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Mike Reiss, one of the people at the heart of The Simpsons, has opened up on some of the untold “secrets” of the long-running animation.
Reiss, 66, worked on the first two seasons of The Simpsons as a writer, before becoming co-showrunner, for seasons three and four, which formed part of what is widely considered the “Golden Age” of the seminal animated series. The comedy veteran is about to embark on a tour of the UK, titled Secrets of The Simpsons: Stories and Scandals from Springfield, in which he discusses his years on the show, and his wider comedy career.
Speaking to The Independent ahead of the tour, Reiss dug into the making of the show – including a perilous brush with cancellation 15 years ago, the unlikely origins of the Simpsons’ iconic yellow skin, and a dark plotline involving Homer shooting someone that never made it to air.
Reiss revealed the idea for an episode would have seen The Simpsons take on gun control. “I don’t think we ever did it,” he said. “Homer got a gun, and then he accidentally shoots somebody, but the guy he accidentally shoots was a serial killer.
“And then you go, ‘What’s the message here?’”
The series did ultimately end up exploring gun control in the season nine episode “The Cartridge Family” – in which Homer gets a gun, but the shooting plotline is excised.
He said that the show’s political ideology came from late Simpsons co-creator Sam Simon, “who just said, ‘Nobody should get their political opinions from our show.’”
One of the most fundamental aspects of Simpsons is the characters’ look – namely their distinctive yellow skin. According to Reiss, the origin of the characters’ yellow complexion had been a mystery to all involved, including series creator Matt Groening.
“A while ago, a six-year-old boy asked me, ‘Why are they yellow?’ and I was dumbstruck,” he said. “It never occurred to me. I asked all the writers, animators, and producers, and nobody had any clue. Even Matt Groening said, ‘I didn’t choose the colour.”
Reiss says it took him “a couple of years” to “track down the Hungarian woman who worked in the paint department of our animation studio,” who had, he claimed, unilaterally decided to make the Simpsons yellow.
“It was a very special choice,” he added. “And she had a very pragmatic reason, which was that [Simpsons children] Bart, Lisa and Maggie have no hairline. Nothing separates the hair from their skin. So she figured yellow is kind of like hair, and kind of like skin. That was it.”
At its peak, The Simpsons drew criticism from then-US president George Bush Sr, but largely cultivated a reputation as a show without a history of scandal behind the scenes.
“Our biggest controversies always came from other countries,” said Reiss. “Seventy-one countries around the world love the Simpsons, until we do an episode where The Simpsons comes to their country – and suddenly it’s not so funny anymore.”
Reiss and his creative partner Al Jean left the show after season four to create the cult animated comedy The Critic, with David Mirkin taking over as showrunner for seasons five and six. They subsequently returned, however, with Jean serving as showrunner from seasons 12 to 34, while Reiss worked as a producer and consultant.
During the later years on the show, there was one time when the show came close to cancellation, back in 2011.
“It was gonna get cancelled,” Reiss said. “Not because of ratings or quality, but because the budget had spiralled out of control. It was only because the show had been on the air so long, and everyone got an incremental raise every year – after after 27 years or something, suddenly our budget was huge.
“We were the most expensive half hour on television, and they were gonna cancel us for pure budgetary reasons.”
Ultimately, everyone involved in the show (“the secretaries, the stars, Matt Groening”) took a 30 per cent pay cut, and Fox has continued airing The Simpsons ever since. “We love working on the show. We didn't want it to go away,” he added.
Reiss also spoke about John Swartzwelder, the eccentric libertarian writer responsible for many for many fan-favourite Simpsons moments. Swartzwelder is known for his extreme privacy, almost never allowing himself to be photographed or interviewed. “He has a big home I've never been to,” said Reiss. “Apparently, he has every historic newspaper ever printed – and also owns the very first baseball ever made.”
Outside of his work on The Simpsons, Reiss’s other credits include work on the Ice Age franchise, and the groundbreaking anti-sitcom It’s Garry Shandling’s Show, which ran on Showtime from 1986 to 1990.
It’s Garry Shandling’s Show “really gave birth to almost everything that makes The Simpsons unique,” he said. “You know, musical numbers, breaking the fourth wall, the crazy use of celebrity guests.
“As a man, Garry was a very thoughtful, nice guy – he came to my wedding. But he was the most impossible boss you could ask for. He was just a man you literally could not please. And I don’t mean that in a mean way, because he was never happy with himself.
“He always thought things could be better, and any time you put him in front of the camera, it was always grudgingly, because he just thought, ‘This could be better. This is not good enough.’ So that’s a very tough boss to have.”
After It’s Garry Shandling’s Show finished, Shandling went on to create the acclaimed series The Larry Sanders Show, set behind the scenes of a fictional late-night talk show.
According to Reiss, he and Jean were approached to be part of Larry Sanders, “partly because we had late-night talk show experience with Johnny Carson”.
“And Al and I just said, ‘We don’t want to work one more day for him.’”
Secrets of The Simpsons: Stories and Scandals from Springfield with Mike Reiss is touring the UK in late July and August. Tickets can be found here.
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