Comedian Pat Hazell’s career coup may have been writing for a show about nothing — he was a writer on “Seinfeld” — but these days he’s proffering a live show that’s certainly about something.

Namely, the power of nostalgia.

“This is not nostalgia like, ‘Remember that sunset?’ or ‘Remember that beach?’ ” Hazell says. “This is very specific, like somebody getting hit with a lawn dart. Or that urban myth about stomachs exploding from eating Pop Rocks. These evoke very strong things.”

Hazell’s show, “The Wonder Bread Years,” which comes to the Herberger Theater Center for a six-week run, trafficks in archetypal memories of American childhood — from Saturday morning cartoons and Cap’n Crunch cereal to the obligatory family vacation photos in front of national monuments.

Backed by glowing blurbs by Jerry Seinfeld, “Wonder Bread” has proved a hit touring the country, so much so that Hazell imagines creating a franchise with other performers doing the show (a trend with comedy
concept shows like this and “Menopause: The Musical”).

In the Valley, “Wonder Bread” will be performed by actor John Mueller, who starred in “Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story.”

Mueller’s guitar chops come in handy, Hazell says, when it comes time to perform favorite TV theme songs on a guitar shaped like a cereal box.

THE POWER OF POP

Hazell’s “Wonder Bread Years” starts with a serious thesis — “How we wonder,” he says, “and how we lost it and what it takes to get it back” — and spins comedy from common experiences, like sitting at the kids’ table at holidays and tasting unsweetened Baker’s chocolate.

“Everyone has a version of that,” he says. “Whether it’s Ex-Lax or bouillon cubes. What I think is very powerful about this material is that people haven’t thought about it in a long time.”

If there’s a larger lesson to be pulled from the show, it’s that America’s adults, from boomers to today’s twentysomethings, have been shaped by rather cushy childhoods, and the ties that bind us are largely the stuff of entertainment.

Witness the popularity of merchandise that celebrates yesteryear: Hot Topic sells lunchboxes and T-shirts sporting old Nintendo characters; DVDs of old TV favorites like “Schoolhouse Rock!,” Sid and Marty Krofft shows and, heck, even “The Greatest American Hero” do gangbusters at retail; even cable channel VH1 has capitalized on pop nostalgia with its
snarky time-machine shows like “I Love the ’80s.”

“The thing about our culture is, we’re not laying rail, we’re not catching buffalo, we’re not going through hard times,” Hazell says. “It’s about recreation and leisure.”

Against that, his “The Wonder Bread Years” is equal parts comedy and shimmery time-machine trip.

“It’s like, ‘Oh my God, we did that,’ in addition to the comedy,” Hazell says. “It’s akin to the power of somebody winning an auction on eBay of something that’s long lost. They get jazzed up about it.”