After Seinfeld ended, Michael did a couple of other projects, but nothing panned out quite as well as before he was on the sitcom. So he went back on the circuit as a stand-up comedian. And one fateful day in 2006, a few audience members bustled into the show loudly, prompting an overreaction from Michael.

In a clip from that performance that went viral, Michael repeatedly calls them the n-word in a two-minute interaction in which his rage is palpable. Many audience members start leaving the show as Michael goes back and forth with the audience member, who is clearly rattled by Michael’s overreaction. As the audience gets unruly, Michael leaves the stage and the host eventually comes back on to apologize.

After an apology-gone-wrong on The Late Show with David Letterman (see the video in the next tweet below), Michael’s career was effectively over. He voiced a small part in Jerry’s The Bee Movie and has made a couple of appearances, but for the most part, he’s kept his head down and out of the limelight. He called activists Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to apologize, although the heckler, Kyle Doss, has said he doesn’t accept Michael’s apology.

Michael did speak about the incident in a 2012 episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee and revealed that it still “haunted” him and was one of the main reasons he retired from stand-up comedy. He did a couple of TV movies after the incident, but he didn't make headlines again until his memoir came out in 2024.