Larry David lives a charmed life – an understanding wife, famous friends, a supportive manager and an angelic singing voice.. so how does he manage to screw up everything? See Larry buy medical marijuana, take a hooker to a baseball game, steal  a golf club from a corpse, ruin Ben Stiller’s birthday party, attempt to cash in on his tenth anniversary present with Gina Gershon and trip the light fantastic in “The Producers” with Mel Brooks and David Schwimmer.

CRITIQUE

In its fourth season, Curb Your Enthusiasm is still going strong and is just as funny as the previous seasons. While some material may seem familiar, the stories are always new and continue to put Larry into mostly embarrassing situations. This time, Mel Brooks asks Larry to star in “The Producers” on Broadway, and upon accepting Mel’s offer, the backdrop of the fourth season is set. Over the course of ten episodes we watch Larry practice step dancing and singing show tunes, yet in his act he also manages to drive away co-star Ben Stiller who leaves the production, so David Schwimmer comes in to take over the role, however a bag of raisins and cashews threatens Larry’s working relationship with Schwimmer.

Also worth noting is Larry and Cheryl’s upcoming tenth anniversary, which builds momentum throughout the season and caps off quite nicely (Larry’s anniversary “present” allows him to have sex with another woman but it becomes void once the day of the anniversary). Larry also gets in trouble when he finds an innovative way to use the carpool lane to get to a Dodgers game in time and also pays a price for getting his dad some medical marijuana. Watching Larry get in and out of incomparable situations tickles the funny bone very often, and as the hour-long season finale begins to unravel you start to feel good for Larry as he opens on Broadway, but so many things that happened before kind of make you feel sorry for Mr. David.

Larry David continues to impress playing his (I would call it “mostly”) fictional self. You got to give it to Larry, you know. Also, Cheryl Hines and Jeff Garlin are very convincing and fun to watch. This season’s guest stars (all playing themselves) make some funny appearances and they include regular returning guests Richard Lewis, Susie Essman, Shelley Berman and Ted Danson, plus Mel Brooks, Paul Mazursky, David Schimmer, Ben Stiller, Christine Taylor, Saul Rubinek, Bob Einstein, Cady Huffman, Gina Gershon, Nathan Lane and Anne Bancroft.

Disc 1: Mel’s Offer, Ben’s Birthday Party, The Blind Date, The Weatherman, The 5 Wood

Disc 2: The Car Pool Lane, The Surrogate, Wandering Bear, The Survivor, Opening Night

THE VIDEO

HBO presents Curb Your Enthusiasm in 1.33:1 fullscreen format. Colors look good, image quality is pretty much average, and there really aren't any major flaws. Some images appear a bit soft and there is slight shimmering in a few cases, but overall I have no complaints. This is a perfectly fine presentation for a TV show. Optional subtitles include English, French and Spanish. Closed Captioning is also available.

THE AUDIO

HBO presents Curb Your Enthusiasm in English 2.0 Dolby Surround. Dialogue is clear and easy to understand, as is the music and the few sound effects. Everything comes from the front, which is perfectly suitable for this show. A French 2.0 dub track is also available.

THE EXTRAS

There are no extras here except episode previews. The menus are nice and each episode menu contains a basic premise of the program.

The packaging is kind of neat, something I haven’t seen with any other DVD set. There's a tab at the bottom of the package that you can pull and two thin plastic cases will emerge from either side. Easy and practical.

FINAL THOUGHT

Despite the lack of extras, I am recommending this DVD set of Curb Your Enthusiasm’s fourth season because all in all the show is a lot of fun.