It stands to reason a book authored by a long-time multiple-award-winning writer for “The Simpsons” would be funny and unpredictable like the TV show. “Springfield Confidential” by Mike Reiss with Matthew Klickstein delivers all you want. And then some.
He answers questions from viewers — like “Where is Springfield?”
There is insider stuff like the show was almost canceled before it got on. And that power plant mogul Burns’ assistant Smithers was African-American but changed after they saw the show in color and decided having a prominent black character kiss up to his cruel, white boss was wrong.
There is celebrity gossip: “I’ve heard that Bruce Willis is so monstrous that one of his directors, a cancer survivor, said, ‘I’d go through another round of chemo rather than work with Bruce again.'”
Insider stuff: Some think “The Simpsons” never won an Emmy. “That’s because our awards aren’t handed out at the boring televised ceremony. Our awards are handed out at the super-boring un-televised ceremony, the Creative Arts Awards.”
On his colleague Nancy Cartwright playing male characters Bart, Nelson and Ralph: “Not since Lassie had a TV actor played a classic character of the opposite sex.”
There’s even stuff about Tom Cruise which I won’t mention because Cruise sues.
The book is sprinkled with interludes like this “True Fact”: There is a Macon, Ga., resident named Homer Simpson who works in a nuclear power plant. Says Reiss, “Poor guy. Having to live in Macon, Georgia.”
I don’t know how this happened, perhaps I was galavanting around the globe as a correspondent, but in the chapter titled “Gay for Pay” Reiss admits his favorite project was not “The Simpsons” or “The Critic” but a web series called “Queer Duck” (He can’t even fly straight.) It was enormously popular, Britain’s Channel 4 viewers named it one of the 100 greatest cartoons of all time. Notes Reiss, “Now, mind you. England is the world’s only exclusively gay country. Britain’s an island — it’s like a big gay cruise that doesn’t go anywhere.”
He writes about the art of comedy — “k” words are funnier. But there are exceptions. “My cousin Kenny was killed by the Ku Klux Klan,” for instance. And he recommends some great comedy flicks you may have missed. And some books about being funny.
Reiss finally answers the burning question of why “The Simpsons is so successful. “… the valuable input of network executives. We don’t have any.”
The book is written with the same comic timing and cleverness that Reiss brings to everything he does. My only regret is that it is not twice as long as it is and my copy is not signed.
(Bob Ingle is a New York Times Best Selling Author, TV and Radio news analyst and award-winning journalist.)
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