The Handicap Spot aka The Drake: PLEASE READ

Sorry if this is an old subject, but I found this interesting. Watched the episode "The Handicap Spot" on TV tonight, when I noticed Jerry Stiller was playing Frank Costanza. I had to do a double take because I have that episode on tape where John Randolph is playing Frank Costanza. Is it normal to re-do an episode with a different actor? Did they re-do every episode that John Randolph was in? More importantly, WHY?

Hmm, I've never seen anyone other than Jerry Stiller do it... and I've seen that one a bazillion times....

[email] wrote:

That's because you've always seen the syndicated version. The original version had Randolph in it.

On Mon, 19 Feb 2001 21:47:37 -0500, "The News Guy (Mike)" wrote:

Man, I knew that they'd gone to the trouble of redubbing some lines, but I never knew that they'd gone to the expense of reshooting an entire scene.

I mean, they must've have reshot that years after the original shoot.

I searched for an old thread but it doesn't say why he left, I'm guessing Stiller was better:

From: The News Guy(Mike) ([email]) Subject: Re: ALTERNATE HANDICAPPED EPISODE? Newsgroups: alt.tv.seinfeld Date: 2000-11-23 17:03:16 PST

Steveo McLaughlin wrote:

Yes, the original episode of The Handicapped Spot had John Randolf playing Frank Costanza. They then replaced John with Jerry Stiller and reshot the scene with him for syndication So anyone who taped the original episode has a copy with John Rudolph instead of Jerry Stiller.

"Byron" wrote"

The Rudolph version is also used in some international syndication packages, so Australian viewers (for example) have never seen it with Stiller.

I think this was the only ep with Randolph and I don't know why he left. In the second ep ever, The Stakeout, Phil Bruns played Jerry's dad and then was replaced thereafter with Barney Martin. But Phil Bruns is shown in syndication, unlike Randolph. Marco wrote in message ...