Unfrosted review: Seinfeld’s cereal classic snaps, crackles and pops

Don't cry over spilt milk: (from left) Jim Gaffigan as Edsel Kellogg III, Jerry Seinfeld as Bob Cabana, Fred Armisen as Mike Puntz and Melissa McCarthy as Donna Stankowski Credit: Netflix[Missing Credit]

Seinfeld’s directorial debut, in which he stars and which he co-wrote, is a paean to his childhood love of Pop-Tarts. As he has put it: “Once I tasted them, I assumed they would not continue to make other types of food, that it would no longer be necessary to eat anything else.” A story of the battle between cereal companies Kellogg’s and Post to create a cereal without milk doesn’t sound promising, I know, but that’s the (true) peg on which Seinfeld hangs an hour and a half of sustained brilliance.

If I tell you that as well as the core cast – including Amy Schumer and Melissa McCarthy – the characters include Nikita Khrushchev, Walter Cronkite, JFK and the infamous Jan 6 US Capitol rioter who wore a shamanic outfit and a bison-horned fur headdress (played sublimely by Hugh Grant, who is also Frosties’ Tony the Tiger) you’ll get some idea of Unfrosted’s eclectic comedic pegs. John Hamm and John Slattery recreating their Mad Men roles provide the extra sugar in this particular cereal bowl.

Milking parlour: (from left) Drew Tarver as Pop, Mikey Day as Crackle, Kyle Mooney as Snap and Andy Daly as Isaiah Lamb Credit: NetflixJohn P. Johnson / Netflix

I won’t bother with the plot, save to say that it revolves around pitch perfect send-ups of mafia and drugs films, with Organised Milk (Christian Slater has a ball as a sinister milkman) and a sugar cartel led by trigger happy overlord El Sucre.

It’s faintly annoying, albeit entirely typical of him, that a man who created and starred in one of the greatest TV comedies of all time, who is now the nonpareil of stand-up, has turned out such a winning comedy – an instant classic, I’d say – with his very first film. But then what else did you expect from Seinfeld?

Utter joy from start to finish.