Larry David Skewers RFK Jr. In Latest HBO Max Episode
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- Larry David plays Dora Salk, mother of polio vaccine creator Jonas Salk, in the latest episode of HBO Max's "Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness"
- David's character confronts a neighbor played by Gregg Perrie, clearly modeled on Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who claims vaccines will "kill people" and "give them heart attacks" and likens them to a Nazi plot
- Dora tells the Kennedy stand-in to "drop dead, Bobby" and warns that putting someone like him in charge would be "a dark day for humanity"
- Kennedy is the husband of Cheryl Hines, who played David's wife on "Curb Your Enthusiasm," making the pair longtime acquaintances through that marriage
- Hines has said her friendship with David seems to have "evaporated in recent years," and unlike other "Curb" performers she has not appeared on the new HBO Max series
- David is described as "an outspoken critic of all things Trump," and Kennedy's years as an anti-vaccine activist "apparently hasn't sat well" with the Seinfeld co-creator
Why it matters: The sketch crystallizes a personal rift between two longtime "Curb Your Enthusiasm" collaborators — David and Hines — whose friendship Hines says has "evaporated" over Kennedy's anti-vaccine activism. By staging that conflict through a historical comedy about Jonas Salk, David uses his platform to publicly criticize Kennedy's role in shaping vaccine discourse.
