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What's the deal with comedians and their cars?

'Round about the time in his life when it should happen for all of us, Jerry Seinfeld's ship came in with a force that almost split the dock. He'd been doing pretty well with his observational style ("There's a cereal now that's just cookies. Have you seen this? Cookies for breakfast. It's called Cookie Crisp. Cookies for breakfast! They oughta just call it 'To Hell With Everything!'"). But he showed no signs of setting the world on fire until he got cast in a show that was either about – depending on the level of comedy geek you ask – the average New Yorker, the very worst people in the world, or nothing. Suddenly Jerry Seinfeld was pretty much the center of the comedy universe. And while his comedy was at once both brilliantly innovative and rooted in the mundane, his next move was a predictable grab at something exotic – he went out and bought his dream car. A rather nice 911, actually. As almost everyone knows, it didn't stop there, and the man put together one of the most enviable collections of iconic Porsches we're likely to see. So what's the connection, if there is one, between cars and comedy? As far as Jerry Seinfeld (the man) is concerned, he's probably not the same guy as the Jerry on Seinfeld (the show) although it's hard to say for sure; his public persona is almost unnervingly well managed. But cars and comedy were the constants in his life then, and, well, just look at what the guy does now; Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee is a cultural constant, and we're certainly seeing Seinfeld the man in that one, and cars are obviously still central to his life. And it's been that way with a lot of very, very good comedy guys. Cars seem to round out their lives, to become the yin to their comedy yang. Ernie Kovacs might not have invented visual gags or surreal humor, but he got them both to kill on television in the 1950s, so he's a comedy hero. He died behind the wheel of his beloved Corvair wagon, so he's absolutely some kind of car-guy hero as well. Bill Cosby, the hottest name in comedy for a good long while, had Ferraris, one of two fire-breathing supercharged big-block Cobras (pictured below), and a BMW 2002tii – none of which either contributed to or in any way make up for the profoundly sociopathic creature he turned out to be, but it's still a data point. The Smothers Brothers, who defied the networks and the norms by getting blatantly political before that sort of thing was cool, went sports car racing.

Jay Leno plugs himself into Porsche's 918 Spyder

As one of the greatest sports car manufacturers of all time, when Porsche puts out a new, ultra-exclusive hypercar, enthusiasts tend to stand up and take note. Jay Leno is no exception, and now, the funnyman is finally getting his time with awesome 918 Spyder.
With his 1963 Porsche 356 and his 2005 Carrera GT flanking a Liquid Silver 918, Leno takes us through the basics of this plug-in hybrid roadster alongside Daniel Eastman of Porsche North America. Following the chat, Leno and Eastman take the German-plated car through the streets of California, testing it in a number of modes and even going on a short, all-electric freeway cruise.
If you're looking to learn more about the 918, or to just here its glorious gas engine at work, you'll want to scroll down and take a look at the latest episode of Jay Leno's Garage.

Porsche 911 R is made for the purist

Who wouldn't welcome a new version of the Porsche 911 with ultra-light weight, a GT3 RS motor, a stripper interior, and a core philosophy of driving fun over outright lap times? The iconic Porsche 911 has been getting larger and more complicated with each passing generation, and that hasn't sat well with every engineer at Porsche. So there's a ready market out there for 911 R, a limited-edition show stopper of just 911 cars, due to start production in Zuffenhausen, Germany, in May. It's a car that combines a unique version of the six-speed manual gearbox, plenty of raw, naturally aspirated flat-six power, and all the feel of a cut-price version of the 911 GT3 RS pseudo racer. Yes, Porsche is bringing the beloved six-speed stick back to the sharp end of the 911, even though the brand's quickest cars are now dominated by the seven-speed dual-clutch transmission (and the less loved seven-speed manual). Porsche insists that the RS is still the 911 to have if it's stopwatch-bashing you need to do. Instead, the 911 R developers focused on trying to give it the most driving purity it could cram in. The most traditional way for motorsport operations to do that has always been to rip out weight. And Porsche Motorsport didn't diverge from the plan. The 911's rear seats have been thrown out, along with a raft of other pieces Porsche Motorsport thought it could either do without completely, redesign to be lighter or stronger, or both. View 18 Photos The R cuts 110 pounds from the next-lightest 911 variant, hitting 3,020 pounds on the scales. The pound-cutting starts at the body and bores all the way into the 911 R's chassis components, though there are some obvious nods to the marketing department that survived the dietician's axe. There is a lot of 911 GT3 in the body, with a combination of a carbon fiber (bonnet and front guards), a magnesium roof, polycarbonate front and side "glass," and aluminum everywhere else. The R cuts 110 pounds from the next-lightest 911 variant, hitting 3,020 pounds on the scales. While the 911 R has lurid (and deletable) red or green racing stripes as standard, it's not supposed to be as wild looking as the GT3. Porsche replaced the GT3's adjustable, tall-standing rear spoiler with a more-subtle pop-up version, and the R uses a rear diffuser under the bumper to offset any loss of rear downforce. The rear seats are gone, and the two remaining seats use carbon fiber shells upholstered in tartan cloth (another nod to early 911s).