The Simpsons began as a series of "bumpers" or animated shorts for on April 19, 1987, and premiered as a full animated series on December 17, 1989, on FOX. The first episode was "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire" (pictured). Regular broadcasts began on Sunday night beginning January 14, 1990.
Matt Groening, the artist behind the comic strip Life in Hell, created the Simpson family using the names of his own father, mother, and sisters. (If you look closely at Homer Simpson, his thin hairline and his ear form the initials M.G.) He also has a sister named Patty, but no brother named Bart. His brother is named Mark.
He grew up in Portland, Oregon, which neighbors a town called Springfield. He has said that, as a child, he loved that Father Knows Best was set in Springfield because he imagined it being his Springfield.
Matt Groening grew up watching all the old Warner Bros. cartoons—Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Roadrunner —as well as Rocky and Bullwinkle. He kept his character design simple to mimic the characters from those classic cartoons. He also grew up watching The Flintstones, but he knew he could do better.
James L. Brooks was the executive producer of The Tracey Ullman show and wanted to include animated shorts in the program. He had seen Groening’s Life in Hell strip and asked Groening to pitch some ideas.
Groening has later said that only when he got to Brooks’ office did he realize that doing Life in Hell on TV would mean surrendering his rights to them. So, on the fly, Groening came up with the now-iconic characters loosely modeled on his own family. Forty-eight one-minute Simpsons shorts aired on the program. Ultimately, Brooks noticed that they were getting a lot of attention. He also knew that Matt Groening dreamed of making a primetime animated series, even though there were none at the time. Brooks, with his background in sitcoms (The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Taxi) and Groening, with his experience as a cartoonist and animator, were the perfect pair to create The Simpsons as we know it today—which looks and sounds notably different from its original iteration
Today, each half-hour episode takes approximately eight months to make, from when the story breaks in the writer's room, to having an episode animated by Film Roman, to when the cast records their lines.
For the first four seasons, much of the focus was on Bart and his pranks. Gradually the spotlight shifted to Homer because there are more opportunities for jokes and much more dire consequences for Homer's actions.
Dan Castellaneta (Homer) and Julie Kavner (Marge) were regular members of The Tracey Ullman Show cast when they were asked to voice characters for The Simpsons. Nancy Cartwright originally auditioned for the role of Lisa, but she was more interested in Bart, so they let her audition for Bart instead. Hank Azaria joined the cast in the second season with very little voice-over work to his credit. Yeardley Smith never meant to do voice-over work, but went to The Simpsons audition because she was "the actress who went to every audition." Matt Groening was impressed with Harry Shearer in This is Spinal Tap and asked him to be a part of The Simpsons cast.
In 1991, Tracey Ullman sued 20th Century Fox for a percentage of the profits made from The Simpsons merchandise. She claimed that her contract gave her a piece of any merchandising profits that would stem from the show. However, James L. Brooks testified that she had no part in creating The Simpsons animated shorts that were part of The Tracey Ullman Show.
The Simpsons is the longest-running scripted show in TV history. Since premiering in December 1989, the series has become a cultural phenomenon, recognizable throughout the world. The show was named the “Best Show of the 20th Century” by Time magazine and “Greatest American Sitcom” by Entertainment Weekly. has won more than thirty Emmys, and its theatrical short was nominated for a 2012 Academy Award.
On Dec. 17, 1989, Fox debuted The Simpsons as its own stand-alone show with a Christmas special episode. The Hollywood Reporter’s original review of the series is below.
The Simpsons may well be the most moronic middle-class family since the beginning of time. But, hey, that’s what makes them so extra special.
The fact that cartoonist Matt Groening has been able to get away with slamming the American bourgeoisie since last January has been a miracle, one of getting stuff past execs who live in a culture where the idea of a major experience is a backyard barbeque with the in-laws. Groening has gone beyond his deliberately annoying snippets from The Tracey Ullman Show and expanded them into a FBC Christmas special called Simpsons: Roasting on an Open Fire Christmas Special.
For those unfamiliar with this particular horror of a nuclear family, it consists of dad Homer (voice of Dan Castellaneta), mom Marge (Julie Kavner), kid Bart (Nancy Cartwright) and fellow munchkin Lisa (Yeardley Smith). Also in there are Harry Shearer, Penny Marshall and Marcia Wallace.
In this particular episode, the family has run out of money because Bart has gone and had a tattoo removed, a procedure that costs them all their holiday money.
Homer has to get a job as a department store Santa — and of course, by incredible coincidence, his son discovers that the old man has had to resort to desperate measures.
Matters aren’t helped any when Homer has to face the inevitability that federal and state deductions have reduced his paycheck to just about enough to feed a gerbil.
This is not exactly a laugh riot by anybody’s standard. But Groening has a talent for understating stupidity.
That’s a redeeming quality that overrides just about everything else. The animation is little better than what we get on Saturday morning cartoons.
But, oddly enough, that generally works in favor of the show’s satiric intent. The sort of stilted junk that the ordinary crumb-cruncher accepts as passable animation is all the more acceptable if it makes its point in understandable visual terms.
As usual in the Simpson family, there’s dialogue here that’s enough to keep the average adult from jumping out of the nearest window.
Lisa gives us a monologue on the meaning of life that should seem familiar enough to anybody who has spent any time exposed to the perils of psychotherapy.
And Bart reminds us of one of the many falsehoods that get thrown at us every year: “If TV has taught us anything, it’s that miracles always happen to some kids at Christmas.” — Bruce Bailey, originally published on Dec. 22, 1989.
What more can I possibly say about a TV show that has already been praised to death? I was 15 when the Simpsons first aired and I'm 25 now. I've seen every single episode, and I'd have to say it's a rare combination of factors that come together to make The Simpsons the best show ever.It's a very clever and intelligent show - they never dumb anything down - and as creator Matt Groening has remarked, "The Simpsons is a show that rewards paying attention." There are always enough obscure pop-culture references or subtle background gags to ensure that the second, third, or tenth viewing of an episode will find you noticing something you hadn't before.In the early days of The Simpsons, they derived a large part of their popularity from the everyday, down-to-earth, unglamorous, average-blue-collar-slob aspect of the Simpson family. Homer is lazy and doesn't like his job, Bart doesn't excel at school, the plastic ketchup bottle they use at the dinner table makes that farting sound, and so on. This aspect of the program contrasts it with popular 80's family sitcoms such as The Cosby Show which always featured impossibly well-functioning families who got along a little too perfectly and usually learned a neat little lesson at the end of each episode. An early tag-line for The Simpsons said that they "put the Fun back in Dysfunctional."Perhaps this blue-collar-slobness by itself is nothing shockingly original - think of previous TV shows such as Roseanne, Married with Children, All in the Family, The Honeymooners - but the Simpsons doesn't stop there. This show is extremely densely packed with jokes - everything from cerebral witticisms and sly satire to Homer falling down and going "D'oh!" Because it's a cartoon, the writers can get away with surreal gags such as the time Homer tells a joke which falls flat, after which a long silence happens which is punctuated by a single tumbleweed rolling through the Simpson's living room.
There are just too many things to mention about The Simpsons. It can be touching occasionally; more often the viewers are treated to an unequalled cavalcade of obscure references, surreal sight gags, wacky adventures, self-mocking irony... The list goes on and on. Just watch it, else you're missing out on one of the most important elements of 1990's popular culture.