Re: The Simpsons to End
And this... Sorry it's cut-and-paste but you need to register with mediaguardian.co.uk
[i]'The movie will either kill the show or completely reinvigorate it'
As Channel 4 prepares to air The Simpsons next month, creator Matt Groening tells Owen Gibson why he still cares about them
Monday October 4, 2004
The Guardian
Matt Groening, the man who created the Simpsons, has news that will make the Channel 4 executives who recently invested millions in bringing the dysfunctional cartoon family to the channel breathe a large sigh of relief.
The 50-year-old, who embodies the same mix of cynicism and na?ve enthusiasm that make his characters globally famous, insists that as the show enters its 16th season in US, his passion for it remains undimmed. "A few years ago I thought, well, we've got to run out of steam soon and that we'd be done by now. We're not, in fact we're going full steam ahead."
While he admits that for a time he felt that the iconic show was winding down, he now believes it will run and run, perhaps to the end of the decade. And beyond that plans for a Simpsons movie are well under way: "We're trying to tell a story that we wouldn't do on television and take advantage of a longer process and a more ambitious process for animation," says Groening, who looks uncannily like a live version of a character from Springfield, the fictional town where the show is set.
"Everyone on the show this year seems really re-energised and we're starting to throw out ideas for the movie and I think that will either kill the show or completely re-invigorate it," adds Groening, who first sketched the characters 17 years ago to fill a short slot in the Tracey Ullman show.
From those humble beginnings, over the course of more than 330 episodes its cultural impact, not to mention its effect on the bottom line of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, is hard to overestimate. It makes its parent network Fox around ?1.4bn a year in syndication fees, is watched in over 90 countries and in the process has become the most analysed and deconstructed TV show in history.
The bad news for its millions of fans around the world is that it looks like the end is in sight. The overall impression from a day spent with some of the sprawling team of producers, writers, animators and voice talent that make the show is that the goal is to reach 20 seasons, which would take it to 2009 in the States. The series would then overtake Gunsmoke as the longest running entertainment show on US television with its place in history assured.
Groening admits that it gets harder with each series to come up with something new. "It's not a machine, it's a bunch of humans working really hard," he says. "It doesn't get easier because we're still faced with the problem of having a history. We're trying not to repeat ourselves and we're also competing with people's memories of their favourite episode."
Yeardley Smith, the voice of eight-year-old child prodigy Lisa Simpson, admits that bringing the curtain down on the show would be a huge wrench. "I would hope that the writers would pull the plug while we're still at the top of our game so we can go out with a bang instead of a piffle in terms of quality and stuff," she says in a high pitched voice that often veers disconcertingly into that of her character.
Behind the scenes it's been a tense summer at the Fox Studios lot where the Simpsons team meet daily to throw ideas around in a building that was formerly the bungalow of another American icon, Marilyn Monroe. In a development that is becoming increasingly familiar in Hollywood the actors who provide the show's voices went on strike to demand more pay, finally settling for a ?4m a year deal. Their new contracts run for four more years, taking the cast to series 19.
Channel 4, which will start airing the show in November with a themed night of programming devoted to The Simpsons, is expecting an immediate ratings boost but also hopes it will remain a schedule fixture for years. Under the deal, it keeps getting episodes as long as new ones are being made. While Sky One retains the rights to screen the show first, Channel 4 can show episodes new to terrestrial TV from series 12 onwards and batches of repeats. It snatched the show from the BBC following a ferocious bidding war two years ago, when it beat the corporation and Five to bag the rights in a deal worth an estimated ?700,000 per episode. One of the reasons they were so keenly fought over was that repeats consistently get as many viewers as new episodes, bringing over three million viewers to BBC2 at teatime.
Such is the multi-layered nature of the comedy and the care that goes into each episode, which take nine months to make it from script to screen, that it bears up well to repeat viewing. C4's head of acquisitions, June Dromgoole, who was responsible for buying The Simpsons when she worked at the BBC, says she agreed to pay so much because of its timeless quality.
"It's a unique series. They've managed to keep it fresh over all these years. At some point in Friends, they get old and move on. In Frasier, Niles and Daphne have to get married; but The Simpsons is different."
Another reason for her confidence is that the show appeals equally to adults and children and, importantly, to the 16-34 audience that represents Channel 4's holy grail in terms of ad revenue. A typical episode could parody Hitchcock, reference Bauhaus architecture and still provide plenty of visual humour and pratfalls.
"Three obscure jokes in an episode is awesome. But you still need the money shot of Homer getting his head stuck in a toilet or whatever. That's what pays the bills," explains Matt Selman, one of a team of between 18 and 20 writers on the show.
Channel 4 plans to capitalise on this cross-generational appeal by screening the new shows in a prime time slot, probably on a Friday night. Repeat episodes are likely to be scattered throughout the week. In contrast, the BBC played the show at 6pm on BBC2, putting it beyond reach of many adult viewers.
For the team of sharp, snappy, preppy writers who work on the show, some of whom were younger than Bart when the series began, the form gives them enormous freedom. Unlike in live action, the characters never get old and stories can be set anywhere from their front garden to outer space. One show in the series that Channel 4 will air first, for example, features the Simpsons re-cast as characters from American history.
"I look at the show like the movie Groundhog Day. Every day nothing ever happened before and it's a clean slate. A different crazy thing happens and it all goes back to a clean slate," says Selman, who has worked on more than 100 episodes. Another writer, Ian Maxtone-Graham, also points out that as the show has developed, other characters in the Springfield universe have progressively become more rounded and given bigger parts.
Part of the series' genius is the way in which it retains this timeless quality, while still being able to poke fun at contemporary American culture. "We try to pick up on big trends rather than what literally happened yesterday. You try to use what is happening in the world in the big picture to tell universal, timeless stories in funny, new, creative, inspired ways," explains Selman.
If the cartoon appears to have lost its subversive edge since the days when George Bush Snr famously declared it a threat to American family values, Groening says that it's not through lack of trying. "I think we still offend people. American culture is full of people lining up to pretend that something bothers them. But they've learned that they look like idiots when they do so, so they've stopped doing it," he believes.
Groening is from the "liberal side" of the political spectrum. As, it seems, are most of the cast and crew. "We're all going to vote for the same presidential candidate. But we take shots at both sides. We really haven't slammed George Bush as much as we have slammed Clinton. Maybe we feel sort of guilty," says Carolyn Omine, the only female writer on the show.
It is precisely this fiercely protected editorial independence that makes the show ideal for Channel 4, argues Dromgoole. "The attitude of the Simpsons is very akin to the attitude of the channel - edgy and irreverent," she says. And the Simpsons' enormous success, which has given the writers almost unprecedented freedom from network control, also offers them the opportunity to rib their paymasters.
"We've poked fun at Rupert Murdoch a number of times and some of the executives are worried about it, although Rupert himself seems to be very good natured. He played himself as 'evil billionaire tyrant Rupert Murdoch' and good for him. Of course, if I was in his position I would laugh about it too," chuckles Groening.
Groening argues that the US president has become such an easy target for comedians that to attack him in obvious ways is plain lazy. "It's really difficult to be politically satirical and not just pick on easy targets. So we try to do it in a fairly subtle way. Sometimes, what The Simpsons does is take a point of view that is the opposite of what we believe, exaggerate it to the point of ridiculousness and hope people get it," he says. But he also promises Bush a rough ride if he wins in November: "We'll do a lot more if he is re-elected".
And while it's true that the Simpsons have become as familiar to some viewers as their own family and, as such, have lost their power to shock, those who work on the show believe that it represents a victory of sorts. "If we're now part of the establishment, I hope we've changed it for the better," says Jean.
For Groening, the goal remains to maintain the consistently high standards the show has achieved. "You tend to remember the things that were funnier when you saw them first time. It's harder. You've seen so much that it's harder to be surprising. But we're trying."
In the show, Homer once told Lisa: "You tried your best and failed miserably. The lesson is 'never try'". Everyone from Channel 4 chief executive Andy Duncan to Murdoch and millions of viewers will be hoping that Groening continues to disregard the advice of his greatest comic creation. [/i]