Talking Simpsons - An Interview With Carolyn Omine!

Episode Date: December 31, 2020

Carolyn Omine has been working on The Simpsons since season 10, and has been working on the series for the last 20 years! We chat with her about moments like Stupid Sexy Flanders, Monkey Knife Fights, working as the only woman in the writers' room at the time, and even her work on the final seasons of Full House! We learned a ton from one of the nicest Simpsons producers we've ever chatted with, so listen now!And if you enjoy this, be sure to check out our MANY previous interviews all on Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons!!!

That suit's a little revealing, isn't it? Well, it allows for maximum mobility. Feels like I'm wearing nothing at all. Quit it! Must wash eyes! Uh-oh. Okay, don't panic. Remember what the instructor said. If you ever get into trouble, all you need to do is... Feels like I'm wearing nothing at all.

Nothing at all. Nothing at all! Stupid sexy Flanders! Ow, my leg! This is the worst pain ever! ahoy everybody and welcome to another talking simpsons interview i am one of your hosts for this one the stupid sexy bob mackie who is here with me today uh it's henry gilbert and i also have come down with leprosy today oh no check to see if it's oatmeal and delicious yummy and who are we talking to today we're talking to carolyn omine if that name doesn't ring a bell she's been writing for the simpsons for the past 22 years and we just referenced it up front her first episode was little big mom which we recently covered on the show yeah she has worked on the series for literal decades now and not just you, as a writer on the show

or co-executive producer or executive producer even, but she's also, you know, has been a voice director on the series too. She has so many fun stories to share. You know, we mainly focused on her early years on there since that's what we're covering right now. But she had so many fun stories to tell. What a nice person too.

One of the nicest people we've talked to. And we go into her pre-Simpsons career, including Full House. We got the dirt on John Stamos. You're going to hear about it in this podcast. We learned a ton about that and easily enough to fill a second podcast we could do. And so, yeah, I think you guys are really going to enjoy this again. A big thank you to Carolyn Amine. Follow her on Twitter.

It's just her Twitter handle name. And then follow her on Instagram too. And you know, if you enjoy this interview, we have a ton of previous ones too. I think we're, I think it's over 30 now. I'm pretty sure we're up that far. We talked to quite a few people over on patreon.com slash talking Simpsons. They're all at the $5 level. Our previous interviews for the first, I think like two and a half years of our patreon we've talked to people like mark kirkland

and david silverman and mike reese and john vd and i keep going and going there's a lot there's a lot of people i think we've covered about half of the uh writers to date at this point uh and it was great to hear carolyn's perspective on on such a long time on the show and her very varied experience on it and also you know being one of the only women in the writer's room for a time too, we, we learned a lot from her. So a big thank you to her. And I guess why don't we just go into the interview?

My first question is an easy one, but like what got you to start your career in comedy? I guess career wise, I was doing a lot of improv and sketch and I wrote a lot of sketches for that. And I was in an improv group with a guy who's Mark Steen and his sister was Nancy Steen, who was a TV writer at the time. And so she was familiar with my sketches and stuff because she had come to a bunch of our shows. I was also working in a literary agency and she called one day looking for writers. And I was like, oh, hi, it's me.

And so she told my boss, who was a literary agent, Rob Rothman, fabulous Rob Rothman, that, you know, she said, you know, your assistant writes, and she said, you should represent her. And he said, Well, you should hire her. And then she said, Well, tell her to give me a script. And maybe I will. And so he came out and he said, you should write a script. So I wrote a script, and he got it to her and she hired me. It's crazy. It worked. It was very, very lucky, but that's, so that's how I got career-wise, but I had been doing improv and sketch comedy for a long time. And that's, that's what sort of prepared me for. Yeah. I was curious, you know, the, the, how would you compare like the,

the improv scene when, when you were getting started to what the improv scene at least in LA of of now kind of feels like like is do you notice similarities or differences it's very you know I did and I I'm not good at judging time but I did I want to say five years ago just I took a I took a class at UCB just to, is that right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I sometimes call them USB. And then people would correct me like, what am I saying wrong? But UCB.

I just did it. I just missed doing improv so much. And I wanted to do that. And it was really interesting to see a different comedy theory. And it always feels weird to think like that comedy has theories because on one hand, it's like this artistic thing, like comedy has no rules, but it does. And I think it actually, there are, you know, it's like religion, I think, you know, there's many ways to get to God. And sometimes you need to look at some what

somebody else did. And so it was very, I thought that the UCB, their whole thing, I don't know, are you familiar? Are you an improv at all? We know it a little, we're kind of on the outside, we have lots of friends who work. Yeah, I mean, they have very specific thing about finding the game of a scene and then repeating the game of the scene and resting it and then coming back. And they get very, when you do improv, like sometimes I came from a different, we were trying to create a sketch off the top of our heads, basically. So we were trying, basically, and there were other little rules. It was all that like yes and and note deny and all those things. But you know,, when I used to teach improv,

I used to like time people because I would say like a really good sketch would be about three minutes long. And so at one minute, you should have had your premise sort of set and by two minutes, you got to like leap to action and then you start reaching for an ending. And I just felt like internalizing that clock

was just something to do. But it's very different because UCB, yes, you know, just something to do, but it's very different because UCB, yes, UCB, I thought I said it again, USB, UCB, they would get very like, oh, wait, you're getting plotty. Cause I would be trying to tell a story and they'd be like, no, no, no, you're just repeat the game. So that was, that was interesting to me. I, when I look at some Saturday night live sketches, sometimes I think, oh, that's what they're doing. They're like, here's the premise. Here's another example of the premise.

Here's another example of the premise. I like things to go, here's these people. Something happens to them, and then there's an ending. But I think it's harder to do, and you have, you know, there's just in the old school, it was a lot more, you just kind of had to accept some of them aren't going to, they're not all gems, you know. But I feel like with the newer version, with this, and they also have this long form is very, mostly people do long form now.

And that allows you to like, oh, it's starting to lose steam. Somebody jump in and, you know, take the scene to another, like take one word and go off in another direction. So it's incredibly entertaining to watch because I do think old improv, short form improv, you would have sometimes these moments of, you know, wow, I can't believe this was is just being made up. And then you'd also have many cringe moments. I think improv was a lot less enjoyable to watch just because you'd feel like bad for people. But, uh, and I think now you, you kind of like, there are people like, there's no dead air because it's all, it's like a, it's like a movie trailer. They're trying to go for like a movie trailer as opposed to trying to create a sketch.

Yeah, I think in the past 10 years, there's been a great amount of improv awareness, at least increased awareness, because I really got into improv comedy via podcasting. Networks like Earwolf where local LA improvisers would just do scenes for a podcast. And I think before that, I would just associate it with whose line is it anyway? I'm like, that's the only improv I know. That's like the only version of it that's possible. But now I know long form and short form and all the different rules set up by the UCB. So yeah. How do you feel about that?

There was not really a platform like that to disseminate your comedy. It's hard because for a long time, most of the, back in my day, a lot of people thought that improv couldn't be on TV. It wouldn't work. And I feel like watching Whose Line Is It Anyway, I kind of felt like, yeah, it doesn't really work. Part of it is that, well, I liked what I would call open scenes. But as exercises, you would do games.

You would do things like every time this guy touches his ear, that person will fall down. Or there's a thing we used to do called Actor's Nightmare, which I think is a great game, where one person has a playbook, like a book of plays, and the audience would open it up to any point. And then you'd read one character's lines. And the other person has no idea what play you're doing. And, you know, you get a suggestion. So you're like, two autoworkers. Meanwhile, this person is only going to be saying lines from glass menagerie and the other person

has to justify and make all of those lines make sense and i think those are great because you know even if you audience just wants to see an attempt and they actually kind of want to see you fail too like that's funny too so i think in that kind of thing, I think that worked really well in television. I feel like whose line is it anyway? I haven't seen it in a long time, but they basically were doing these games, which to me would be more like exercises.

But I think in television, that's kind of, you know, why I think it doesn't work is that when you're watching a scene and it's actually happening and it's just a scene and you're watching it live, there is that thrill of like, knowing this is happening live. I feel like you, you don't believe it. If you see it on TV, it, it feels like, yeah, they could have cut and edited that. Or I don't know. I'm not sure why, but I, yeah. So for a long time I thought, well, I don't know if improv will ever really work on, on a TV. And I have to admit, I haven't, I've heard, I know that UCB does a podcast and I haven't,

I haven't heard improv on a podcast level. Maybe I think that could work. Well, it depends on the improviser too. Like, yeah, they have to be certainly trained for it. Well, so once you got into the industry, there was one of your big shows before Simpsons was Full House. And we definitely have some Full House questions. Yeah, that was surprising to me because it is a very non-Simpsons show. And I say this as someone who has a lot of affection for the old Full House show. I watched it sincerely as a kid and then ironically as a teenager.

And how did you find yourself on that show? And what was the atmosphere like compared to what would happen later in your career on The Simpsons? Well, so Full House was, you know, I had been on a couple shows before that. And one was, you know, it was like, we have 20 episodes and we're out or not. No, not 2014. And we're out and then it didn't go any further. And, you know, it was it was I was so excited to have to be able to go on hiatus and come back and know that the show would still exist. So even though I wasn't like, I watched the show and I was like, I don't know, this is my cup of tea. Like, I don't know if I would have watched it had it, you know, cause I was younger person and didn't have kids, but I was like, all right, I won't have to like worry about coming back after hiatus and wonder if there's

any jobs. But it was a happy place to work. Everybody was really nice. Nobody had any attitudes and the actors were all very nice. And the writing staff was very, I don't know, happy, diverse, funny. It was, it was, you know, to be honest, the writers knew that. I feel like the actors and the people on stage were like, when the Emmys would come out, they'd be like, why don't we win Emmys? And I was like, we're full house. But in the writing staff, they were like, mainly it was because the actors used to paraphrase all the time. That was what they do. Like, I love John Samos. He's super nice. But like, he'd sort of been taught early on that the script is just a starting point.

It's like an outline. So if you gave him a joke that was like, why did the chicken cross the road if he was supposed to say to get to the other side, he would go, well, it's what I would call to get to the other side per se, like he kept saying per se, like he didn't know how to use it, but he kept throwing that in there. And he also learned these little tricks, like he told somebody once, like he told another actor, and then they told us that like, if you walk while you talk, they can't edit around you as much because you'll jump, you know, you'll, you have to, you have to sort of keep all of that or at least keep part of the cross so i feel like a lot of the writers were sort of demoralized and

and also with a lot of notes you know from the network so you just were sort of churning out what you could and i i remember sometimes some somebody would be like but but does it make sense that he would be so obsessed with his hair? And then people look at him like, oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm holding us up, you know, dealing with logic. Let's keep moving. But yeah, it was a very particular thing.

And so, yeah, so something like The Simpsons is very different in that to be at a place where people were, one, you know, our actors are very, very respectful of us. And so they also, we work as, you know, together, we do take their improvs, but they will always give us at least one take that is what we wrote. So, you know, it makes sense to, you know, really think about the wording of a joke, because they're not going to just plow right through it and say it however they want to anyway, you know. So I think that dynamic between us and our actors at The Simpsons really keeps the writing morale up and keeps the writing good. And I think that there was sort of this spiral of like, you're, you know, the writers were sort of, we didn't have as much influence as the executives who would be like these young people who have like came up for marketing. And now they got moved into being executives on the show. And they would, I think they got paid by the note.

No, I'm sure they didn't get paid by the note. But they wanted to sort of justify their job by giving notes. And so they would, they would give these, you'd see'd see they'd have like they'd have worked on these notes. And I remember this was on a different show that I was on that was also very note heavy. But there was like it was it was called Stand By Your Man. And it was these two women whose husbands were in prison. And at one point somebody said, you mean I have to drive 150 miles to this prison? And then like the note was, can we make that 200? Because 150 is a little wordy. And so great, great Titan. And then when we did when we changed it, the actor was like, Whoa, well, why is the prison getting further

away? Like he was thinking that was meaning his part was going to get smaller. I feel like a lot of a lot of shows, not just Full House, but a lot of shows of that era the writing really suffered because the writers were so at the mercy of the the notes and then also you know the actors could just do whatever they want or not do your thing or you know and yeah speaking of the writers on it i did see uh in in your years on it actually the i think it was the teleplay of the episode right before the last episode you wrote is credited to Adam I. Lapidus, who is also he wrote a Simpsons before going on to Floss. Did that that Simpsons work ever come up while while you guys were working on the show? Yes. I mean, he mentioned it a lot. Yeah, he did. He did a freelance episode.

Is it the front? Yeah. Yeah. He and I think And I think he knew Sam Simon. And so that was like, yeah, it was early in his career. He did a freelance episode for The Simpsons. Yeah. Did you know you were writing the last episode when you were writing that season? Of Full House? Yes.

Yeah. Yes. Was it officially canceled by that point when it was assigned to you? Yeah. We knew that it was towards the end and uh my first draft we we all there were a lot of and then i don't know how much stayed there were a lot of sort of swipes at the show good natured swipes but i think there is because she has amnesia right yeah and that uh she michelle um has amnesia and i think she sort of says like wow this house looks

so much bigger on the inside just on the outside that was always the thing like you know that the exterior they would show of this little townhouse but there was always like here's joey's room and and you know uncle jesse and becky and becky were like they've got this giant like there were so many rooms and every once in a while there would suddenly be a basement and another kitchen. When Jesse and Becky moved into the attic, I think that was the first time as a kid I questioned like, how big is this place really? Oh, we've got an attic now. What did they use the attic for before? It was just this empty room. So you eventually would move on to animation writing with some class QTupo shows like Aureal

Monsters and Wild Thornberries. How did you first start to, you know, broach this new frontier? I actually did those while I was like, as I was at Full House. And then I went with Mark Warren and Dennis Winslow, who ran Full House at the time, then they went on to do a show called Parenthood. And I was writing with them. And were, it was sort of similar shows, but not as successful. But I had a friend, Mark Steen, whose sister gave me my first job. He was running Real Monsters. And he said, look, you know, if you, if you ever want to do one of these during your hiatus, they're really fun. And, you know, we don't get much notes. So I was like, oh, yeah, really, I and I wrote an episode, and he changed very little. And it was, you know, they recorded it. And I was so excited. It was very, it was, it was such an exciting thing to

me to be like, wow, something that doesn't get all diluted and changed. And so then the next hiatus, I had another friend uh who was also from an improv group i was in mark palmer he was running the wild thornberry so he said you know do you want i saw i wrote one for him but then at that point then claskey chupo and nickelodeon they started deciding we're gonna give notes and and it was like back and forth and it wasn't as bad as like network and studio notes on the other shows that i've been working on but it was enough because the money was way less it was way way way way less so like the only reason i was doing it was because so i was like can i say yeah

i was i was like oh no i was like i was like shoot this is uh this is exactly like what I do for much more money why would I do it you know the only reason I wanted to do it was to um just for artistic satisfaction of being able to write something and not get it all changed um but it did it was also the first time I wrote and those two writing for animation and just sort of going, wow, this is cool. Because with especially writing sitcoms, you know, like in a show like Full House, you have this giant stage. So you have so many sets, you know, despite how big the house was on the inside.

But you could only have one or two swing sets. I mean, literally because of the size. So it'd be like, if we've got a giant store, then we can't go to Jesse's apartment and Becky and, you know, like certain things would have, like if the smash club is here, we can also have this. So you'd have to write grips knowing with those things in mind, how, you know, you can't have a bunch of swing sets. There's only so much real estate we've got in this stage and budget and all that other stuff but then you go into animation

and none of that is is a consideration you can go to the moon if you wanted and you can have thousands of people like you know if you look on those old shows sometimes you know somebody would turn to somebody like like you know the hot dog vendor and go can you believe it and that guy's just got to go like oh like because he can't we we can't afford another person speaking you know which we never have we don't in animation you know we have our fantastic cast and they do so many different voices and that's true of most animation actors, you could have a salesperson come in and that person can have a great part and be a strange character.

And it can all, you know, this is, you know, one of the great things about animation. And I think The Simpsons really benefits from that. And I mean, you know, Bob's Burgers, you know, all of us, but it is this, you know, idea that you don't have to

just have the same people and you can go anywhere and everybody can talk. Did did working on those, you know, prepare you for when you applied to the Simpsons and in season 11? It I think it certainly helped me when I write my scripts and think about the shows. Are you asking if it did it help me get the job? I don't know that it did. I because I don't know that they I don't know that they knew. But I mean, I might have mentioned it to Mike Scully was the person who hired me. But I had been recommended from by Brian Scully, because I had worked with him on a on a show. okay. So yeah, I mean, I might have liked it in my interview, but I can't remember. I said, hey, I also did this Saturday morning cartoon.

So I know how to, it definitely helped a little bit in the thinking. Although I think that, you know, we've had writers start on our show who have no animation experience and you pick it up. So how did the hiring process work for you for season 11 and were you concerned that your work with more traditional sitcoms might be seen as a strike against you in that simpsons world i i knew it was going to be a

strike against me to like some of the fans and i i think that i do remember when i saw like on that bulletin board of before before there were like websites, they were like, we just found out she wrote for full house. But no, I did feel, I think I did feel a little, I don't know. I kind of was a little self-conscious. I didn't think I was as good as these other guys because mainly everybody else had such stellar credits and, and including the also that they were all from like Ivy league schools. And I was from, well, I graduated from UCLA,

but I started at the university of Hawaii and you know, so yeah, there were all, there were a lot of things that made me like kind of feel like I better just work really hard. But I actually didn't, I actually, I didn't start in season 11. I actually started a little bit earlier, like almost towards the, I started in season 10. But it was a whole season before I got a script. Because there was, there was like, most of the episodes were assigned. And then for the first season, and then I remember it was like me and Tom Martin, they were like, you guys can have can have a pitch off basically like we both were gonna have to like go and write stories and then we'd come and we'd have to pitch them and only one of us was gonna get a story because that's all we had this year and then maybe next year you could get a script and uh and and they also said at this point we've got enough homer and bart story so it's got to be be a Lisa or Marge story. And which are a little harder and cause they're not as splashy.

And then, then Al Jean came back and it was like, it's so we're like, Tyra already like, okay, here's the big pitch out. And then Al was like, oh wait,

are you pitching stories? And we're like, well, Tom and I are. And then he's like, oh, I got stories. He just pulls out this notepad and he's

like oh and then he pitches this story about homer becoming a food critic and then you know just like oh that's great i'm like yeah it's got homer and so we're like yeah and the scoop goes to al so uh yeah we were tom and i were well, maybe it's next year. When we interviewed Mike Scully, he mentioned early when he started there, you know, it was, it felt really intimidating to him, especially all these, you know, Harvard guys and it's such a famous room. He was intimidated to pitch jokes for his first like few episodes on the show. Do you remember the first time you pitched a joke and and it got on the show i do i remember exactly what my first joke was and it's probably it's actually probably for season nine because we we were always rewriting i mean it probably was i

don't know it's the vegas show oh that's 10 i think that's early 10. Is that Viva Ned Flanders? Yeah. Is it Viva Ned Flanders? I remember my first joke was, it was a sign joke that got on the air. Cause yeah, cause it was, so it was, it was something that was late in production where it was like, it was in a color and it was almost ready to go. They were like, we just need a,

we just need a couple more signs as you go down the boardwalk. And so I pitched Loose's Craps in Town. a we just need a couple more signs as you go down the the boardwalk and and so um i pitched lucis craps in town that's a great first one that's a classic i was very excited about that yeah i did watch it on tv like yeah but so it was a while before so it wasn't until season 11 that I got an episode and at the time I believe I believe that uh Julie Thacker was the only other uh female writer in the writer's room um how how has that changed over time in the in the past 20 years well Julie was she was

Julie was like a consultant because she was yes she wasn't in the room as much but yes so for a long time I it was I was the only woman we had Valentina for a while it was me and Valentina and then I would I want to say again I'm bad at estimating time I would say like she was there for about five seasons maybe six I guess because we have to go with even numbers yeah probably six But now in the last few seasons, we have many women. We have Christine Nangle. We have Jessica Conrad, Elizabeth Kiernan-Averick. And then we had Megan Amram for her. She was on our show during the weeks that she was off from The Good Place.

So yeah, she was sort of doing what i was doing like a much more high caliber version of what i was doing uh where she just she's like the simpsons so she just spent her breaks with us um she did it for two seasons and now now she's developing things so off into the wild blue rounder was it tough at first being like the the only moment regularly in the in the writer's room then? It was you know it was tough at moments. I mean for a lot of times I felt like it just kind of felt like not like one of the guys but I just felt like another writer. I felt like it took a moment to win everybody's trust, I guess, to like, let them know that I was one, you know, I at least competent, and as good as they were. And I don't know, I think there was a moment early on where people were afraid to make raunchy jokes around me. And then I made raunchy jokes. They realize, okay, all right.

But no, it definitely there, there are things that are difficult about it. And I'm so glad that it definitely is a difference to have more women. It just is an energy feeling of it just, it feels good. But, you know, it's one of those things where it's like, yeah, it wasn't easy being the only woman. There's a lot of things I could complain about, but I sort of don't want to because I don't want to like, you feel like when people have evolved, I don't want to be like, yeah,

but you know what they used to do was this. And because, yes, we were getting better. And but also, it was, you know, this, it's always it still is this really interesting, funny room of fascinating people. And I will say all of it. I'm sure me too. We all have strange, weird opinions about things. And so yeah, there was a couple times I was like, what are you saying? That's crazy. But that's sort of what makes them so brilliant. Everybody, one of the most brilliant people, and he's not, he doesn't write with us anymore, but was John Schwarzwalder, who doesn't, he was never in the room on a daily basis, but he did a lot of episodes. And when he came in, he was always so interesting because he kind of lives with his brother. And I kind of have the

feeling that he's kind of not interacting with a lot of other people. So when he would come to the room, he would just be full of conversation and full of like theories about the world. And, you know, he was he I remember he really hated Bill Clinton and he he at that time, I think Clinton was president. He was like, I think he had a bet with somebody that this that that Clinton would leave office being chased out of town and he would in a car and he would be firing at the people. Like this. this was his prediction of what would ever like you you know seriously think this is gonna happen and that's

just another that's a very extreme example but you know sometimes you just kind of go all right you're brilliant you have some strange thoughts it is amazing for us to hear people who have actually talked to john swartzwater we think of him as this j Salinger figure that no one has ever seen in like 30 years. But I didn't actually know he was actually still coming in to deliver his scripts. I thought he'd just throw them over the wall from his Cadillac and then peel off. No, no, he would be here for a couple of days. Oh, wow, okay. To do, well, we worked out the stories.

And, you know, my early days of writing in sitcoms, like one of my first rooms I was in pre-Full House, everybody smoked. I used to smoke. I was like right there on the, I mean, apparently just before I got there, there was other things happening in the rooms. But at this point it was just,

I remember there's one girl on the staff that I was on this show, home for an early Matthew Perry vehicle. And she didn't smoke. And I always felt so bad for her. They would put a fan like, you know, facing outward, like, well, this will suck the smoke out. And we would try to stagger. So like not all 10 people were smoking while this one person didn't smoke in this room. But anyway,

you know, a year or two, maybe the very next year, it might've been, you couldn't smoke in the room and everybody started quitting smoking, but you know, Schwarzwälder always smokes. And it was like, well, he's here and he's not here very often. So get him like a candy dish and that would be his ashtray. And he would sit and smoke and tell us he's crazy like he'd come in and say you know you could probably buy enough land in rhode island until you could eventually own enough of it then be the senator like he would have these one time he was going to own a coffee farm and he just has a really wonderful mind yeah i got a feeling sometimes homer or bart would make a crazy

pronouncement in the show and we think like that's schwarzwalder must have just said that in the room and they put it into his mountain yeah and and just his his stories i mean i don't know if you he has book on amazon oh they're great yeah yeah they're great i've heard i've heard some people complain like there's too many jokes jokes, which I don't really find is a problem. If a sentence goes by in one of those books and it wasn't a joke, I'm like, oh man, he got lazy on this sentence here. You know, he's on Twitter. Is that really him? I was sure that was a fake account or something.

It is him. it is him i is him and um he had a pilot that i know at one point you could he put it on there so you could at least connect to a link so i guess it is oh i wish i could think of the name oh it's pistol p yes everyone should watch it because that is so it's it's like one of his books in pilot form and it's uh it's kind of you know he's so he's he's he's very he loves cowboys i think he uh i think he at least the last time i heard he was living in um roy rogers house wow i think it was roy rogers's old house and yeah he had very uh strong opinions he loved trigger and that you know he was roy rogers's horse and he loved dale evans roy rogers's wife but and then he would say and buttermilk which is dale

evans's horse and she apparently buttermilk didn't do any tricks like this real like bitterness towards like why is that horse famous like yeah pistol pete isete is uh is kind it's kind of a mess and it's fun to watch but i just find it interesting that it exists and that someone gave him a development deal to make a live action pilot that's great yeah it is it is like his books that are just full of these great silly jokes and uh yeah it was pretty amazing now we we've also heard that when you're a new writer on the simpsons you you get assigned a marge script or like you're probably given a marge is that little big mom was your first script was was that your pitch or was was it assigned to have a marge script um yeah i don't know i don't know about that that new writers are assigned wire scripts

but uh yeah it's i guess it's sort of but that was uh it was an assignment in a yeah it was i remember we were going to have a pitch out and i was working on a story and the story i was working on was that the simpsons would house sit for Burns. And the reason why I wrote this, why I wanted to come, I was sort of backwards engineering because something Ron Hauge had said, he just said the phrase of monkey knife fights. And I just thought that was the funniest phrase. And I was just, I think I was thinking, how could I get to a monkey knife fight? So I had come up with this pitch that the Simpsons house sit for Mr. Burns and eventually get access to his boat. And then once they're in international waters, no rules apply.

And that's when they start having monkey knife fights. So Mike Scully had come to me and of course I was also like, Oh, I can't wait to get a script and I can't wait to pitch this story. And we were going to have these pitch outs but then the pitch outs kept getting you know something would come up and they would be delayed and so but every once in a while he would say he he would have an idea and say okay I just want this story done so maybe you do it and he had this idea and his whole idea was that Marge gets hurt and Lisa takes over in the house. And so I was like, okay, I'll do that. And I was like, I just told him my pitch.

And then he said, oh, that sounds good. We'll do that. We'll give that to John. So that ended up being a Schwarzwilder. Like he came and then we pitched it to him. And then he ended up writing that. That became the mansion family. Yeah, that's amazing.

I didn't know that was your pitch. That's such a great episode. Well, you know, the greatest thing about that episode is Ron Hauge's pitches. But, you know, that's the power of the room. But yeah, so we then we're just like, okay, you know, we got a that's what the assignment, you know, was, was Marge gets hurt, and Lisa takes over. So in the room, we were just pitching out well how could she get hurt and then at some point somebody was you know we went to a bunch of things and we're kind of you know we do that thing where we have a first act is a set piece of some sort and

usually sort of starts through the and we realized we hadn't gone skiing yet and then and I know it was George Meyer who came up with a very funny idea that Marge should get hurt by like, she should not ski, but get hurt in the lodge, like everybody else would, you know, ski. And then I remember at one point, as the story was going, and I'm like, you know, we're all pitching. And then at one point, I don't even remember who pitched it or how it started. And I know I was pitching there too, but thinking it was a joke that, that, and then Lisa will trick them into thinking they have leprosy. And I was, you know, we're all like laughing about this. And often we will sometimes go down a path that's not going to like, there's no way we could do it. But, and that's what I thought we were doing. And then I just remember at one point realizing like, as, as they started talking more, I was

like, oh wait, we're, we're actually going to do this. So I started writing down one point realizing like, as they started talking more, I was like, oh, wait, we're actually going to do this. So I started writing down the notes like, oh, okay. All right. We're going to go to a leper colony. Yay. So it was exciting for me because that was a great way to get them to go to Hawaii. Because they go to the leper colony on Maui. I mean, I'm sorry, Molokai.

And I'm from Hawaii. So it was the first time the simpsons went to hawaii and it was very exciting and uh speaking of that episode little big mom it is uh pretty famous on social media for the stupid sexy flanders segment do you take any pride in seeing that constantly on twitter and every other form of social media oh yes yeah yeah especially because i think everybody probably feels that way about the first episode where they have a little like it feels really special and important. And, you know, yeah. What I love about that bit is that Homer, he admits that Flanders is sexy. It's not that he's also grossed out thinking about his butt that he knows it is a sexy butt as well yeah that's the problem right like it's his sexiness that is keeping him from being able to remember what his instructor had told him one thing that's

really brilliant about that that little segment is that there's that moment where he his legs split apart and um and then he gets hit in the crotch with moguls yeah that if you listen to it that at the record and it was one of the first records i went to like i i now direct a lot of the records but that was at first you know you would go to the table reads and sometimes you could stop by the records but most of the time we're writing when they're recording but because it was my episode i went and so it was so dan you know like they're like okay you know he we usually do the lines and then we're like look at the stage direction and go, well, are there any sounds we need

here? And so he first just did, ah, and then I remember saying, oh, it's, he's getting hit with mogul. So it's sort of like a repetitive thing. And he's like, oh, okay. And then he just did it like, oh, it has this, so they animated to his vocal track, which is often the case. I mean, there's some things, though, we will just kind of some things you kind of just sort of make the call that like, no, we'll let the animators do the action and we'll have the actors do over it. But because, you know, our cast is so good at sort of just putting humor in these little noises there it's not just wallah it's not just a sound they they will you know we we do find a joke there too but that's that to me was just

really brilliant just hearing him kind of imagine okay what would it sound like if you were being repeatedly hit in the crotch with moguls yeah and it's just a brilliant vocal he's a superstar i don't want to go like episode by episode on your credit ones, but your next one was the dolphin segment on the treehouse. And you also wrote a full treehouse episode too. So I was curious, what's it compare writing a third of a treehouse in the way it used to be done on Simpsons versus writing the entire episode? I really liked the way we did it before only because we all love the treehouse and it was a way to sort of spread the wealth around. And it's very difficult to write, you know, three different

stories. They're hard to write in general because you really have very little time. You have less than seven minutes to tell your story. And so everything's got to be very compressed. And, you know, it's just, it's got to be super efficient. You know, there are three different styles usually too. So it's hard to do all three. And, you know, it really is an episode that tends to get very rewritten. I mean, all of our episodes are rewritten, but with the Treehouse especially,

I would say pretty much every time anybody's done works, been all them, then they'll often be like, eh, we don't like this segment. And that segment will just go and then we'll just write another whole segment. Yeah, it happens. I mean, I'm sure it has happened not that way. But pretty much I'm, I'm thinking it tends to be all right, we got these two, but we need that one more. And sometimes

sometimes there's more than one, like, write another one. And then it's like, yeah, let's come up with something else. Write another one. Yeah, so most of our shows are very, very rewritten. But I think Halloween tends to be especially so. Yeah. And I think that's part of the reason why, you know, the whole thing about how we have holdovers from the season. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah.

So we always have. And that's done. So we have a cushion in case something terrible happens. I don't know that anything ever has happened. We start the season with four episodes already pretty much done or at least very close to it. That's why we always sort of make the Halloween is always a holdover because those episodes also have a longer post production because, you know, usually it takes we always say from the table read to air, it's usually about nine months. But the holdovers will go from the table read to the air it would

be more like a year and a month you know oh yeah and because the halloween episodes treehouses are um especially are are very uh hard on the animators as well harder because generally everybody looks different there's you know there's just a lot more designs and the background is going to be different. It's just you can't depend on with, you know, I mean, we do have episodes that also do that. You know, we just recently did the episode set in Rome, ancient Rome, things like that. But yeah, those those episodes are a little bit harder because you can't pull as many stock or library images.

And well, you mentioned the voice direction. direction yeah i was very curious about that like how uh how did you get uh get put in charge of that and also you you've not only been the voice director for the show but also for you know uh at least two the simpson video games and how how does doing it for a video game compare to the uh to the tv show well at least you're credited for tapped out and for the simpsons game uh i will say that i don't know that i'm credited as like a as a voice i believe you're i'll i can double check this i mean imdb has got wrong yeah i think sometimes the simpsons game does have full animated scenes. 2D animated scenes with the full cast.

I don't know. I did not do the Simpsons game, but I did do some tapped out things. Although most of the tapped out, the voices were just pulled from the library. I mean, you know, like the character things. But there were a couple of animation things, and I did direct those. I've done, it was one time, Garmin. It was early GPS, you know.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like now that everybody has the car. But before it used to be these little devices that people can put in their car, and they wanted to do one with homer's voice on it and i directed directed that and that was a very long session was really long of like turn right it was at the roundabout go straight yeah so tapped out is similar to that, but yeah. So how did I get to be a voice direct? I'm not, I'm not in charge of like doing it all. I did for a long time do a lot of the, at least initial records. I think I just sort of started doing it during Mike Scully's when he was still on the show. And then, and then I just kept doing it when Al took over.

I think partly having done a lot of acting and improv and stuff, I sort of have a sense of what actors want to hear and how to say it, I hope. Well, it must be tough, or maybe not, with you coming in to direct actors who have such established roles by, you know, they're more than 10 years into playing the characters when you took over. Did that make it, like, easier or harder to direct? They're the easiest actors to direct because they don't have a lot of, you know, like some actors will be like, don't give me a line reading. Like, and sometimes, you know, it's hard to describe something. Like Nancy will sometimes go, just give me a line reading. And Yarley will too, you know, like they'll just, because sometimes it's just easier.

Because, I mean, it's not so much about ever changing what, you know, their character would normally do. It's really just about being somebody that was there when it was written, or at least sort of knowing these writers well enough to know what they're going for, and just helping that be translated to so that the actors understand what the writers were going for. And like I said, you know, we always try and get at least a couple takes of what was initially envisioned. And then they're always, you know, Dan will go, wait, I want to try something. And then he'll do it. And, you know, a lot of times it's really great. And, you know, and sometimes it's just, he, sometimes he just sort of will add a little something at it at a table read and and

like it'll be like oh that's so funny well like we'll put it in it um yeah they're they're they're really great and and i mean they're all of our actors are just really nice and have really just great helpful attitudes and dan is he's almost from another planet he's so serene and calm and and yet funny usually usually people who are who are super chill and and calm are not you know they're just they're just chill and relaxed he's also wickedly funny and it's it's a really nice combination well carolyn we've uh gone an hour now but thank you so much for all of your time. And we have more questions. We got through about like 65% of them. So if you want to come back, we got plenty of other ones to ask you. Oh, sure.

I'm so flattered that anybody would be interested. And I love to talk. I mean, like, yeah, Halloween of Horror is one of my favorites of the last few years. And you got Marge High. Like, that's such a great yeah halloween of horror is uh is is my favorite too wow that was yeah just i love i love homer in it i love yardley and i just i love everybody and i do think that was a time when that episode you know mike anderson really liked ha really liked Halloween and he directed it.

And he's our supervising director, but he, you know, he doesn't direct episodes that much because he's supervising everybody else, but he did direct that one. And I think all the animators were, they love Halloween. So I felt like the animators were like firing on all cylinders and the writer's room was firing on all cylinders with you know just because we hadn't done a canon halloween episode and we all love halloween and i i thought even like alf and i thought the music was extraordinarily good the score yeah i just i love that episode it's a beautiful episode but i guess i mean you know folks should follow you on twitter but you have

anything else you'd want to promote uh i am on Instagram, too, although it's mostly my very adorable dog. But occasionally, I do think I'm going to start just looking at all my Simpsons stuff. And I was like, I should take some pictures of these things because I have weird Simpsons things. But yeah, so Instagram, Twitter, I don't really have anything else to promote. I'm trying to think of some charity that I should promote. But thank you so much. Yes, thank you so much, Carolyn.

Thank you. Feels like I'm wearing nothing at all. Nothing at all. Nothing at all. Stupid sexy Flanders.