Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: Release Date and Cast of the TV Series

HBO has released a new teaser and images of the original limited series Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness. The seven-episode series will debut Friday, June 26 at 9:00 PM ET/PT on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max. New episodes will be released weekly until the season finale scheduled for August 7.

The plot starts from a premise: President and Mrs. Obama wanted to honor America's 250th anniversary and celebrate the unique history of the nation on this special occasion. But then Larry David called.

Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness Streaming: Where to Watch the Series

The announcement was made during a panel at SXSW with David and Jeff Schaffer, moderated by Lorraine Ali of the Los Angeles Times, where new footage from the series was shown. In addition to David, the series will feature select actors from Curb Your Enthusiasm and noteworthy guest stars.

Larry David TV Series: The Collaboration with Higher Ground

The series is written and executive produced by Larry David and co-creator Jeff Schaffer, who also serves as director. Executive producers include Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Ethan Lewis and Vinnie Malhotra for Higher Ground.

Higher Ground was founded by President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama. From scripted and unscripted television to movies, from animated series to podcasts and digital series, the company tells acclaimed stories across all platforms. Higher Ground has earned 3 Academy Award nominations (winning the Oscar for American Factory), 12 Emmy nominations and 3 Grammy nominations, producing celebrated projects like Leave the World Behind, Crip Camp, Rustin and American Symphony.

The Cast of Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: Recent Projects

Larry David, after concluding Curb Your Enthusiasm in 2024 with the twelfth season, thus returns to television seriality with this project that marks his first collaboration with Higher Ground. The series represents the creator of Seinfeld's return to sketch comedy, a format he had not worked in since his time at Saturday Night Live, where he worked as a writer from 1984 to 1985.

Jeff Schaffer, who collaborated with David for all twelve seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm as executive producer, writer and director, recently worked as executive producer and showrunner of The League and directed episodes of Dave, the FXX comedy series with Lil Dicky that debuted in 2020 and concluded with the third season in 2023.

Barack and Michelle Obama, through Higher Ground, recently produced Rustin, the 2023 biographical movie directed by George C. Wolfe with Colman Domingo in the role of civil rights activist Bayard Rustin, which earned Domingo an Oscar nomination for best actor. In 2023 Higher Ground also produced Leave the World Behind, an apocalyptic thriller directed by Sam Esmail with Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali and Ethan Hawke, distributed on Netflix and becoming one of the platform's most-watched movies that year. Among the company's most recent projects is American Symphony, a 2023 documentary that follows composer Jon Batiste, nominated for Grammy Awards.

The limited series Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness thus enters the HBO catalog as an experiment that combines Larry David's comic sensibility with the Obamas' production vision, in a sketch format that promises to reinterpret American history through the lens of the irreverent humor that has made David an iconic figure of television comedy.