Kenny Kramer

Kenny Kramer
Kenny Kramer in 2007
Born	May 1943 (age 73–74) New York City, U.S.

Kenny Kramer (born May 1943) is an American stand-up comedian.

He is the inspiration for the character of Cosmo Kramer from the television sitcom Seinfeld.

Kramer had a spotty career as a stand-up comedian, and worked as the manager for a British reggae band. Kramer sought to manage Bill Beason, a New York point karate champion, with the hopes that the karate tournament scene would develop along the same lines as wrestling had, since corporate sponsors such as Budweiser and Paul Mitchell were emerging.

Seinfeld co-creator Larry David lived across the hall from Kenny for six years, just as the character of Jerry Seinfeld did from Cosmo Kramer in the show. The two lived in Manhattan Plaza, a federally assisted apartment complex for performing artists in Hell's Kitchen, New York City. David said that Kramer was a little bit eccentric and would be a good character to have on the show. Many of the traits of Kenny Kramer, such as the obsession with golf, fruit, hot tubs, taking things out of the refrigerator and coming up with strange ideas and inventions, were featured in the show.

Michael Richards did not want to meet with Kenny to study the character and wanted to create the character himself. This situation was later parodied in the Seinfeld fourth season episode "The Pilot". The character was originally going to be named "Kessler" (parodied when he and Jerry are shown meeting for the first time in "The Betrayal"), due to Larry David's fear that using the name might spur the real Kramer to exploit his association with the character. However, Jerry Seinfeld thought that the name was too good not to use. Kenny Kramer then proceeded to contact Castle Rock Entertainment with a list of several demands, many of which were financial, for the use of his name. One demand not met was that Kenny would get to play Kramer, which is also parodied in "The Pilot".