Carol Leifer, the 68-year-old comedian and writer who helped inspire the character of Elaine on “Seinfeld,” continues to break new ground in her five-decade career. After winning her first Emmy Award in 2024 for her work on “Hacks,” Leifer is now preparing for her 11th Academy Awards ceremony as part of Conan O’Brien’s writing team for the March 2, 2025 broadcast.
When asked about being the inspiration for Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ character, Elaine Benes, Leifer acknowledges the connection while maintaining some distance. “Look, we have a unique relationship,” she says, referring to Jerry Seinfeld. “We dated early on at the beginning of my stand-up career, beginning of his, and since then we really only went out for a year or so, but we’ve stayed very good friends.” She adds that the concept of “a woman on the show who is not only a friend, but someone that Jerry once dated, makes for an interesting relationship.”
Leifer joined the Seinfeld writing team in Season 5, where she infused her own life experiences into the show’s most memorable storylines. She recalls how Larry David, in particular, sincerely appreciated stories rooted in real-life moments, finding them the most compelling and authentic. One example was Elaine’s scheme to have George’s father translate Korean at her nail salon, a plotline that stemmed directly from actual events.
Her recent Emmy win came from her work on “Hacks,” where she initially served as a consultant before joining the writers’ room full-time for Season 3. The show’s creators sought her expertise to add authenticity to Jean Smart’s character, Deborah Vance. “They were very keen on gleaning a lot of my experience back then, and I appreciated that they wanted validity to her story,” Leifer says of the creators, who are approximately 30 years her junior.
Leifer played a pivotal role in crafting the “Hacks” episode “One Day,” in which Deborah and Ava find themselves stranded in the woods after an injury, forcing them to confront their vulnerabilities. The episode resonated deeply with Leifer’s reflections on aging in Hollywood. This theme has become increasingly personal after nearly five decades in the industry—a milestone she still finds surreal. She acknowledges that with so much experience behind her, she now thinks more about the next chapter of her career, whether taking on a small role in a Broadway production or finally pursuing creative aspirations she once put on hold.
Throughout her extensive television career, Leifer has written for numerous prestigious shows, including “Late Night with David Letterman,” “Saturday Night Live,” “Modern Family,” and “The Ellen Show.”
During her time on “Seinfeld,” Leifer contributed to what would become one of television’s most successful sitcoms. The show ran for nine seasons from 1989 to 1998, garnering 68 Emmy nominations and winning 10. At its peak in its final season, “Seinfeld” averaged 38.03 million viewers, and 76.3 million viewers watched the finale. When Leifer joined as the first female writer in Season 5, the show was already a rating powerhouse for NBC, consistently ranking in the Nielsen Top 5 shows.
The “show about nothing” earned over $3.1 billion in syndication fees by 2013. Multiple episodes Leifer worked on are considered classics, including Elaine’s nail salon storyline. Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld’s unique approach to the writers’ room, where they encouraged mining personal experiences for stories, helped establish a new template for television comedy.
Beyond television, Leifer has authored multiple books and is preparing to release a new work titled “How to Write a Funny Speech.” The book aims to help readers craft humorous presentations for significant life events