Jason Alexander almost quit "Seinfeld" because he wasn't getting enough screen time

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https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/...161425741.html

"Seinfeld" could have looked very different if one of the main stars followed through on his threat to leave the hit show.

Michael Richards, who appeared on the show as Kramer, revealed that Jason Alexander, who played George Costanza, nearly quit the show after "The Pen" episode.

Neither Alexander nor Richards appeared in that episode, as Jerry (Jerry Seinfeld) and Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) pay a visit to Jerry's parents in Florida.

Page Six obtained an excerpt of Richards' upcoming memoir, "Entrances and Exits," where he says he took not being on-screen with "equanimity," but says Alexander had a different approach.

"Jason threatens to quit after learning that he’s also not in the episode. He’s furious," Richards wrote in his memoir, according to the outlet.

Richards was able to sympathize with Alexander.

"Jason came onto the show with the most confidence of anyone," Richards wrote, Page Six reported. "He had won a Tony Award on the New York stage, not an insignificant achievement, and until the table read for ‘The Pen,’ he has assumed that ‘Seinfeld’ is a buddy show, starring him and Jerry."

He continued, "But this business breeds both massive egos and incredible insecurity, and this episode is one of those ego-jarring wakeup calls."

Alexander confirmed Richards' claims in 2017. He told Access Hollywood at the time that he had snapped at Larry David, the lead writer for the sitcom, and threatened to leave the show.

Alexander said he had told David, "If you do that again, do it permanently … if you don't need me here every week, I'd just as soon go back home and do what I was doing."

"Thank God he didn’t say ‘Take a hike,’ because I would have had no life and no career," Alexander emphasized at the time.

Reps for Alexander did not have any additional comment.

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