In the Seinfeld episode “The Bris,” which originally aired on October 14, 1993, Jerry and Elaine become the godparents to one of their friends’ babies and have to organize the child’s bris. The mohel they end up hiring is an ill-tempered man who doesn’t seem to care for children or his job. Kramer tries to run off with the baby to prevent it from being circumcised, and George passes out in anticipation of the procedure. The agitated mohel then accidentally clips Jerry’s finger in the midst of the chaos.

Though the episode was well received, one person who wasn’t laughing along with everyone else was Jason Alexander. In a 2014 interview with the Television Academy Foundation, Alexander, who’s Jewish, said he found the depiction of the mohel offensive. “To a non-Jew, the whole practice of the circumcision, the bris, is mysterious and kind of distasteful,” he explained. “And to present the figure of the mohel, the person who goes, ‘I’m gonna be the guy. My life’s work is gonna be to remove the foreskin from the genitals of young Jewish boys. That’s what I devote my life to,’ is already a person of questionable character to the non-Jew.”

The One ‘Seinfeld’ Episode Jason Alexander Regrets Filming

Alexander went on to say that he thought having the mohel be an incompetent person who hated children was antisemitic. Because of that, he decided to boycott the episode and ask Larry David to write his character out of the script. David didn’t initially understand Alexander’s concern, but assured him that he would “soften” the mohel’s character in the next draft. It isn’t exactly clear what was removed, though the changes were sufficient enough to get Alexander to agree to be in the episode.

All Alexander said about the version of the script that made it to the table read was that the mohel was “disgusting.” However, he also thinks that the character remained disgusting in the final show. So much so, in fact, that “The Bris” is the one Seinfeld episode Alexander wishes they hadn’t shot. You can hear Alexander’s full thoughts on the subject in the video below.