The Old Man (Seinfeld)

Plot

Jerry, Elaine, and George volunteer to help the elderly. Jerry gets assigned to Sid Fields (Bill Erwin), a bad-tempered old man with a Senegalese housekeeper (Lanei Chapman), who he claims is trying to steal his possessions. Elaine is repulsed by the goiter problems of the woman she is visiting and George depresses his assigned senior citizen, Ben Cantwell, by questioning his outlook on dying, until he walks out, telling George that "Life's too short to waste on you". Later, George becomes attracted to Mr. Fields' housekeeper when he learns that she can't speak English.

Kramer and Newman try the business of selling some of Jerry's old records to a used record store but are not satisfied when the store's owner (Tobin Bell) offers them a very small amount. The man Jerry is responsible for tells him that he wants to get rid of some of his "junk", including a large amount of old records which Kramer and Newman show up later to pick up. The man gets upset at their intrusion and bites Kramer's arm, causing him to jerk back and launch his dentures into the garbage disposal. Jerry loses track of Fields when they try to take him to the dentist to repair his dentures, which were promptly destroyed after the garbage disposal was turned on by George, mistaken for a light switch.

Meanwhile, Elaine discovers that her old woman had an affair with Gandhi, and one of the stories she tells directly mirrors what George had said to the housekeeper about him "dipping my bald head in oil and rubbing it all over your body".

Kramer and Newman take Fields' records to the music store's owner, who still offers them a small amount of money. Upset, Newman insults the owner (with help from Kramer) and a fight ensues, resulting in the records being destroyed. The search for Jerry's old man leads to everyone (including the old man's son) bursting in on George having oil rubbed on his head by the housekeeper.

The episode ends with the two old men, in the diner, in the same booth the main characters use, having much the same conversation Jerry and George had at the beginning of the episode, during which Fields tells Cantwell about the woman he was recently "fixed up" with - mentioning both her goiter and her youthful relationship with Gandhi. However, Fields recounts that she put milk in his tea without asking, calling it "a turnoff", an opinion with which Cantwell agrees, telling Fields "you don't need that."

Production

In this episode it is revealed that Newman is a mailman. Lanei Chapman plays the housekeeper. In an alternate ending to this episode that was never broadcast, her character reveals that she speaks fluent English (with an accent native to New York, not Senegal), causing George to lose interest in her.