The Contest

Written by Larry David and directed by Tom Cherones, the episode originally aired on NBC on November 18, 1992.

[1][2] In the episode, Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer hold a contest to determine who can go for the longest time without masturbating.

[3] The term "master of my domain", describing someone who has resisted the urge to masturbate, has since become a popular catchphrase.

[4][5] David won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series for the episode.

In 2009, "The Contest" was ranked number 1 on TV Guide's list of the "100 Greatest Episodes of All-Time".

At Monk's Café, George tells Jerry, Elaine, and Kramer that his mother caught him masturbating while reading a Glamour magazine, resulting in her falling over in shock and going to the hospital.

The others meet various temptations of their own; George is distracted while visiting his mother in the hospital by an attractive nurse giving another woman a sponge bath behind a curtain, Elaine's fitness club is patronized by John F. Kennedy Jr., and Jerry is frustrated because his girlfriend Marla, a virgin, is hesitant to have sex with him.

[7] Part of the opening scene was originally written for "The Seinfeld Chronicles", the series' pilot episode.

The cast and crew commented positively on the similarity in appearance between Harris and Jason Alexander, as it made it more believable that their characters could be related.

David won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series for the episode.

Jonathan Boudreaux for tvdvdreviews.com said: "The Emmy-winning script by Larry David introduced the brilliant euphemism 'master of my domain' to our lexicon and helped the series to truly become must-see TV.

"The Contest" effortlessly takes a potentially incendiary subject and renders it utterly inoffensive yet hilarious.

[citation needed] "The Contest" is referenced in other Seinfeld episodes, the first being "The Outing", in which Jerry and George are mistakenly outed as gay.

"[8] In the "Shaq" episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry David and Shaquille O'Neal watch "The Contest" together.

In the Family Guy episode "Jungle Love", Peter pays the people of a South American village to re-enact "The Contest" as one of them hums the Seinfeld scene-changing music.

[21] The season 5 premiere of Big Mouth, titled "No Nut November", directly parodies the episode.

The main characters agree to abstain from masturbation in an animated version of Monk's Café.