Julia Louis-Dreyfus opened up on Amy Poehler’s Good Hang podcast about her role as Elaine Benes on the hit sitcom, Seinfeld.
Speaking of her role on Seinfeld, Louis-Dreyfus revealed the one thing she wishes she could change about her character, Elaine. She spoke on 90s fashion and also on health issues during her stint on Seinfeld.
In the December 2025 episode of the podcast, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, 64, said she still couldn’t shake her character, Elaine’s 90s New York fashion. “God, I’d love to go back and fix that look,” she explained.
“Listen, if anybody in America is listening to this: Please don’t do the ’90s again,” she told her audience. “I don’t know what to say. I’m just so f***ing sorry. I really, really am.”
Julia went on to do comparisons between Seinfeld and another sitcom set in New York, Friends, which made its debut midway through her Seinfeld run. She said that Courtenay Cox, Jennifer Aniston and Lisa Kudrow had a much different look that her character did.
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“I actually remember because Friends came out at some point when we were doing Seinfeld,’” Louis-Dreyfus recalled. “And all those girls were so sexy! And I remember thinking like, ‘Ah, f***, I should have been sexy! This is such a missed opportunity.’ I’m, seriously, like a midriff. Anything. Anything!”
Poehler then speculated that the sitcom wouldn’t have worked “if Elaine was paying attention to” her fashion choices. However, Louis-Dreyfus said, “It might have worked.”
“Just coming in like in tight jeans and like how they all dressed,” she added. “Anyway, let’s not dwell on my regrets.”
What fans of the sitcom might not know is that the Seinfeld actress was pregnant twice during her run on the sitcom. Moreover, she told Amy that she wore “huge like picnic tablecloths” during certain seasons.
Speaking of Elaine’s wardrobe, Louis-Dreyfus expressed her regret over her look. “I have nothing but regret for that look. At the time I was trying to be funky,” Vanity Fair wrote about Louis-Dreyfus’s appearance with Stephen Colbert.
Speaking to Vogue in 2019, Louis-Dreyfus said that she did have input into her character’s style, but messed up. “I’m afraid I did have a lot of influence on Elaine’s outfit,” she said. “I mean, we had a costume designer for sure, but I mean, for instance, that’s the typical floral pattern with the socks and the shoes. I just thought that at the time, I thought, ‘There is nothing groovier than this look.’”
She added, “[Elaine] definitely dictated her own style, and I think she was not somebody who dressed super sexy. That wasn’t her vibe, man. She was kind of didn’t need to do that. She was a little tougher.”
Julia’s memories about her role in Seinfeld weren’t just about her not-so-fashionable wardrobe on the show. She explained that she felt forced to reveal her breast cancer diagnosis, as she knew she would have to pause her role on her hit show, Veep
Julia Louis-Dreyfus felt forced to reveal her diagnosis as she knew she would need to explain the pause of her hit show, “Veep” and felt her fans needed to know.
Meanwhile, on the Good Hang podcast, Poehler commended Louis-Dreyfus for going public with her diagnoses, stating it was very helpful for a lot of people” while it wasn’t something she felt obligated to share.
“Well, I was kind of backed into a corner on that one, because we had to shut our show down,” Louis-Dreyfus, 64, said. “It’s funny how that worked out, because normally I would not have done that. I’m very private.”
Readers can enjoy the full Good Hang podcast here.
