# GRIP STRENGTH
**作者**: Jeremy Giffon
**日期**: 2026-07-20T19:02:01.000Z
**来源**: [https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184)
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Last night I watched a documentary called "Comedian". It follows Jerry Seinfeld four years off his TV show. He is now extremely rich and extremely famous and has just released an HBO special that encompassed the set he had been honing for the past twenty one years. Fifty minutes honed over two decades. Now he has got nothing and is trying to put together a new set to gain back his own identity as a "comedian".
The film is full of delights. He has just traded his seventeen year old girlfriend for a new wife that he casually approached at the gym and proceeded to steal from a New York scion fresh off their honeymoon. He races from set to set in a brand new 911 and commutes between his place in the Beresford and the thirty two million dollar Hamptons house he bought off Billy Joel. When he rolls up to the clubs and walks on stage he is greeted with a standing ovation (this never happens) while all the other broke late thirties comedians with roommates stare at him in a rage. And yet, quickly thereafter the glow wears off and he begins to bomb in a way that is viscerally painful to even the viewer. Before long the audience is heckling him.
The documentary also follows a twenty nine year old comedian on the come up named Orny Adams (doomed from the start) that is perpetually on the brink of making it; he's just been signed by Jerry's manager and is scheduled for his debut on Letterman (a major milestone to becoming a famous comedian). At one point Orny is bemoaning to Seinfeld that he has to make it soon or he is going to kill himself. He spends a solid five minutes talking about how he has been doing comedy for over a decade while all his friends from high school have gone on to get rich on Wall Street, etc. Orny declares that if he doesn't blow up and get famous soon he will be a complete and total failure and lists a thousand reasons why he should get put on but is being blocked or inhibited.
This is the most important moment of the documentary. As Adams is delivering this angsty soliloquy, you can see Jerry get a look on his face like Orny is speaking Japanese to him. He quite literally cannot understand what Adams is saying and keeps repeating "what" over and over. The idea that one of his friends making money on Wall Street could relate to Adams doing comedy is quite literally incoherent to Seinfeld. He sincerely cannot fathom how these things are related.
Later in the film, as Seinfeld is taking off in his plane to do one of the weekly multiple dates he's booked himself in some middle of nowhere club to rehearse his new set, he talks about how to him there is only one criterion for success: "are you still working?". If you are, you've made it. If you have stopped, you're a failure.
This was twenty years ago. You have never heard of Orny Adams.
What is so interesting about the doc is just how fucking badly Orny wants it, just how much he believes he is destined for it and how tightly he's holding on to it and how little he gets in return for it. At one point, Orny has just finished taping Letterman and is upset with his performance. He says that he's never been closer to getting what he's wanted since he was a child but he's never been more miserable.
Meanwhile, Seinfeld, who has just bought an entire warehouse on the Upper West Side to store his Porsche collection. He believes in nothing other than the virtue of his work. At one point another comedian is talking about some major CEO he has just met with and Seinfeld looks at him and says "what we do is so much more important. we make people laugh, no one else can do that".
At the risk of taking this essay in a bit of a Gladwellian direction, there are many areas of my life where I am Orny and not Seinfeld. Where my actions are dictated by an outcome I am owed. Where what someone else does somehow threatens the way in which I conduct my own affairs.
I know I am rehashing this point over and over, but I think it is something of a fucking miracle that graspingness is not causative to greatness. It's somewhat incredible that the top 10% in the world have to completely white knuckle it at the cost of their well-being and sanity but the very best are totally effortless. Orny Adams spent a life trying incredibly hard, grasping to something he was owed with all his might, got pretty good but not great, and ended up with nothing but misery and empty pockets.
Meanwhile, the only thing Jerry's ever held with a tight grip is the wheel of his 911 as he races around Manhattan.
## 相关链接
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- [3:02 AM · Jul 21, 2026](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184)
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*导出时间: 2026/7/21 10:35:45*
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## 中文翻译
# 握力
**作者**: Jeremy Giffon
**日期**: 2026-07-20T19:02:01.000Z
**来源**: [https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184)
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昨晚我看了一部名为《Comedian》（喜剧演员）的纪录片。它讲述了杰瑞·宋飞在他那部电视剧结束后的四年生活。现在的他极其富有、极其出名，刚刚发布了一部HBO特辑，里面包含了他过去二十一年打磨的段子。五十分钟的内容，打磨了二十年。现在他一无所有，正试图组合一套新的段子，以重新找回自己作为“喜剧演员”的身份。
这部电影充满了妙趣。他刚刚抛弃了十七岁的女友，换来了一位新妻子——他在健身房随意搭讪了她，随后从一位纽约豪门继承人手中把她抢了过来，那对夫妇刚度过蜜月。他驾驶着一辆全新的保时捷911在各个演出场地之间飞驰，往返于他位于贝雷斯福德公寓的住所和他从比利·乔尔手中买下的那座价值三千二百万美元的汉普顿豪宅。当他驱车抵达俱乐部并走上舞台时，迎接他的是全场起立鼓掌（这种事闻所未闻），而所有其他那些三十多岁、身无分文还要与人合租公寓的喜剧演员则愤怒地盯着他。然而，没过多久，光环褪去，他开始遭遇“炸场”，那种尴尬甚至让观众都感到切身之痛。没过多久，观众就开始起哄他了。
纪录片还跟踪了一位正在崛起的二十九岁喜剧演员奥尼·亚当斯（Orny Adams，从一开始就注定坎坷），他总是处于即将成功的边缘；他刚被杰瑞的经纪人签下，并排定在莱特曼秀上首次亮相（这是成为著名喜剧演员的一个重要里程碑）。有一次，奥尼向宋飞哀叹，说他必须尽快成功，否则他就自杀了。他足足花了五分钟讲述自己做脱口秀已经超过十年，而他高中时的朋友们都去华尔街发财了，等等。奥尼宣称，如果他不很快爆红成名，他就是一个彻头彻尾的失败者，并列举了一千个理由说明自己应该上节目，但正受到阻碍或压制。
这是纪录片中最重要的一刻。当亚当斯发表这段充满焦虑的独白时，你可以看到宋飞脸上露出的表情，仿佛奥尼在对他说日语。他真的听不懂亚当斯在说什么，不停地重复“什么”。对于宋飞来说，他朋友在华尔街赚钱这件事竟然能与亚当斯说脱口秀联系起来，简直是无法理解的。他真诚地无法想象这两者之间有什么关系。
后来在电影中，当宋飞驾驶飞机去某个偏远地区的俱乐部排练他的新段子——这是他给自己预订的每周多次演出中的一次时——他谈到对他来说成功的标准只有一个：“你还在工作吗？”。如果在，你就成功了。如果停了，你就是失败者。
那是二十年前的事了。你从未听说过奥尼·亚当斯。
这部纪录片最有趣的地方在于，奥尼是那么拼命地想要成功，那么坚信自己注定属于那里，抓得那么紧，却得到那么少的回报。有一次，奥尼刚录完莱特曼秀，对自己的表现感到不满。他说，他从未离自己儿时的渴望如此接近，但他也从未如此痛苦过。
与此同时，宋飞刚在上西区买下了整整一个仓库来存放他的保时捷收藏。除了工作的美德，他什么都不信。有一次，另一位喜剧演员在谈论他刚见过的某位大公司CEO，宋飞看着他说：“我们要做的比那重要得多。我们让人笑，别人做不到这一点。”
冒着让这篇文章带点格拉德威尔风格的风险，我想说我生活中的许多方面，我是奥尼而不是宋飞。在这些方面，我的行动受制于我认为我理应得到的结果。别人所做的在某种程度上会威胁到我处理自己事务的方式。
我知道我在反复重申这一点，但我认为这真是一个他妈的奇迹：贪求并不能造就伟大。世界上的前10%往往不得不死命坚持，以牺牲福祉和理智为代价，但那些最顶尖的人却完全举重若轻。奥尼·亚当斯花了一生的时间极其努力地尝试，用尽全力去抓取他认为自己理应得到的东西，变得相当不错，但并不卓越，最终除了痛苦和空空如也的口袋，一无所获。
与此同时，杰瑞唯一紧紧握住的东西，就是他在曼哈顿飞驰时那辆911的方向盘。
## 相关链接
- [Lenny Rachitsky reposted](https://x.com/lennysan)
- [Jeremy Giffon](https://x.com/jeremygiffon)
- [@jeremygiffon](https://x.com/jeremygiffon)
- [463K](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184/analytics)
- [Upgrade to Premium](https://x.com/i/premium_sign_up)
- [3:02 AM · Jul 21, 2026](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184)
- [463K Views](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184/analytics)
- [View quotes](https://x.com/jeremygiffon/status/2079280687346295184/quotes)
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*导出时间: 2026/7/21 10:35:45*