Elaine Benes: “Everybody’s calling me Nip!”
Who is Elaine Benes?
Elaine Marie Benes is a fictional character on Seinfeld, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
She used to date Jerry Seinfeld, and their characters remained close friends. This is usually explained when one of them is introducing the other, though the explanation is often not necessary. Her other main friends were George Costanza and Cosmo Kramer.
Elaine was the only character, of those mentioned above, missing from the pilot episode. She would make her first appearance in the second episode, “The Stake Out”. Her character was added because NBC executives felt the show was too male-centric, and demanded that creators Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David add a woman to the cast, or the show would not be renewed.