From the archives: Seinfeld on 60 Minutes

This week, 60 Minutes profiled comedian Larry David, who made his name and his fortune as co-creator of the famed NBC show "Seinfeld." Almost 20 years ago, Larry David made his first appearance on 60 Minutes, so we decided to pull the tape on 60 Minutes Overtime.

That 1997 story, posted in the video player above, was reported by Steve Kroft and features David's co-creator Jerry Seinfeld.

"The fact that I bet on myself and didn't lose is a pretty deep reward," Seinfeld said in his 60 Minutes interview.

60 Minutes senior producer Frank Devine, who worked on the story, remembers Seinfeld as "a guy who was supremely confident in his art."

Devine also recalled that Seinfeld's team was reluctant when 60 Minutes planned to conduct the interviews in Seinfeld's Los Angeles home. Once inside, however, Kroft and Devine got some of their best material from the comedian.

"He had fun things in it," Devine said, such as the 1989 audience test of the "Seinfeld" pilot episode. The framed document stated: "No segment of the audience was eager to watch the show again." After the poor audience test, NBC was only willing to commit to four episodes of "Seinfeld."

Seinfeld: Which is the smallest number of episodes ever ordered by a network. I mean, six is a slap in the face. Four is like...

Kroft: 'Don't quit your day job.'

Seinfeld: Yeah.

NBC later came around, and at the time 60 Minutes aired this story, Seinfeld and his co-stars were asking to be paid $1 million apiece per episode for a ninth season.