Lederer was briefly mentored by comedian Jeff Garlin at around the time Garlin was co-creating "Curb Your Enthusiasm". He was the only regular performer, aside from Garlin himself, on Garlin's live, weekly comedy show in the spring of 1998 and hosted when Garlin could not. Lederer consulted on the rewriting of an abortive sitcom pilot by Garlin and the two glancingly considered a writing collaboration on a possible HBO bio of Milton Berle. Later, Lederer assisted Garlin during the making of a short Jackie Gleason documentary and was one of those asked to offer opinions on the feature, "I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With" before the completion of its edit.