The internet made a huge fuss when it was recently announced that television series like The Office and Friends would soon depart Netflix. The streaming hub has been a safe haven for sitcom rewatch binges for so long now, a perfect security blanket of familiar laughs and characters, a way to soothe ourselves after a long or stressful day. It’s a shame that those big-name series will soon move to a new home, but luck for Netflix, they aren’t losing all comedy good will. According to the Los Angeles Times, Netflix has landed the global streaming rights for Seinfeld.
The Jerry Seinfeld-starring sitcom ran for nine seasons back in the ’90s and is one of the most celebrated and beloved series of all time. It’s currently available on Hulu, which pays $150 million annually to stream the series, in a deal that ends in 2021. Netflix scooped up the global rights in a deal that allegedly cost quite a bit more than the $500 million NBCUniversal paid for The Office and the $425 million WarnerMedia paid for Friends. Seinfeld will be available to Netflix’s audience of 151 million subscribers starting in 2021, and the deal will last for at least five years.
Jerry &
Elaine &
George &
Kramer &
NetflixAll 180 episodes of the Emmy-Award winning Seinfeld are coming to Netflix — worldwide! — starting in 2021 pic.twitter.com/tLvcCKH4vl
— Netflix US (@netflix) September 16, 2019
This is definitely a huge win for Netflix, especially after the loss of The Office and Friends, but it remains to be seen if Seinfeld will hold the same mass appeal for younger audiences that those series did. Seinfeld is more male-centric and the comedy skews a bit older, taste-wise, so it may be a harder sell for the Generation Z audience. (It’s also famously a show about “nothing.”) However, we have to imagine their parents will be thrilled to have the series at their fingertips. It will share a home with Jerry Seinfeld’s current series, Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, making Netflix the one-stop shop for all things Seinfeld-related.
Feature Image: Sony Pictures Television