in Studio City, Los Angeles. [2] "The Ex-Girlfriend" was the first episode to be filmed there, as the majority of season one was filmed in a studio called Desilu Cahuenga, in Hollywood, where The Dick Van Dyke Show had also been filmed. [9] Tom Azzari designed the sets for the second season of the show, and was able to re-use various sets from the first season, thanks to Castle Rock Entertainment's decision to store them in a large storage facility. The chiropractor's waiting room, in which George believes he was charged too much for a visit, was the only new set which appeared in the episode. [2]
Although the scenes in Monk's Cafe were filmed at the CBS Studio Center, the exterior of Tom's Restaurant, a diner at Broadway and 112th Street in Manhattan was used as the exterior for the cafe. [10] The second scene of the episode, which takes place on a street, was filmed on CBS Studio Center's "New York Street", a set that consists of four very small store fronts. During seasons one to five, "New York Street" was the only set the writers could use to replicate New York City. This scene, and additional scenes which take place in Jerry's car, were filmed on October 22 from 5:00 to 8:30 p.m. One or two members of the crew shook the car to give the impression that it was moving, though it never actually was. Other crew members would move lights around the set to simulate street lights or headlights of other cars. Behind the car, two lights on a wheeled stand were placed to give the impression that there was a car behind it. This technique is called "poor man's process", because it is cheaper than other ways of achieving the effect. [2] The show had previously experimented with this technique in the season one episode "The Stake Out". [11]
Some scenes in the episode were cut prior to broadcast. The opening scene in Jerry's car, in which George discusses breaking up with Marlene, originally had George proposing that he would stage his own kidnapping while walking down the street with Marlene, then hide out until she had given up on him. Although it was cut before the episode's broadcast, this scene was included on the Seinfeld Volume 1 DVD set. Another scene which was cut featured Jerry's neighbor Kramer entering Jerry's apartment carrying a plate with cantaloupe on toothpicks. [2] [12] Originally, the scene in which Jerry tells George that he is dating Marlene took place in a library, with a librarian repeatedly shushing George and Jerry and kicking them out of the library at the end of the scene. The location was changed to Monk's Cafe because the dialogue had nothing to do with a library. [2]
