Performance Artist

When you look at the greatest comedies of the last 10 years: The Office (UK), Arrested Development and Curb Your Enthusiasm they are all direct descendants of the Larry Sanders' Show and really couldn't have happened without it. When the show first aired it was groundbreaking, offensive, hilarious and unlike anything TV had seen. It was one of the shows that propelled HBO into the whole "it's not TV" era of Sopranos, The Wire etc.

Today when you look around at shows on TV like The Office (US), Parks & Rec, Community and Modern Family - the influence of Garry Shandling's show is everywhere.

The Performance Artist is one of the more biting and political episodes that satirizes David Letterman's decision to cut Bill Hicks' act from his show 15 years ago. A great episode and a great show.

An earlier review for this episode suggested that this was meant to satirize when David Letterman censored Bill Hicks' performance. If that's the case, we need to talk to the writers of the show about their secret time traveling device considering this episode of Larry Sanders aired in August 1993, and the incident with Hicks being censored on David Letterman's show took place in October 1993.