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Writing For The Simpsons (with Carolyn Omine) · Four Finger Discount (Simpsons Podcast)

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  This podcast is brought to you by Patreon dot com slash four finger Discount,
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  home to all of our exclusive shows including Tales of Futurama, Talking Seinfeld,
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  Speaking of the Hill, The Movie Guys, and so much more. Plus
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  you also get a whole range of cromulent goodies that are short term and beg
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  in your life. So go ahead and support the show today by joining the
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  four Finger Discount family on Patreon. Hey, everybody, welcome to four Fingered
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  Discount Extra. I am at Brendan Dano. Thank you for tuning into the
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  show this week. I am, of course incredibly excited because this week I
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  was fortunate enough to be joined by one of my favorite Simpsons writers of all
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  time. She is the amazing Carolyn Amine, and she was kind enough to
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  give me over an hour of her time. We're we cover a whole range
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  of topics, including her first down the job at Simpsons HQ, which gave
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  that she pleaded with Mike Scullery to be taken out of a script being the
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  only woman in the Simpsons writers room. We even talked about how she wrote
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  stuper Sexy Flanders. Plus we also delve into two of my favorite more recent
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  episodes Halloween of Horror and a mid childhood Night's Dream, both of which she
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  wrote. Now, if you enjoyed the show, I would absolutely love if
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  you could please show your support by joining the four Finger Discant family on Patreon,
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  where you will get early and ad free access to next week's episode of
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  four Finger Discount Extra, where I will be joined by Lyddy Out from the
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  Simpsons Theory. Of course, we also have our four exclusive podcasts on their
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  available as well. Plus we also have access to our discord server Facebook community.
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  A whole lot of fun. But for now enough shilling. Thank you
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  for tuning into the show. But let's sit back and enjoy my conversation with
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  the incredible Carolyn Amine. So Halloween is Halloween this week. I know your
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  boys moved away to college, but do you still do much for Halloween?
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  I feel really we just had Halloween. Yeah, and uh, my neighborhood
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  used to be so into Halloween and it hasn't recovered since the pandemic. Okay,
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  I mean there was there were a few people, but it used to
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  be like, you know you from like four o'clock, you would you could
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  open the door, you could hear like in the neighborhood people, you know,
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  kids laughing, and and it hasn't come back yet. It's made me
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  a little bit sad. But we used to. We would have like in
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  the you know, early evening, the little little kids and then they get
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  older, and then then then later and then I we'd have people coming in
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  from other neighborhoods into ours. Halloween was never a thing in Australia until about
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  maybe three four years ago, and then we well whether we had the pandemic
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  and was slowly starting to sort of build it up now. But as a
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  kid growing up in the nineties, I always to watch a treasts of Horror
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  and all these horror movies and think I want to do this and now finally
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  I can live through my kids. Oh that's so great. Yeah, so
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  the first Halloween this year. But how mad is the the rot Is Room
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  right now? Because you've just finished the strike And I was talking to Matt
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  a couple of weeks ago, an you guys, it's just absolutely crazy.
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  Now. Yeah, it's gonna be hard because we're doing two table reads a
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  week for a couple of weeks and so that's going to be hard and hard
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  for the animators too. I feel bad for everybody because uh yeah, and
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  our support staff in general like having to just go kind of crazy. But
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  and we're not. We don't want to cross these picket lines and with sag
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  and stuff. Although our actors are we have a separate contract stone. I
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  think they can work right now, but so we don't want to cross the
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  picket line to get onto the box. So we've been going to other We've
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  been working out of our it's currently working out of the animation studios. But
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  for a while we were like half of us were at Bleeding Fingers, which
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  is our music people, and half we're at in Burbank, And then like
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  five of us got COVID. Is this your first time of having COVID?
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  It is? I was so bummed because like like I'm like one of maybe
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  three who haven't gotten it. So I was a little bit of like maybe
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  I'm super human untouchable. That might have been my undoing. Maybe I was
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  little Yeah, I mean too the mindset though of a writer, no,
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  someone as creative as you during the strike process, because I know the main
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  focus was we're not going to be working technically, but someone like you who's
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  so creative, do you ever actually can you switch off or you're always just
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  working in some in some way, I you know, I I that's other
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  times we have I mean you're not supposed to, but yeah, exactly.
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  Yeah. The last strike, I remember thinking like I'm going to write a
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  novel and I'm gonna do that, but then I never did. And I
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  didn't do it this time either. But this time was different for me because
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  we have this I'm not sure if you know we would since season thirty three
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  and thirty four we were doing this thing where we have co co showrunners,
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  so like under Selman, each of us were in charge of four episodes per
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  season. And I'm not gonna do that anymore. So okay, so I'm
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  just going back to being a writer. So is it a personal choice?
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  Yeah, I mean there's a personal choice as a business choice. I mean,
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  you know, like in Just Broad Strokes, it was like it was
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  sort of offered and it was like this thing that I mean, for me,
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  it's gonna was gonna be a lot more work because I am very much
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  a control free and you know, I was a at one point wanted to
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  be an an, So I'm very very involved in animation and like when we
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  do you know, I mind like very hands on in the you know,
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  storyboarding and the designs and then and then I'm very opinionated the music and the
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  editing, and so I ended up, you know, it's just I work.
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  When I was doing these four episodes, I was just doing I was
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  just constantly, constantly working. And when when it was first offered, I,
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  you know, Salmon said, you know, is there any is there
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  any story that we were all off at that point because it was like the
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  actors were hadn't you know, we were between a contract negotiation, so we
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  were while we were waiting for the actors to sign their contracts. And so
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  he told us for and we didn't tell the rest of the staff yet,
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  but he said, you know, if there's any story you've heard or you
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  had any ideas for something, you know, because you know, besides what
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  you're writing, you're going to be in charge of. And so I had
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  had this thing where John Frank had pitched like he wanted to do there was
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  that TV show alone, and at first he wanted to do like the Simpsons
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  got on that you know, we're in that contest or whatever, and then
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  we were like, you know, maybe you shouldn't be the contest, let's
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  think of another way, and we really kind of just did an afternoon on
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  it. And at the same time I had told him, you know,
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  there was this thing I'd seen about these honeymoon cabins that had been left abandoned,
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  and then so I sent them to him. And it was one of
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  those things that sometimes a story will stick in my head even though it's not
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  my story, and I'll just go off and start so writing this story in
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  my head, you know. And so when Selman said that, when he
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  mentioned, like, is there any story he'd like to do, I was
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  like, yes, actually, because I had sort of come up with the
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  idea in my mind of for the story for Pixelated and Afraid because one of
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  the things during our talk at one point Simon went we talked about how when
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  alone, this guy kills the wolverine, and then Slone was like, Oh,
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  my god, wouldn't it be awful if, like we'd be crazy if
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  Homer killed a wolverine. And so in my mind I just sort of had
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  like the challenge would be, like to make it not only acceptable that Homer
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  kills the wolverine, but like could do it so that it was like the
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  most romantic thing you could do. And so I had come up with this
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  idea and I was like, yes, I really want to do this idea.
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  And I started, you know, we couldn't meet with John or anybody,
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  so because nobody else knew this thing was happening. So I started writing
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  this story and I was very very excited about it, and I knew what
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  I thought about this others, you know. So I had all these story
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  ideas and I was really excited about this thing I was going to do.
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  And then then they came to us with like the awf of what was you
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  know, because first they had to deal with the actors, and then they're
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  like, okay, so here's the deal. Zero percent raise, no credit,
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  no and the same title. And so it was like, okay,
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  so for nothing, I'm going to be working all these extra holities. So
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  and you know, I was like, all right, well, it's kind
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  of hard to to not feel like a huge chump. But then the other
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  hand, the opportunity to have a little bit more say and to like,
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  generally, when whoever is running the rewrite room is basically the writer, you
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  know, because it's all going to be filtered to them, So to be
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  the filter to be the one who runs a rewrite room and the one who
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  decides a lot of the things, and of course it's always going to be
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  under Salmon's supervision. I was like, all right, that is that's not
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  nothing. So I decided that's that's what. So I did tell myself,
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  like my plan was, I'm just gonna use a shit out of it.
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  I'm just gonna really these episodes, I'm just gonna like, I'm just gonna
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  do it to the hill. And I will say that there came a point
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  where at one point, and it was starting out with pixelating and afraid that
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  like I had a very strong idea of like how I wanted it to be,
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  and one of the things that I wanted to be very different from our
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  usual. Usually in a story, somebody will point out, hey, this
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  is what's wrong with you, Like in this case, Lisa and Bart say
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  you guys aren't romantic enough, and they say, no, we're fine,
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  and then usually that means later they're going to find oh, no, we
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  weren't romantic enough, and they learned their lesson. But what I wanted was
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  I wanted that they would say no, we're fine, we're great, and
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  then they would be right, and you know, which was not the usual
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  story path you take, and that I feel like most kids and most I
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  think all of us, you know, this sort of Instagram world we see
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  like a couple of goals and stuff like that. What you think a couple
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  should be and what romance is is very different from like actual old I'm not
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  old love, but like a love that's been for a while, where it's
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  comfy and it's the person who can help you get the splinter out of your
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  foot or whatever, you know, or like help you you know, like
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  just those cozy, schlubby that kind of love. That's what real love is.
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  And so it was really that's what I wanted. But there was this
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  movement to try and make it a normal story, because whenever you have this
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  thing where you deal with eleven writers, everybody's gonna want to go, well,
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  here's the note I'm going to give because it's a normal note, which
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  is, oh, there already seem a little romantic at the beginning, Like
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  there was a note about you know, Homer feeding her cheese puffs already seems
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  romantic. So and I was like, yeah, that's the point. But
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  I think had they given me a raise, and it was actual promotion.
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  I think that I would have felt like, okay, you know, I
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  got to take your note, but because I wasn't, I was. I
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  just felt like, look, the only thing I'm getting out of this is
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  that I get to do it my way, so I'm going to insist that
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  it be this way. And so in a way I kind of feel like
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  had it, you know that in the end, in an artistic way,
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  it sort of helped it because it did make me have to say, like
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  I might not have had the guts to like stand up and say no,
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  I want this this, I want to do it this different way and that's
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  why we're doing it, and you know so, but maybe so in the
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  end, maybe that's that's uh, you know that maybe that all worked out
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  for the best. But this is a really long answer to this is a
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  personal decision. It's great, yeah, you know, but but so after
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  two years of this, then you know, the next offer was zero more
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  percent. Then I was like, uh, now I'm good. I mean,
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  I'm only getting artistic fulfillment out of this, which is great. It's
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  not a small thing, it's a huge thing. But I was like,
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  I'm fulfilled. I guess it's kind of a case of, you know,
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  I did it for no extra money. I prove what I can do with
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  my with my work. How about you stop paying me more now? No
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  thanks, Okay. It's amazing to think though, that Fox or Disney,
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  whoever was running the shot at the time, them being cheap skates somehow resulted
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  in you putting in a better product in spite. I think so in a
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  weird way, it did. And they don't tell them that we've discovered the
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  secret. I mean, the biggest problem in show business. I'm gonna tell
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  you the biggest problem the show is not No, it's not the biggest problem.
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  A problem is that the people who negotiate our contracts and stuff are not
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  the people who are in the room doing work. So yeah, I mean,
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  it's it's it really would depend on people within the room having to like
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  go to bat for me. But at the same time, you know,
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  everybody's like, you know that their own struggles, But yeah, no,
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  I don't. I don't know that. Like it's hard to say, Like
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  Fox and Disney don't don't get how good I am. I what whoever Fox
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  and Disney are, They're just like this giant like I'm not sure who should
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  know, but the people who negotiate the contracts are not the people who know.
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  They don't. How did the relationship change between the execs per se and
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  the stuff you guys when Disney took over? Was there a shift? No?
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  Not really? But did I did I just kick the same people on
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  like when it comes to Fox? I mean, you know, that's what
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  I'm saying. There's a whole disconnect because so I only deal with you know,
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  we we deal with Matt Salman, and so it's a good person to
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  deal with. Yeah, and Matt would I mean, I'm maybe Matt has
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  more insight. Yeah, I don't know that they're not you know, they're
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  not like showing up them. Yeah, you know, it's uh yeah as
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  middleman. Yeah. Do you think we should expect a write a strike based
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  episode of someone collin in season thirty six? Or was it just let's just
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  pretend that never happened? There is an episode Czar did, an episode that
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  does have sort of a union theme to it. Yeah, I don't know
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  that it's writers strike based, but I think just you know, it's good.
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  I think I do feel like just this in America. I don't know
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  things are in Australia, but you know, because writers, the actors,
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  the ui W hotel worker, i mean, there's everybody's sound strike and I
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  think there is a general undercurrent of just sort of reawakening of people starting to
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  understand that, you know, the actual people who do the work should be
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  compensated barely, and that things have been going the other way for a long
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  time where just the people with a lot of money, you know, just
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  keep kind of hoarding it to themselves. It's just nice that everyone seems to
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  sort of be on the same the same mindset now we have to stick together,
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  because it felt like for a while they're saying that from from a fire
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  that you know, there was the rumblings that you know, we're not getting
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  we're getting screwed here, but no one's really going to sort of speak up.
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  But now that everyone's on the same team going we want more, and
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  so it was just great to see yeah, yeah, they're they're yeah.
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  It's it's strange. Every once in a while I'll notice because everyone it's so
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  strange to me when there are people who feel the opposite, especially if they
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  are I mean, there's a thing that happens in America and I don't know
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  if it happens in Australia too, but I think sometimes there are people who
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  who want the rich to get away with paying less taxes and less help and
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  alls because they think of themselves as like, I'm just I'm gonna be rich,
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  so I'm locome like I'm just a frustrated billionaire right now, but but
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  one day it's gonna happen to me. So they put up with laws that
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  aren't in their favor and in hopes of one day being the rich guy.
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  But I think people are starting to understand that. Yeah, so I'm just
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  realizing that you know you, so you screwed yourself over them in the first
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  place by putting out a great product when you won't getting paid enough. One
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  thing, I used to work in a factory right and my very first day
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  I was trying to work hard impress the boss. I used to work at
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  Ford before it closed in Australia. I'll never forget. Towards the end of
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  my shift, this old man who I worked with for the day just went
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  slow down. I was like, what do you slow down? Over time?
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  It's just that ment kind of never showed them how good you were working
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  because I expected every other day. Yeah, I mean, you know,
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  I do think that like in the you know, early on I heard that
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  when you know, I wasn't there at the beginning of the sentence, but
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  I was there with like people like George Meyer and John Shwartzwelder and like that
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  who came would come in and we talk about and they said that, like
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  at the very beginning that Sam Simon came in and said, you know,
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  here's this crazy idea we have and it's probably going to be thirteen episodes and
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  we'll be done. And so there was this very this mindset of like,
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  let's just do it. Let's just do a really good job. And I
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  think, I think, you know, just ultimately as a as an artist.
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  And I always like, I always like cringe when I say artists because
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  it sounds so pretentious, but I there is sometimes you have to kind of
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  think in a sort of pure way because you're really the only one who's going
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  to be able to like try and keep this thing pure. So yeah,
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  I thought that was how I was going to approach these eight episodes that I
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  would have in my care to sort of be like it, Yeah, like
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  I'm gonna I'm just gonna go balls to the walls. Yeah, with that
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  first season, there was no expectation was there. It was just here's a
• 20:07
  go make a show. And then but by the time you came around,
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  what was it like, was that was the running room? That feels like
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  there was an expectation to live up to because The Simpsons was such so critically
• 20:17
  acclaimed at that point. Yeah, yeah, no, definitely that by the
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  time I got there there, everybody was like, I remember when I was
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  interviewing because Mike Scully hired me, okay, and I remember him saying that
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  like that, he was just sort of admitting to me how terrified he was
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  like when he took over, because it's like, you don't want to be
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  the one that screws it up, yeap, and and many people do.
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  Pigeonhole Mike and is saying that's when the show changed. But I remember,
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  you know, from a workers perspective though, wasn't he the show runner that
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  introduced the go home at a normal time. We're finishing at a normal time
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  work day. It was like knocking off at six as opposed to we're staying
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  till two am until we get the right joke. Mentality. He definitely was.
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  I don't like since I started with him, I don't know, I
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  do. I did hear that it had there had been some terrible hours,
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  you know, I left my Oh he's great, Oh brilliant. Yeah.
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  Now I want to touch on something. I was going back and doing my
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  research for this, for this chat, and I was going through all the
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  lists of female writers that the show has had over the years, and I
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  couldn't help but notice something that absolutely astounded me. So that correct me if
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  I'm wrong. Now, besides Mimi Pond getting her name as a writer for
• 21:36
  the pilot and now writing an episode in season two, you were one of
• 21:40
  only a couple female writers to actually get a solo writing credit who wasn't either
• 21:45
  married or related to a male staff member until like something around the show's twentieth
• 21:49
  season. But regardless that, there was nowhere near enough female staff writers on
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  the simps. And I will say, I just to like not to just
• 21:59
  Mimi part who was a friend of Matt braining she was a cartoonist. She
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  hadn't I don't know that she had had any writing credits before that, but
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  it's sort of a misnomber to say that she wrote the pilot, because the
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  actual pilot of the show is the episode that is written by Sam Simon and
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  Matt Graine. I think it's the only episode that has Yeah, someone chanted
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  a Thing's the actual pilot, right. It came back and looking terrible,
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  and Silverman and kind had to fix it. You know, it was they
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  were you know, it was everybody who's learning how to do animation. And
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  so apparently when it came back, the first animation came back, they were
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  like, oh no, and they had to like fix a bunch of stuff,
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  and then they were like and then like, I think the next episode
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  in the in the order came up and it was Mimi, who was a
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  freelance writer, so the script had been I mean all scripts are rewritten quite
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  a bit. Yeah, Yeah, freelance writers tend to be were rewritten because
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  you know, they're they're not in they're not they don't have access to like
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  the discussions about the show because they kind of come in, they pitch,
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  and then they and and also and especially for a show that is new,
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  so you know, she she had no idea what the show actually looks like
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  or looked like. So but anyway, yeah, I think Jennifer Crittendon.
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  I think she. I definitely think she had, Uh, she had a
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  few a couple of episodes. Yes, So you look, there's only a
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  couple of handful like you and maybe Jennifer and a couple of And it's just
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  amazes me how a show can be going be so popular on TV. But
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  is that just the sun of the times? I guess, like, what
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  what was the mentality behind just such a male dominated ROTS room? I mean
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  part of it, I mean, there's a couple of things. Part of
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  it is like the show is very at the time, it was very rare
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  to have a show where you didn't have any network and studio interference, so
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  anybody who came on the show never was not going to leave. So there
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  was there was that, like there just wasn't a big turnover. And too
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  you have like coming out of the Harvard lampoon and all so and a lot
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  of those guys. Know I feel weird saying because I don't really didn't go
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  to Harvard, but I know other women who you know, had experiences difficult
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  getting into like women who are very good writers and proved to be quite brilliant
• 24:33
  in other when they had other opportunities had a hard time getting into the Harvard
• 24:38
  mypoon, So I don't know. I think it was maybe started there and
• 24:44
  like and so yeah, I by the time I got there, I remember
• 24:49
  because you know, for a long time, I was the only woman in
• 24:53
  the room, even like Julia Thack, Julie Sacker was there a lot of
• 25:00
  the times, but she was not all the time, not a full time
• 25:06
  And so it I think that part, I think that can be unpleasant for
• 25:11
  some people, But I didn't find it that unpleasant. Did you feel you
• 25:18
  couldn't speak Was there something you wanted to speak up about? But it just
• 25:19
  didn't feel like it was going to be hurt or speak up to say?
• 25:26
  Is there no other is it to say? Like, it would have been
• 25:29
  nice to have another female writer sort of bounce ideas off of Right when you're
• 25:33
  writing like a March centric episode, a forty year old male isn't going to
• 25:37
  understand the March character as much as like a from from an experienced perspective of
• 25:41
  say, a female writer, you know, right, I mean that was
• 25:45
  I mean that? Yeah, I don't know that I I yeah, I
• 25:48
  don't know if I ever like said, hey, we get us another woman
• 25:52
  exactly. Yeah, they weren't really hiring in general, so it was like,
• 26:00
  I mean, I can remember later when I was like, really,
• 26:07
  another guy like what we did. But I did find myself sometimes not wanting
• 26:14
  to say I mean, sometimes I would want to say well, as a
• 26:15
  woman, I don't think this, or and then at I trying to not
• 26:19
  want to say that too much because I don't want to be like I represent
• 26:25
  everybody, like my vote should count play more than everybody else. But and
• 26:32
  I don't know that it came up right. I felt that was true all
• 26:36
  the time, but there definitely were certain times where I was like, no,
• 26:38
  that's not what we think. And it just would be the most bizarre
• 26:44
  things too, you know. Just I remember there was like one time where
• 26:48
  it was like I was getting really frustrated because they were it was about how
• 26:52
  they wanted to pitch his line where Lisa was like, and we don't even
• 26:55
  have the good toys. We have to play with stupid dolls and we want
• 26:59
  to play with chemistry SAIDs and rockets, and I was like, that's not
• 27:02
  true, like I do or know, yeah, but take me to how
• 27:11
  you got your position on the show, because he said they weren't hiring all
• 27:14
  that often, So how did you make that happen? Well, I do
• 27:21
  so what I've heard from Brian Scully, who's my Skilles brother. I had
• 27:27
  been on a show with him and he told me once and he's so sweet,
• 27:32
  but he he told me, he said, look, I knew that
• 27:36
  I could maybe recommend that. He said, I didn't want to recommend too
• 27:40
  many people to my brother, because I'm sure everybody recommends people. So he
• 27:45
  said that I thought really hard about who I was going to recommend and what
• 27:48
  I recommended. You wait, that was definitely my intro. And then my
• 27:55
  agent is also my Stones agent, so my agent I had interviewed and what
• 28:03
  was your mindset where you scared? Yeah, I was really scared. I
• 28:08
  also because I didn't it took so long for me to get the job because
• 28:12
  I I interviewed and then and then that's still Hartman thing happened, and so
• 28:22
  it was like they were just like, we're not doing anything for a minute,
• 28:27
  and Dave and I think they told my agent like it's not a no,
• 28:33
  but we're we're just not We're just not doing anything. So it was
• 28:36
  like two months had passed and I should have given up hope, because,
• 28:40
  like you know, usually if you interview for a job and you don't hear
• 28:44
  for two months, it usually means you can forget it. But but they
• 28:48
  had they did kick sort of checking in and I was like okay, and
• 28:52
  then when I got it, I was like I remember first being super elated
• 28:56
  and happy and and then I had I had had a lot of success in
• 29:02
  my early career where I felt like I knew that I could go to a
• 29:07
  room and I could go and I knew how to contribute. Yeah, and
• 29:11
  I knew like okay, I know what to do. But then alsoid I
• 29:12
  was like I'm going to go now this this room is going to be different.
• 29:17
  And I really had like this one moment of like as I was driving
• 29:21
  it like maybe I want to go back what I can do? But yeah,
• 29:27
  no, I think I did. Okay. Everybody always told me that
• 29:30
  like George Meyer was the person you had to impress and he could be kind
• 29:34
  of tough, and although I didn't really find that to be true, I
• 29:38
  mean, I think we just sort of hit it off. I'm not sure.
• 29:41
  I think we just sort of have a similar sense of humor. Was
• 29:45
  there something you'd wanted for a while or was it just something that sort of
• 29:48
  popped up and you went, oh, you guess So this was because in
• 29:49
  the ninety seven ish, wasn't it when you when you got your gig ninety
• 29:52
  seven ninety eight ish? Yeah, because ninety eight was was Phils. Yeah.
• 29:56
  So at that time and it's still argue with to this day, was
• 30:00
  the Simpsons writers room for writers sort of like the mecca? Absolutely, it
• 30:06
  was at that point for me, it was the ultimate. It was like,
• 30:11
  Okay, this is everything, this is the best. Did you have
• 30:14
  ideas already going in what you and you watched the show and gone, oh,
• 30:17
  I'd love to do this with my module. Was it just going in
• 30:19
  fresh and thinking nobody is once you got there? I don't think I had.
• 30:23
  I don't think I had any ideas. I was just like okay,
• 30:27
  I just kind of And it did turn out to be true that like they
• 30:33
  you know, it was gonna take a while to get us, Like I
• 30:37
  was on for like a year before I got a script. Now we're I
• 30:41
  feel like we're more like, Okay, when there's new writers, we gotta
• 30:42
  get them scripts. And you know, my main thing was like I'm I'm
• 30:45
  an improv person. So I was just like, I'm going to go in
• 30:51
  and my main thing, like the main advice I give people who want to
• 30:55
  be a TV writer, because this is what most of your job is,
• 30:57
  is like go win and be the solver. And as I'm often I'm often
• 31:04
  the only woman or one of two women in these rooms now and now I
• 31:10
  think there's more women now. So what you kind of learn is to be
• 31:15
  seen as somebody that's helpful. Is sometimes there are jokes one of our shorthands
• 31:22
  where it is like cranberry sauce because like, okay, so it's like,
• 31:29
  you know, it's kind of like the example is or where this phrase cranberry
• 31:33
  sauce comes in, is like you're pitching jokes and it's all silent because everybody
• 31:37
  has any ideas, and then then you go, okay, well all right,
• 31:41
  and then then they have Thanksgiving dinner and then all of suddenverybody's like cranberry
• 31:45
  sauce gravy, like you know, everybody, there's certain jokes where everybody knows,
• 31:51
  you know. So I realized and I sort of learned early on that
• 31:55
  sometimes this is definitely a thing that happens to women and maybe hopefully happens least
• 32:00
  now that there's more word is that sometimes your voice doesn't get hurt and it's
• 32:05
  hard to shout above the boys, and so sometimes I just be like,
• 32:08
  okay when there's the cranberry, when there's a joke, and everybody's great,
• 32:12
  but you know, I can try and like slip into the blank spots.
• 32:16
  But the best strategy for me is to wait for the jokes that where everybody
• 32:22
  goes silent because they can't think of anything, and then be the saver there.
• 32:27
  That's where you can be seen as like, oh, thank god,
• 32:31
  that person. And so that that was my strategy, was that I was
• 32:35
  just gonna be that person. And I don't know, but I know that
• 32:40
  when I got home that day that my agent had told me that Mike Scully
• 32:45
  had called him that day after my first answer, she's gonna she's gonna be
• 32:49
  fine that way. So I had a good day. And I remember my
• 32:53
  first joke that got in and it was on the first day, and it
• 32:58
  was it's not an episode. I don't even think I'm credited on that episode,
• 33:00
  but it's the Vegas episode and they needed a sign joke for like these
• 33:07
  Vegas signs. Mine was loose at craps in town. Oh wow? How
• 33:16
  often? How long do they spend on the and still to this day on
• 33:21
  the sign gags because a lot. Yeah, and it is still over the
• 33:25
  stew over rock. What was that writer's room like in ninety seven, ninety
• 33:30
  eight, even through the early two thousand compared to now, because you said
• 33:32
  there's a lot boys shouting and trying to get hurt over the top, is
• 33:35
  there still that kind of vibe of just everyone in the room just bantering ideas
• 33:38
  back and forth to seeing what sticks. Yeah, I mean, you know,
• 33:43
  it's it's sort of different, a different vibe depending on what the thing
• 33:46
  is. Like if we're doing a story, it is going to be different
• 33:50
  kinds of things. And when we're doing a story, it's just it's sort
• 33:54
  of like we'll just kind of go this whole area. It could be this,
• 33:57
  it could be this, and then this could happen like you know,
• 33:59
  and then you know, then you kind of get in there and shape it
• 34:01
  and then you but then as as then when you're rewriting a script and then
• 34:07
  you're sometimes you get to where it's like very specific, like okay, here
• 34:10
  this joke, what can we replace it with, and sometimes you can pitch
• 34:15
  something that will change the whole thing, or sometimes you know, the whole
• 34:21
  change the setup. Sometimes then as we get further along, when it's like
• 34:23
  color, then it's like okay. Then it starts to become like, okay,
• 34:28
  we can't change the setup. We can only change this line. And
• 34:30
  then sometimes if we're trying to even save the lip flap from the color because
• 34:35
  we don't want to do a retake, it'll be like, okay, so
• 34:37
  it needs to be a new line. It needs to be this long blah
• 34:42
  blah blah blah blah blah blah, and then the last symbol has to go
• 34:45
  ooh, because that's the way it go. So you know, you have
• 34:50
  to get very very specific, and you know, sometimes you can do it,
• 34:53
  and sometimes you can put things, you know, at the color.
• 34:57
  You can can start a line on the back of somebody's head or something so
• 35:00
  that there's the flap. Does Sometimes you watch the old episodes and the mouth
• 35:04
  clearly doesn't work for like a certain line. Obviously at that time, this
• 35:07
  went this joke's too good, we don't care, we're putting it in.
• 35:09
  Yes, every once in a while you kind of well and those are usually
• 35:12
  done at adr you'll just like kind of go like sometimes the actor will come
• 35:16
  up with something, or you'll come up with something and like just kind of
• 35:19
  okay, that kind of good. Yeah, And a lot of times,
• 35:22
  if it goes by fast enough, people don't How do you decide on a
• 35:27
  joke? Obviously everyone's just contributing. Oh, you could say this, it
• 35:30
  could be that, could be this. What is the quota before everyone agrees
• 35:34
  that that's the joke we're going with. Is there a certain sort of like
• 35:37
  checklist? Is it like a vote of hands? Or That's the thing about
• 35:40
  where it has to be you know, the person running the room. It's
• 35:45
  really really the only way it works because it can't be a democracy, you
• 35:50
  know, you can't, So it has to be you know. Now.
• 35:52
  That's the other thing I always tell people who are new to this TV writing
• 35:55
  room is because like sometimes you'll have like new writers will come in and you
• 36:00
  know, they'll pitch a joke and somebody else picture joke and they'll go no,
• 36:02
  and you're like, no, no, no, You're you're not the
• 36:05
  one running through. You don't have to say no, don't because you know,
• 36:14
  you why why give yourself that grief. Yeah, uh, you know,
• 36:20
  you just it's only it's only the one person who's running the room.
• 36:25
  And that's kind of the word has to be because it can't really be well,
• 36:30
  okay, how many people like this joke? All right, raise the
• 36:34
  show of hands, you know, because it kind of has to be this
• 36:37
  whoever has kind of the vision for this thing, and and in the end
• 36:43
  it's generally the show winner. I guess it would establish a bit of a
• 36:46
  divide amongst the writers as well, to say three are voting for your joke
• 36:50
  and for art to be like, well why not, guys, what's going
• 36:52
  on here? You know? Yeah? Yeah, And then it's like,
• 36:54
  well, yeah, just see if I vote for your joke, but it
• 36:59
  feels yesterday, what do you them? Yeah. So it's just like I
• 37:04
  was, if you're new and you're you know, just just go and pitch,
• 37:09
  and like, if you hate a joke, it's probably not going in
• 37:14
  and but you don't have to be the one to knock it down. You
• 37:16
  just pitch another one, and like, you know, occasionally if they go
• 37:21
  yes and they're like it's some baby killing joke and they're like ok, and
• 37:25
  you're like, you know, you can't go you know what, Excuse me,
• 37:29
  I think we shouldn't do the baby killing joke. You know, maybe
• 37:32
  then, But other than that, it's not really up to you know.
• 37:37
  Now, I'm a little more opinionated. I'm the more senior member. Sometimes
• 37:39
  I will have opinion about other jokes and what they get in. While'll be
• 37:45
  like, I don't know, that makes her seem a little unlikeabull or whatever.
• 37:47
  I will, but usually I'll just I do realize that whoever's running the
• 37:54
  room, it's they're the person that's that's there. When you're you're obviously running
• 37:59
  the room on occasions, right when it comes to this situation. Yeah,
• 38:01
  So when you're running the room, is it challenging to when you know that
• 38:06
  one of the writers really thinks the joke's gonna work, but you know that
• 38:09
  it's probably not best for the episode. Is it? Is it challenging to
• 38:13
  say no to them even though you know they really want it, or is
• 38:15
  it just that's just part of the gig, you know, It's just you
• 38:17
  need to understand I know what's best. I mean, yeah, ultimately that's
• 38:22
  true. So like I run the room on the on the shows that I
• 38:27
  co write, Yeah, yeah, I mean generally, generally, that's not
• 38:32
  something you really run into that much when it's just somebody pitching a joke on
• 38:37
  it. And I think what you might sometimes get that is when somebody has
• 38:43
  it's like from it's their draft, you know, it's like they're they're they're
• 38:46
  written by writer the baby. Yeah, So sometimes I'll be like, sometimes
• 38:51
  you might get a little sort of petulant, Well I call a locals in
• 38:53
  this group, you know, and then you know, and sometimes I'll just
• 39:01
  say, well, okay, I feel like I need to change it because
• 39:04
  of this. Sometimes I explain myself clean your desk on the way out,
• 39:07
  sir. But you know, generally, I do think in the end,
• 39:15
  hopefully it's gonna it's there's gonna be a level of respect anyway. Right when
• 39:20
  you go into the Simpsons writers room, you just respect the people who have
• 39:22
  been there for so long. You just listen to what they have to say.
• 39:24
  I'm assuming, right, I mean, yeah, it's a it's a
• 39:28
  respect for as yet it is also the process. You know. It's just
• 39:30
  that like I can't remember one time even like you know, we're doing stories
• 39:35
  and I was, I was, you know, this is a long time
• 39:37
  ago. So it's not a writer who's on the show currently, but like
• 39:42
  a writer who later quickly googles list of rights. I'm not. I'm not,
• 39:45
  but I will say this and when I everyone, if I say this
• 39:49
  problem writer was problematic everybody who is listening, who's on the staff and what
• 39:52
  I'm talking about. But we, you know, we were I don't know.
• 39:58
  At one point he pitched it like and then Bart gets a job doing
• 40:00
  this, and then Barket's a job doing this, And at one point I'm
• 40:02
  like, Bart is is ten, so I can get all these jobs,
• 40:06
  you know. Then he's like, there had been this episode where Bart had
• 40:09
  like taken over the comic book shop and he's like, oh, but if
• 40:12
  you run a comic book shop or whatever like it. I was just like,
• 40:14
  Okay, that's not a job. Yeah, And they went through a
• 40:19
  lot of machinations to make that make sense. And a ten year old would
• 40:22
  take a comic book shop. But you know, at the same time,
• 40:27
  I was like, look, I'm I'm in charge of the room right now.
• 40:30
  All I can do is choose the thing. I like, that's all
• 40:35
  I can do. So I don't like it, you know, I mean,
• 40:39
  I'm you know what is best served is whether I like it or not.
• 40:45
  And maybe if somebody else were running room, they would love it,
• 40:49
  but I don't. But also if you can't see that the people who have
• 40:53
  been there longer probably know the process, I understand the process and know what's
• 40:57
  best for the show, then you're probably not suited for this, right And
• 41:00
  that's the thing that is the main thing is like this really does not come
• 41:04
  up very often because generally that is, we all understand that, you know,
• 41:07
  we all understand, and I also know, like as for myself and
• 41:13
  I and I do try to acknowledge this to people. Like sometimes people will
• 41:16
  go sometimes people will bring up a problem and they'll go, well, this
• 41:20
  is this, and I'm like, I don't see that, and then I'll
• 41:23
  I honestly don't. And then I'll at dinner, I'll go, oh,
• 41:27
  wait a minute, and then I'll understand what they're saying. Sometimes it takes
• 41:31
  me a minute, and then like the next day, I'll go, you
• 41:34
  know what, you were right, and then I'll change it. Sometimes,
• 41:37
  you know, that's all you can do is really I just feel like once
• 41:42
  you start second guessing yourself, you're lost. That's it. You have to
• 41:45
  go by what you think is funny and what makes sense and what seems right
• 41:49
  for the characters. And that's all, you know, all you can do,
• 41:52
  and and and so most people will understand that, and and so even
• 41:57
  if they disagree with me, and if I'm running the room, then they
• 42:01
  just and that's and that's the way I feel with other people too. But
• 42:05
  I disagree with them and they're running the room. It's like, Okay,
• 42:07
  did you have experience that yourself, like when you first sort of started working
• 42:10
  for the show and got your first script. After that first year, did
• 42:13
  you ever have an idea that you thought to yourself, I really think this
• 42:15
  is better, but you know what, they're really running the show. I'll
• 42:20
  go what they say. I never I don't know if I ever thought like,
• 42:22
  wow, my joke was so great. I never thought like a joke
• 42:24
  was so great that I wanted to or a story bat or something. There
• 42:28
  was one thing, yes, there definitely was my very first episode. Well,
• 42:34
  I mean we were going for the story and we were just talking about
• 42:37
  it and then at one point are you talking a little big mum? Is
• 42:39
  that what you're talking about? Yeah? Yeah? And then also they're like,
• 42:43
  then maybe they convinced Spartan Homer that they have leprosy. And sometimes we
• 42:49
  go off on crazy tangents that we're never gonna do. We're just like,
• 42:52
  yeah, that begrets, and we pitch on this thing that's not real,
• 42:55
  but just sometimes just to sort of amuse ourselves. And that's what I thought
• 43:00
  was happening. I thought we were I thought we were just kidding, and
• 43:02
  then then it was like, oh, oh, oh, we're really doing
• 43:07
  this. And then so I wrote it, you know, I was like,
• 43:09
  okay, okay, yeah, all right. So I remember being surprised
• 43:13
  at that, and then there came a point and I was fine with that.
• 43:15
  I thought it was kind of funny. And I liked the idea that
• 43:20
  they get visited by the ghost of the seal Ball, just because it's such
• 43:23
  a crazy idea. But there were at some point there were jokes that were
• 43:29
  kind of hard hitting. I won't even say them, because I actually found
• 43:32
  them to be sort of mean about lepers and because I go to the island
• 43:37
  at the end, and I grew up in Hawaii, and I think that
• 43:43
  for a lot of the guys in the room, they were they were talking
• 43:45
  about like a biblical disease that didn't exist anymore. Whereas I grew up,
• 43:51
  I remember seeing these people on the news who had been banished to this leper
• 43:55
  colony and now they were going to take away their land, and they you
• 43:58
  know, they you know, they were real people to me, and I
• 44:00
  was like, I don't want to do that. I'm glad you brought this
• 44:04
  up, because I thought it was very un karolin Amine. At the ending
• 44:07
  of that episode, I thought, this just seems we that this story's felt
• 44:12
  somewhat granded, and then it's just gone so wacky, you know. It
• 44:16
  was. It was, you know, it was I was like, okay,
• 44:21
  I mean, I'm fun too, you know, but yeah, I
• 44:24
  do. There was Actually I went to visit Cala Papa and which is the
• 44:30
  leper colony in Mulokai, and just you know, really being there and it's
• 44:34
  really it's very moving. And at the time, I'm not sure because it
• 44:37
  was so long ago. At the time, they were only if you left
• 44:39
  me because they had discovered the cure in nineteen seven, I think, so
• 44:45
  it was really the only people who sort of had been disfigured, and they
• 44:49
  had lived there in all of their lives, and so they were just letting
• 44:51
  them live the rest of their life. But I was just like, I
• 44:53
  just remember calling Mike Seleton, please, we cannot make this joke about and
• 44:58
  he's like, okay, So that's I didn't get into the episode. No,
• 45:00
  No, there were a couple of jokes there that got taken out.
• 45:06
  Yeah, but it did take me calling in tears from from the island of
• 45:10
  Molokai to get it taken out. But it just felt like in those earlier
• 45:15
  days, that particularly with the LGBTQ plus community, that there are a lot
• 45:21
  of jokes that you would not make now. But as we were reviewing them,
• 45:23
  we sort of go, well, that doesn't seem fair about this joke.
• 45:25
  But it's also just a sign at the times as well. I guess
• 45:29
  you know, you can't you can't review it just should never have been that
• 45:31
  way, But you can't critique it from twenty twenty three something that was made
• 45:36
  in two thousand. If that's just seemed to be that wasn't as it should
• 45:39
  never have been, shouldn't have been accepted, But it just was, I
• 45:42
  guess, on television to make those jokes. Yeah, I think so,
• 45:45
  it definitely was. I always hope that like, no, matter what,
• 45:49
  even you know, everybody wanted to be edgy and come right to the line.
• 45:53
  It was that the South Park mental was because we were reviewing these episodes
• 45:57
  now season eighteen. But it just felt like for a while they felt that
• 46:00
  the Simpsons were almost trying to lean into that Family God territory because Family God
• 46:04
  was sort of taking the will by Stone at that point. And that's not
• 46:07
  why people liked the Simpsons, you know, And that's why the Simpsons are
• 46:08
  still on TV. And I don't know, Family Guy's on TV, but
• 46:10
  people don't talk about Family talk about the Simpsons. You know. The Simpsons
• 46:14
  didn't need to be edgy the way Family Guy was. Yeah, I always
• 46:19
  just wanted to, Like I mean, for me, I always just feel
• 46:22
  like it has to be really obvious that your intention is not to hurt somebody,
• 46:29
  because otherwise if you feel that in the least bit. But then at
• 46:32
  the same time, like I like, I love drag Race, I don't
• 46:37
  know if you're Grace, but they did this whole thing, like this reading
• 46:42
  challenge where they like read each other, and it's just where you really see
• 46:45
  that like, if you're really funny, you could say the meanest thing and
• 46:51
  it's like, oh my god, that's so funny. But like if that's
• 46:54
  the scariest thing about those reading challenges, like if you're if you're not funny,
• 46:59
  then you're and you're like, and you know this thing now it just
• 47:04
  seems like the meanest thing ever. It's like, oh, it's like it's
• 47:08
  such a scary thing that like, if you don't have the levity of actually
• 47:14
  being super funny, that joke is gonna hit so hard and so mean.
• 47:19
  It's the same thing that goes for the roast that you see on TV exactly.
• 47:22
  Yeah. Sometimes you watch shows and you go, oh, that didn't
• 47:25
  land well yeah, yeah, and like somebody else have said something way crueler
• 47:30
  but it was really funny, and you're like, oh, well no,
• 47:34
  one just flew over and that was fine. But they're like something just like
• 47:37
  the mildest thing, but it ooh, just like what that was just rude.
• 47:44
  You've said in the past, I've read that the other shows that you
• 47:45
  worked on, the actors would at times add lieb or paraphrase your writing,
• 47:50
  which can be quite annoying. But you've said it rarely happened on The Simpsons
• 47:52
  when you were when you're in this interview. Can you remember a particular line
• 47:55
  on moment on The Simpsons where one of the actors ad libbed one of your
• 48:00
  jokes and improved it? Yes, because I mean that's That's one thing that's
• 48:02
  really great is that our actors will always give us at least one take or
• 48:07
  two takes, and not just like not just like, oh, here here's
• 48:09
  your take, you know, like the way you wrote it. They will
• 48:12
  they will try to perform it the way you they clearly you wrote it,
• 48:16
  and and then they will also try and add lib on it. And I
• 48:22
  can't think of any particular but I know what happens all the time. Yeah,
• 48:25
  that's so much more. I'll do a podcast with Jim Cummings, who's
• 48:28
  the voice of Winnie the Pooh and Tiger, and he always says that when
• 48:31
  he's doing the acting, he voices it as written, and then he gives
• 48:36
  his version and sometimes I'll go his version, sometimes they want he doesn't.
• 48:39
  It doesn't boll the hum which version they go with, but he just likes
• 48:42
  to give his input that way. No, it's I think it's really I
• 48:45
  think it's really important because one I like that our actors feel that they have
• 48:49
  that ability because you want you want everybody to feel like creative and like that
• 48:54
  they can contribute. But I think it's also very important to do it the
• 48:59
  other way, choose that the writers feel because I feel like when I was
• 49:01
  on shows where the actors were always just going to be sort of in the
• 49:07
  ballpark of the line you wrote, Well, then you stop trying to like
• 49:12
  worry over exactly how you word it, you know, because it's like,
• 49:15
  why are we bothering with the exact wording of this when they're just going to
• 49:22
  kind of do something close but not really that. But with our actors we
• 49:27
  do, and so we and so the writers do really really think about the
• 49:32
  exact wording, and you know, that's what writers do. And so I
• 49:37
  think sometimes there are really really well written jokes that come from from knowing that
• 49:44
  that will be treated without much care, so you can craft it or you
• 49:47
  know that it's it is funny, or if it's this word instead of this
• 49:51
  word, and you know, like who imprompts the most, I feel like
• 49:52
  it would be Dan and Hank, right, Yes, Dan and Hank definitely
• 49:58
  Hank is Hank really loves to just go off, especially certain characters who loves
• 50:02
  to go off and Harry could too. He's just not as I found Harry
• 50:08
  hard to read these days, he's hard to He's not as often in the
• 50:15
  kind of playful mood when wouldn't need to be in to uh improvise. But
• 50:21
  uh yeah, and and trust also trust Mcneilie Truss is unbelievable. Yeah,
• 50:27
  she's a great improviser. Like Dan just comes up with like these great little
• 50:31
  things, like he loves his sounds. He's going to come in or just
• 50:37
  random sounds and groans and things. Yeah, to have only just little sounds
• 50:42
  like I remember one day I just always thought was the funniest thing. It
• 50:44
  was like actually during the little beep beep beep, you know, like those
• 50:49
  things that happened before that, the thinking was on and home just went here
• 50:52
  comes true, Like Homer, he's so smart, what's coming next? And
• 51:02
  but you know, we did. There was one thing that I just thought
• 51:07
  of we were in I don't know if you saw this episode a while ago
• 51:10
  called fantaly Feed. There's there's this it's really fun and there's a Beyonce.
• 51:21
  It's basically, uh, I'm obsessed with Beyonce, especially who isn't a Lemonade
• 51:27
  parody, and there's a where we just wanted him to do a background voice
• 51:34
  and she's singing with this woman named Jade Nova, who is brilliant there,
• 51:38
  and so she sings like even when I do things wrong, and then he's
• 51:44
  supposed to say I do wrong things and then Dan gets on and he's like,
• 51:49
  I wrong do things and it's so wrong. We're like, oh my
• 51:53
  god, that's so good. Just put So that's what we put in.
• 51:58
  And I don't even know if people realize, you know, but it just
• 52:01
  it's it just tickles me. But that is that's sort of like he also
• 52:06
  you know, like I think you might know the story that like when he
• 52:08
  was the line I am so smart s m. Marti, Like that is
• 52:14
  him just h yeah, he's just he's just inhabiting that character. Yeah,
• 52:22
  well with the writing. So when you record the audio, when does the
• 52:27
  animation actually start? So do you record the audio the dialogue first and then
• 52:30
  they animate to the dialogue or is it the case of the Yeah case that's
• 52:34
  that allows for the improp because you would not start the animating and oh man,
• 52:37
  Dan just created a great joke. Now we're going to reanimate the face
• 52:39
  for that joke. Yeah, yeah, like I was, I was just
• 52:42
  thinking about this end of the day. I guess I talked to somebody about
• 52:45
  the stupid sexy Flanders meme. But that was one of my first records that
• 52:52
  I got to watch and was did you write that or is that a group
• 52:57
  effort? That I always say I came up with that line, but but
• 53:04
  the definitely the thing because I you know, I born and raised in Hawaii
• 53:09
  when they were like, yeah, you know when you go skiing and some
• 53:12
  guy shows up like your your friend and they up in that really tight snowsuit
• 53:15
  and you're like embarrassed, and I'm like, never happened from Australia. I'm
• 53:21
  the same. I could imagine what it would be like. They're like,
• 53:24
  yeah, you know you see every so I mean I could imagine it,
• 53:28
  but yeah, it wasn't really like but uh so, you know just before
• 53:34
  Homer has that thing where he his skis spread and he gets hit in the
• 53:37
  crotch moguls and so so Dad did one line and then I was like,
• 53:44
  could you do it again? But when you do it, could you just
• 53:45
  because it's you're you're going downhill and you're just being hitted hit repeatedly in the
• 53:50
  crotch by these mogules, So could there be a little rhythm to the oh,
• 53:58
  like as a hit and he does it and it was so brilliant.
• 54:02
  It had like this very particular rhythm to it, and he cries and like
• 54:07
  that that's what they animated to. So like they timed the moguls to hit
• 54:12
  his crutch with his cries and it's just really great. Can you believe that
• 54:17
  the stupid sixty flanners became a thing? No? I mean I knew,
• 54:22
  like we were. I remember actually because Ian was running the room at that
• 54:27
  time, and like like even the way he wrote the thing that like Flanders
• 54:30
  turns around and and waggled his shapely dairy air or something like he says something
• 54:37
  like that, so we knew he did say it in a way that definitely
• 54:39
  spun the animators to a certain things. And then when it came in and
• 54:44
  we're like whoa, We're like, oh, that's intense. Okay, all
• 54:50
  right, cause it's it's now it's nuggas an like action fee it's like a
• 54:52
  funky pop for it and never it's it's it's it's like it's been immortalized yeah,
• 54:58
  yeah, you know that is that is just all whenever we have any
• 55:02
  thing that works, it is that thing where it's like thirty percent writing,
• 55:07
  thirty percent of the voice acting, thirty percent of the animation. But then
• 55:14
  it's not really like it's it's somehow it's that thing where it's actually turns out
• 55:16
  it's actually more like this, you know what I mean. Like, but
• 55:21
  all three of those things weren't really well in that. It's funny because at
• 55:23
  the time that wasn't necessarily like I was still I wouldn't say kid, I
• 55:28
  would have met thirteen fourteen when the episode came out, and we still talk
• 55:30
  about the Simpsons of school, but it wasn't what We all went to school
• 55:32
  the next day and went nothing at all. It was just you know,
• 55:36
  but twenty years later, for some reason, we had just clung onto it.
• 55:38
  Yeah, yeah, I don't know's that's true for a lot of that
• 55:43
  means, yeah, Homo, through the hedge and just I think just the
• 55:46
  introduction of social media and gifts, I think just really helped those things.
• 55:51
  Yeah, I think. So. I want to talk about the writing process
• 55:53
  in general, though, so we've heard about the nine month process. It's
• 55:57
  just been a thing that we've all known nine months from creating the idea to
• 56:00
  coming on TV. How has it changed from what ninety eight to now?
• 56:02
  Is it still a very similar process when you when you sort of break it
• 56:06
  down, it is generally the process is and then I do if we because
• 56:09
  I know we were going to talk about a mid childhood, Yeah, what's
• 56:14
  what's let's talk about that now of your life. Let's let's go for it.
• 56:15
  I mean, just because that was a very different process. I mean
• 56:19
  usually usually we come in where you're like, I have this story idea,
• 56:23
  Like sometimes you might have a whole story. I tend to like to have
• 56:27
  my ending and you know, to know where I'm going, and then like
• 56:31
  pitch ideas and then like figure out where these scenes are and then you pitch
• 56:35
  it outline and then you can just when you write the script and then come
• 56:37
  back. But for a mid childhood that was different because one I had had
• 56:45
  I'd had this one idea in my head and I had sort of tweeted about
• 56:50
  it that, like Yardley had said, she'd asked me once what advice I
• 56:53
  would give Marge her being the mother of a ten year old, because at
• 56:58
  the time my son was fifteenth, and I was like, wow, that's
• 57:00
  a great idea, I mean, great question. And I didn't have an
• 57:02
  answer, but I thought about it for a long time, and then when
• 57:07
  I realized the thing I would say is that you know, ten is when
• 57:10
  I realized, like, ten is kind of the end of like when they
• 57:14
  were a little kids. And then that made me dad and I remember I
• 57:17
  remember like my niece who I kind of raised as my daughter too, Like
• 57:22
  when she was ten, she was I was going to get her an iPod.
• 57:25
  That's what she wanted, like a little iPod nana or something. And
• 57:30
  then as we were watching, she saw the American Girls Store and she's what
• 57:34
  is this store? I don't love And I normally can't stand the American Girls
• 57:36
  Store. I think like they're just I don't know why I kind of think
• 57:38
  about that, but I was like, it's a store with these dolls and
• 57:42
  she's like, oh, I want one of those. And I was like,
• 57:44
  so happy that you want. I was like, oh, you know,
• 57:46
  Norma'm like, oh, you need dinner with them or were lunch with
• 57:50
  them, and I was like, do you want a doll? And I
• 57:52
  was so happy that she wanted a doll? And because she was, you
• 57:54
  know, she was almost at the end of you know, being a little
• 57:58
  girl. And anyway, so I was I kept thinking I wanted to write
• 58:00
  something about that, and I couldn't think of what, but it was always
• 58:05
  just sort of stuck in the back of my head. And so here we
• 58:08
  were now doing this co running thing, and I knew I needed to write
• 58:14
  another script, but it was like so much work doing all this running these
• 58:17
  episodes. And by now it was like, because it was my second season,
• 58:22
  they were starting to kind of double up, you know. Now I
• 58:23
  was sort of dealing with eight episodes, and so I couldn't I know,
• 58:28
  I wouldn't be able to take the time off to write it, but I
• 58:30
  had to take time off to drop my son off at college, and I'm
• 58:36
  you know, he's my only child. And I already knew I was going
• 58:38
  to be a mess. And so we didn't have anything. We didn't have
• 58:42
  a story. I had this sort of one idea, and I just told
• 58:45
  Matt, I said, look, I'm just gonna I'm going to write this
• 58:49
  script and we're not going to be like pitching on the story and all this.
• 58:52
  I'm just gonna and I and and and he was very I could tell
• 58:57
  you was he would. He had been sort of feeling like, Okay,
• 59:00
  we got a daycare of Carolyn, because you know, this is gonna be
• 59:02
  really hard time for her, and so he was being very like, yeah,
• 59:08
  it was very very sweet, and I was just like because I just
• 59:10
  remember, I was like, I'm just gonna write it, and he's like
• 59:14
  okay, and I'm like, and it's gonna be sad, okay, okay,
• 59:21
  and so I you know, I just I was like writing it like
• 59:27
  in between, like like at the same time trying to like get every moment
• 59:30
  I had with my son left, but then like on the plane and night
• 59:35
  after we went to sleep, and I just it was it was really like
• 59:38
  probably the most personal I've ever done, where like I'm like and most like
• 59:45
  this is happening right now and I'm just gonna write about it, and the
• 59:50
  memories of just you know, just like it was all of those things,
• 59:53
  you know, just like even that moment at the beginning when she goes to
• 59:58
  the store in at the grocery store, I remember that feeling of like as
• 1:00:01
  a as a parent, that which actually starts happening around ten when you kind
• 1:00:07
  of realize you know, when you're when they're little, you can you can
• 1:00:10
  see a little like toy car or something, and you just toss that in
• 1:00:15
  and then you come out and go look what I got and it's like,
• 1:00:16
  oh my god, like this joy that you cannot believe. And then you
• 1:00:22
  know, later there comes a point where it's like, you know, maybe
• 1:00:25
  maybe if you buy them a camera or a new phone, like there's there's
• 1:00:30
  a little bit but not quite the same as like like it's not like,
• 1:00:34
  oh my god, I've brought magic into the world. Yeah, you know,
• 1:00:38
  and even as a as likes at a certain age, you you drive
• 1:00:43
  around and I remember just seeing like there's this really specific kind of sadness when
• 1:00:46
  you go, oh, look at that park, Like you notice there's this
• 1:00:50
  really good swing area and you're like, that's great, and then you realize,
• 1:00:52
  oh, my kid's too old for that, and it's so sad.
• 1:00:57
  So I just thought that's you know. And the other thing was to me,
• 1:01:00
  one of the saddest songs but also one of the most beautiful songs is
• 1:01:04
  that song Puffed the Magic Dragons. Yes, there's a band from Australia or
• 1:01:07
  the Seekers who used to sing the song and it's they were on the first
• 1:01:12
  bands I ever want to see live. So I know that song very well.
• 1:01:15
  Yeah. I my son, I remember when he was like four,
• 1:01:17
  he came home from preschool and he was singing it and he wanted me to
• 1:01:21
  sing it with him, and every time we got to that part, it
• 1:01:22
  was like then one day this happened. I could never sing without right.
• 1:01:31
  Just that that's anyway one one that with Beautiful Boy. For John John Lenon,
• 1:01:37
  I'm a huge John Lennon fan and Beautiful Boy when he goes, I
• 1:01:39
  can hardly wait to see you come of age and it's just like, oh,
• 1:01:42
  I can't wait, but I also don't want you to ah. I
• 1:01:45
  mean, you know, I will say, because I know your kids are
• 1:01:50
  like five five and just turned three. Yeah, so my boys starting school
• 1:01:54
  next year. And that's why I think this episode hit me so hard.
• 1:01:59
  Yeah, yeah, I mean it is. It is because there is a
• 1:02:01
  part of you that's like, you know, you go through like the minute
• 1:02:06
  you have this baby and you're like night, have to protect my baby,
• 1:02:08
  have to protect my baby, like and then all of a sudden, it's
• 1:02:10
  like my baby's gone. My baby's not with toddler, you know, and
• 1:02:15
  and it's really it's just that dual thing where it's like it's always great because
• 1:02:21
  it's like, oh, but they're so cute at this age, and then
• 1:02:23
  but then you do miss this stuff, and like, right now, my
• 1:02:28
  son is so great, he's so much fun to talk to, and it's
• 1:02:31
  really exciting to he's an adult now, you know, it's really really,
• 1:02:36
  really great. And but yeah, you know, there's there's that magic of
• 1:02:40
  childhood. My son he's just started to be able to do things for himself.
• 1:02:45
  So he'll go, I want to watch the Muppets place and I go,
• 1:02:47
  yeah, sure, I gotta get their money. He goes, I
• 1:02:49
  can do it. I'm like, oh, okay, you don't need me,
• 1:02:51
  no worries, all right, we'll help you get this. I'll get
• 1:02:52
  dressed by myself. Ah okay, no worries. All to sit here then.
• 1:03:00
  Yeah, But I think just this episode in general, because you know
• 1:03:02
  it starts with Bart going to is it kindergarten he goes to in this episode
• 1:03:06
  or was at school where he looks back and he's sad. I think it's
• 1:03:07
  kindergarten, right, yeah, as well as the kindergarten. Yeah, yeah,
• 1:03:10
  yeah, I just remember this Throughout the whole episode, I was just
• 1:03:13
  like, this is my life right now. And as a result of watching
• 1:03:15
  this episode though and hearing your thought process going into about the whole ten year
• 1:03:20
  old thing, It's changed how I've parented I now am. I feel like
• 1:03:23
  I was always made the most of, you know, being a parent,
• 1:03:27
  but now I'm making the most of every second I can. You know,
• 1:03:30
  hey, mate, let's just sit there, Let's go go outside and kick
• 1:03:31
  the ball, or let's just go do something together, you know, yeah,
• 1:03:36
  you know. I remember my neighbor on my side, she's an older
• 1:03:40
  woman, and I remember when my son was really small, rainieces all the
• 1:03:45
  time, and like the house was a mess. It was all these little
• 1:03:47
  toys, and she came over and I was like, I'm so sorry the
• 1:03:52
  house is such a mess, and she said, no, no, my
• 1:03:55
  house is so neat, and it was so and I remember at that moment
• 1:04:01
  thinking like I want to really make sure I don't I don't want to be
• 1:04:06
  because sometimes you can get so much in life where you're like when you're in
• 1:04:11
  the middle of the mess, going oh, I wish this house was neat,
• 1:04:13
  and then when it's gone, well, I wish I had the mess,
• 1:04:15
  and I'm like, I wanna I want to switch that and really enjoy
• 1:04:18
  the mess while it's here, because there's gonna come a time when it's gonna
• 1:04:24
  be gone, and maybe then I'll be like, well, good, I'm
• 1:04:26
  glad it's neat. I don't know if I will, but it does make
• 1:04:30
  you realize, Like I think that, like anything like when your kids are
• 1:04:34
  really little and then they're having trouble potty training, or they're waking up in
• 1:04:41
  the middle of the night, or there are any of those little annoying things
• 1:04:43
  that they do, you know, the thing is like, okay, but
• 1:04:45
  it's enjoy them very Yeah. Everything is temporary and you're gonna miss that one
• 1:04:51
  day when that thing goes away. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah.
• 1:04:55
  I just think that the way that you captured that feeling with just the holding
• 1:04:59
  hands, like when he grabbed her hand at the end, I grabbed my
• 1:05:00
  chest. Oh, it was just yeah, it was so sweet, and
• 1:05:04
  it reminded me because I've always thought that, you know, Maggie's had her
• 1:05:09
  sweet ending with and Maggie makes three, right, Bart has this sweet ending,
• 1:05:14
  so at least that's a sweet ending with Lisa's wedding whether she's walking off
• 1:05:16
  with home at the fair. This is, to me is the sweet ending
• 1:05:19
  that Bart's always needed, you know, with the parent because he has March
• 1:05:24
  being not proud where they have this sort of the sweet embrace that he gets
• 1:05:27
  the photo. But there's a joke at the end, but this one doesn't
• 1:05:29
  end with it ends with the theater and joke, but it's essentially ending with
• 1:05:31
  that walking off into the sunset. Such as sweet ending and Barts never really
• 1:05:35
  to my recollection, had one of those kind of moments and you gave him
• 1:05:39
  that, you know, I mean I really did, you know. It
• 1:05:42
  was like there's there's these things where you have this idea of something that you
• 1:05:45
  want to do, Like I like when when Yardley had asked me that question,
• 1:05:49
  I had for a long time in thinking like I wanted to sort of
• 1:05:54
  capture somehow I just because my you know, I have one kid and he's
• 1:05:58
  a boy, and I wanted to capture the mother son thing. And yeah,
• 1:06:05
  and also that like's not he's not bad in this episode at all,
• 1:06:11
  Like it's never like because you know he often is. You know, he
• 1:06:15
  I really wanted like even in that moment when he's telling her that he wants
• 1:06:20
  he doesn't want to do the thumbs up. You know, I really wanted
• 1:06:25
  that to feel like, you know, we get into these really emotional arguments
• 1:06:30
  parents and children, because it is that you're going to have these arguments about
• 1:06:34
  I want to grow up and I want you to stay the same for you
• 1:06:38
  know, and I wanted that like that. Bart Is is being very kind
• 1:06:45
  in that tip to March. He is trying to say this as gently as
• 1:06:48
  possible to her. And I do think, like deep down, bart is
• 1:06:53
  a good kid and he does really love her, and so even on some
• 1:06:58
  level as a little kid, he might not know this like the way an
• 1:07:01
  adult would know it, but he does know that this is hard for her
• 1:07:05
  and I have to gently tell it that I can't thumbs up. But and
• 1:07:13
  she sort of embraced what he did instead and acknowledged, Okay, this is
• 1:07:15
  just the new this is what we're doing going forward. And she accepted that
• 1:07:18
  and he held her hand. It's just the beautiful yeah, I And uh,
• 1:07:24
  Julie is so good. And you know, at that at this time
• 1:07:28
  when we did this episode, she was going through a really hard time,
• 1:07:31
  you know, her her husband passed away sort of around that time, and
• 1:07:35
  they were each other's love of their lives, like they were just but Julie
• 1:07:41
  is always, you know, always wants to give her best and and just
• 1:07:45
  she's just the sweetest, kindest and just always just the best work ethic.
• 1:07:51
  And you know, there's a hard episode to do because it was so much
• 1:07:55
  lines for her, and so it was a long recording session and you know,
• 1:08:00
  these are the things that you only really get in one really good recording
• 1:08:02
  set. We do a bunch of pickups and stuff. So when you when
• 1:08:06
  I have an episode like this, you're like okay, Like I tell myself
• 1:08:11
  like, okay, well it's gonna be okay. But like going in and
• 1:08:13
  I'm like, oh, she's good today, you know, like you really
• 1:08:16
  and she was just so good and so I don't always do this, but
• 1:08:21
  I did write to her and I and I said, do you I just
• 1:08:25
  want to let you know you were just amazing today and it really I can't
• 1:08:29
  thank you enough. It was just really really good. And she actually called
• 1:08:31
  me as she was all cheery and she's like it means so much to me.
• 1:08:38
  Yeah. So so I do think that that that really infused a lot
• 1:08:43
  of it too, just she she was just really phenomenal. Yeah, I
• 1:08:46
  love that you put so much thought into Bat's emotional state and trying to explain
• 1:08:50
  it to Mauch too, because, as I've said with the podcast, we
• 1:08:54
  go through cological with the season eighteen, it feels like sort of around this
• 1:08:57
  point, there's almost like an apathy with the character. There's lots of Margin
• 1:09:00
  Homer splitting up storylines, and but and Lisa don't seem to really be bothered
• 1:09:04
  that Margin and Homer aren' getting along anymore. And it feels like in recent
• 1:09:08
  seasons there's been a real switch and a more focus on taking it back to
• 1:09:11
  its roots, where Homer isn't the dim wit that he sort of become in
• 1:09:15
  later seasons, and he's sort of gone back to being the respectful husband.
• 1:09:18
  Sure he has these moments, but it feels more like you guys have focused
• 1:09:23
  on the emotional side of the characters again, is has there been a focus
• 1:09:26
  on that? I mean, for me, like that was part of why,
• 1:09:30
  because I just never really like the splitting up stories. Always just say
• 1:09:35
  like, look, I'm a big fan, like I can only ever look
• 1:09:40
  at like where do I look at as a fan myself? And I'm like
• 1:09:43
  I love like I love Bob's Burgers. I don't want to see I don't
• 1:09:45
  want see bobble Land a break up. You know. I was like,
• 1:09:48
  I was a big fan of Blackish, and I mean I love what they
• 1:09:53
  did. I mean I respected it. You know, I don't know if
• 1:09:57
  you watch just like they because I think it's so based on Kenya Barris's life.
• 1:10:01
  There comes a certain point where they split up and I was like,
• 1:10:04
  no, it happened because it just it just I don't know to me,
• 1:10:10
  I and so I this was my I have felt since this time when just
• 1:10:15
  I can't really again, you know, it's like I can't speak for everybody,
• 1:10:19
  just for me. What I wanted to do is to me like that
• 1:10:26
  that moment when in the way we was, you know when Homer says,
• 1:10:32
  look, I don't know so much. I just know that I love you
• 1:10:35
  and and I'm just gonna keep on loving you. And like I just thought
• 1:10:40
  in my mind, like my head canon, like as I say, like
• 1:10:44
  Marge realizes then that like, look, he's not the smartest or whatever,
• 1:10:48
  but he loves me so much. And that is a rare thing to see
• 1:10:56
  a love that's so pure and real. Indeed, and it we As long
• 1:11:00
  as we have that, everything else is gonna fall into place. And to
• 1:11:04
  me, I thought, so that's what I did really want for the first
• 1:11:08
  episode, that I was gonna be in charge of that. As for pixelated
• 1:11:13
  phrame was I wanted to first and foremost reinforce that the rock of the center
• 1:11:19
  of this whole show is that Margin Homer love each other like crazy, and
• 1:11:26
  that is that's like everything else can happen because of that. They can they
• 1:11:30
  can be crazy, and you know, I mean, Homer can be dumb.
• 1:11:35
  Johnsh Warswalld used to always say, like, like the level of dumb
• 1:11:40
  is that Homer should always know at least as much as the dog knows.
• 1:11:44
  So yeah, so he knows his name. But to me, I even
• 1:11:50
  feel like sometimes I could even there's sometimes even even when we're doing non canon
• 1:11:55
  things, I don't like it when the like when our or main characters,
• 1:12:00
  I don't like even when we're doing no non candidates, I don't like it
• 1:12:03
  with if Homer does something that would not be something at heart what a good
• 1:12:11
  person would do, you know, like they have to have a certain goodness
• 1:12:15
  that is deep and from Marge as well. So that's just the way I
• 1:12:20
  feel about which is what I think is being very evident in the last say,
• 1:12:25
  three to four years. It's just it's the show feels different. It's
• 1:12:28
  hard to really pinpoint exactly why, but I think it's just more they don't
• 1:12:31
  they feel like they love each other again, and for a while it felt
• 1:12:34
  like, well, they didn't love each other, but they didn't show it
• 1:12:36
  enough, you know, because I always feel like, like I remember in
• 1:12:41
  general, like I remember Scully telling you this once. He said, if
• 1:12:45
  if Homer doesn't give a shit, none of the jokes land, Like,
• 1:12:50
  if you don't feel like Homer cares about the outcome of this story because it's
• 1:12:57
  gonna affect his families, gonna affect this is going to affect whatever, none
• 1:13:01
  of the jokes land, and none of you don't get pulled forward through the
• 1:13:06
  narrative because if he doesn't care, then nobody cared. Then the audience isn't
• 1:13:12
  going to care. It's just going to be a series of gags and and
• 1:13:15
  so you need to I just have that feeling at the center, like that
• 1:13:20
  that they all kind of care, and we always know that with Lisa and
• 1:13:30
  Marge. But I do think that like Bart too, though, Like I
• 1:13:34
  like when we get to those moments that sort of exposed where Bart has to
• 1:13:38
  kind of expose that, Like, no, that doesn't make me sad,
• 1:13:42
  and I do feel bad about it. Yeah, now, I know we've
• 1:13:45
  gone long tonight, but it's one more thing I want to touch before let
• 1:13:46
  you go. That's okay, because I'd regret if I didn't. It's Halloween
• 1:13:49
  of Horror. It's one of my favorite episodes ever. And you watched a
• 1:13:51
  couple of days ago with my kids because they love watching it as well.
• 1:13:57
  My three was like, it's scary, and I was like, yeah,
• 1:13:59
  it's scary, but it is genuinely scary at times. But what was your
• 1:14:04
  What was the inspiration for that one? Because we touched on your inspiration with
• 1:14:08
  you some for the previous episode for this one here? What how did How
• 1:14:12
  had it been so long without doing a canon Halloween episode? Was it just
• 1:14:15
  something never discussed or was that a deliberate choice to not interfere with tresfr We
• 1:14:19
  had never I mean that was so that the idea to do a canon Halloween
• 1:14:24
  episode was was Salmon's idea? I love Halloween, you know, like,
• 1:14:29
  like I've said, my neighborhood is very Halloween and I have this crazy Halloween
• 1:14:33
  party and I just I love Halloween. So yeah, that and that was
• 1:14:39
  my first because you know, Satt was Selman had started doing where he would
• 1:14:44
  do four episodes and he's just a little bit more collaborative than I was.
• 1:14:48
  And and that was really the first time where I felt like I was and
• 1:14:51
  I felt like even more so with that because at that point Selman he had
• 1:14:57
  done a couple of years, so he was getting a little bit behind too.
• 1:15:00
  So there were many times when people just sort of let me go off
• 1:15:02
  like they were all every time. Mike Anderson, who did a wonderful job
• 1:15:05
  directing it, he would go, we need more costume ideas, and then
• 1:15:10
  I just write these lists and like like you know, Missus Skinner Amy Whitehouse,
• 1:15:15
  I just you know, come up with all these things. But for
• 1:15:19
  me, I had some definite things that I wanted. I wanted it to
• 1:15:23
  be. I wanted it to be actually scary, and so I thought,
• 1:15:29
  and this, but this also gonna be real. And to me, like
• 1:15:30
  the things the scariest things movies are those home invasion type movies, they like
• 1:15:36
  Strangers Checked the Children. Yeah, yeah, because those are all the ones
• 1:15:43
  that you know could actually happen or you know, it feels really like it.
• 1:15:45
  So yeah, I wanted there to be a moment where you felt really
• 1:15:50
  really worried, and then I did also want and then then there was so
• 1:15:57
  many things that were just because it was the only time we the first time
• 1:16:00
  we had done Cannon Halloween, it really became like really all of us love
• 1:16:05
  Halloween. So everybody had just these moments of like, and then there's this
• 1:16:10
  like we we all had several experiences with either being a child and going to
• 1:16:17
  a haunted house that was too much, or taking your child haunted house that
• 1:16:23
  was too much this year and regretted it at the very end, that's for
• 1:16:27
  sure. Like Skelly was actually because he tied and it was even his girls
• 1:16:32
  were older, but he said he'd taken him to like the Universal Halloween of
• 1:16:36
  Horror, and like he said that he was like that, they were like,
• 1:16:41
  we want to go, and they were like, oh, so expensive.
• 1:16:50
  So we definitely sort of had that kind of Homer has that little like
• 1:16:58
  it was really but you know even that I can remember being a little little
• 1:17:02
  kid and going to a school carnival with like a babysitter, and like we
• 1:17:10
  went into it just like it seemed like it was a classroom and there was
• 1:17:13
  like somebody with a Frankenstein mask, and I can just remember screaming and then
• 1:17:17
  having to be taken out, and I was like, I didn't sleep in
• 1:17:19
  it that night, and you know so well. I feel like a bad
• 1:17:23
  parent there because my daughter was two at the time. She hadn't even turned
• 1:17:26
  three yet. My son was five. I go to buy the tickets necessarily
• 1:17:28
  go we want to go, and I was like, are you sure you
• 1:17:30
  want to go on here? It's going to be scared now we want we
• 1:17:32
  want to go on there? Okay. Then I go to the ticket man.
• 1:17:35
  I said, no one pops out and scares. It's just it's just
• 1:17:38
  things on the walls, right He oh, yes, it's the kids one.
• 1:17:40
  It'll be fine. So we get on there. We get on the
• 1:17:43
  cart. The guys at the front front pool and leave it and let us
• 1:17:45
  go in. Just before we go in, I said, no one pops
• 1:17:46
  out to do that. He goes, yeah, three of them. As
• 1:17:48
  we're going in. I'm like, oh no, oh no. I did
• 1:17:54
  the same thing. I went to like a haunted pumpkin patch and my niece
• 1:18:00
  was like seven, and she really she's really brave and she always wants she
• 1:18:04
  wants to go and said there. But my son was like a year old,
• 1:18:08
  and I was like, oh, but I couldn't. She didn't want
• 1:18:11
  to go by herself. But it was just us three. I couldn't.
• 1:18:14
  I couldn't leave a one year old outside. And I'm like, oh,
• 1:18:15
  hey, here we go, and we go and I'm holding this and he's
• 1:18:20
  like burying his face and like they it was. I didn't realize it was
• 1:18:25
  full of these actors who were really good and they would not drop character.
• 1:18:30
  And I was trying to like reason with them, like please, please do
• 1:18:32
  the both of you, and then my niece is immediately fraid. She just
• 1:18:35
  we're just trying to get out and I hard trying to walk with her grabbing
• 1:18:39
  out of my legs and people are I'm just like, please just know,
• 1:18:43
  we don't we don't want to do this. They would not dalk character.
• 1:18:45
  They would not leave us alone. I was trying to get out of there.
• 1:18:48
  One guy I doubled up on us because he saw how scared my kids
• 1:18:51
  were, and I said to my son, I said, that's it.
• 1:18:54
  That was the third one, I went, that's it, he's finished,
• 1:18:56
  and he followed us at the end and chased us at the end and got
• 1:18:58
  him again. I was like, oh no, and helped my daughters.
• 1:19:00
  I'm so scared. But yeah, but yeah, Halloween of Horror, just
• 1:19:06
  if I've always said since I've watched it, it is a season eight episode
• 1:19:11
  in like season twenty seven or whenever it was twenty six. It's just it
• 1:19:14
  felt like there was twenty years of jokes that hadn't been sitting there waiting to
• 1:19:17
  be used in a canon Halloween that finally came out. I just I love
• 1:19:20
  Halloween of Horror. It's one of my favorites. Yeah, we definitely there
• 1:19:24
  definitely was like, uh, you tapped into something that we all had.
• 1:19:28
  Everybody had stuff to say. Yeah, yeah, and the song's great as
• 1:19:30
  well, and yeah yeah. And my nephew had this thing where he would
• 1:19:35
  he had a little he did have a little tail. Then he used to
• 1:19:38
  rub it. It was actually five hole the Mouse little stuff Bible, and
• 1:19:43
  he would rub it against his face. So I do remember that moment were
• 1:19:46
  like Salmon and I we went to watch the scoring with this big orchestra and
• 1:19:54
  just that moment when when Lisa gives up Tailor, we were all like,
• 1:19:57
  oh yeah, like, oh my god, yeah, real coming of a
• 1:20:02
  story. It was great. I love it. Yeah, but Caroly,
• 1:20:04
  it's been such a pleasure to talk to you, sir. It's been going
• 1:20:06
  on, but I just want to take this chance because, yeah, your
• 1:20:10
  favorite writer, and I wanted to ask as much questions like it. But
• 1:20:12
  it's an absolute pleasure, absolute pleasure to talk to you. And yeah,
• 1:20:15
  all the best of season thirty five and thirty six. Thank you very much.