Matt Groening discussed his career in comics and television with Tom Gammill, an acclaimed writer/producer/cartoonist, who has written for such programs as Seinfeld, Late Night with David Letterman, and The Simpsons.
After Groening and Gammill came out, they thanked everyone for coming and introduced a video with some of their favorite clips, also it had some cool entrance music.
Groening shared some great examples of his early work on Life Is Hell and shared his inspirations.
By the end of the session they welcomed questions from the audience. I didn't have a full idea of what I wanted to ask, but I could not resist the chance to ask something to the creator of The Simpsons.
Only moments after my question I started thinking of better questions.
- "Mr Groening, thanks for coming out tonight. Could you share how The Simpsons has had to deal with pressure from the networks to include in-show advertising?"
- "Throughout all your experiences what has been the biggest frustration or struggle and how have you dealt with it, and what did it teach you?"
I can't recall the exact question or my phrasing, but it was something to the effect of "You had already mentioned a little about how other cartoons have been an inspiration, can you comment on how Itchy and Scratchy were created and maybe the influence of Tom and Jerry?"
Groening responded with yeah [something, something] and then I asked if they ever really completed an episode - especially the one when the nerds unplugged the TV. He's tried to pitch a full episode of Itchy and Scratchy but it was not received well by the other writers, and so they have never written an full episode.
Here is a follow-up article by the Dispatch
