They have to be good to afford what the cast makes.
Incidentally, the movie The Truman Show resembles the Philip K. Dick novel Time Out of Joint. It’s probably just a coincidence, but the plots are similar. In each one, a man discovers that his life isn’t real. Everything around him has been set up to make him think it’s real. There’s also some Robert Heinlein works in which the hero discovers that his life isn’t real. This trope also occurs in The Twilight Zone where a hero discovers this.
As I noted above, ratings for the show in recent years are OK, but a fairly small fraction of what they were in the '90s. I suspect that the combination of reduced costs of animation thanks to computers, and continuing licensing and syndication income, mean that the show is still profitable, despite lower ratings and the voice actors (at least the core six) making good bank.
Let’s see what happens if one of the main voice actors passes away, especially Castellaneta (68) or Shearer (82).
I wonder if any of them have signed away their voice rights for after they die. I believe James Earl Jones did, possibly only for Darth Vader. It is a way to provide income for loved ones…by “working” after you die.
He did, indeed, back in 2022.
It’s a pretty common trope. See, for example, Frederik Pohl’s “The Tunnel Under The World”.
IIRC, there was a sci-fi short story where a ludicrously rich young woman falls for a guy who’s maybe nothing special and who dies tragically — and she puts all the money it takes into making sure another young man grows up to be just like him, or as close as she can get it. It ends by asking the reader: hey, are you a young man who’s ever applied for a job you wanted and figured you would’ve gotten, but for some reason they turned you down and you got a job offer from a place you maybe wouldn’t have thought would hire you? Have other events in your life played out as though someone is making sure you live out a script designed to make you do coming-of-age stuff on a desired timetable? Yeah, it’s possible you’re about to meet a woman who’s obsessed with you, or with who she hopes you now are…
‘The Computer Wore Menace Shoes’ in season 12 had a Truman Show reference:
When Homer is sailing away, the boss of the clan is watching him from a big building with a round window, and is trying to stop him using different things. This is a reference to the 1998 movie The Truman Show, when Truman Burbank is trying to escape from the fake town.
“The Simpsons already did it.”
Like someone upthread, I watched the very first episode live with my housemates. One of the housemates was a fan of Tracy Ullman and knew about them. We would all watch that and Married With Children together.
Whenever they do, I hope the last episode reveals which state Springfield is in.
Didn’t the show make it clear that the state is North Takoma?
David Silverman, one of the directors, joked that Springfield was located in the fictional state of North Takoma. There are episodes with state abbreviations “NT” and “TA,” which would support this. However, this is not enough to be considered canon. IIRC, there are at least two episodes which suggest Illinois, due to either a map or a spacecraft rising above the Earth or whatever indicating a location close to Chicago or whatever, but this would be contradicted by other episodes.
As a long-running show, the Simpsons have a floating timeline (I.E. Bart will always be 10 years old, etc.) and part of this is that something that was canon in one episode may be retconned in a later one.
They’ve had various episodes in which the family visits other states (New York, California, etc.). So if those episodes eliminate these states as possibilities for the show’s location, has anyone made a list of which states weren’t visited and are therefore possibilities for the show’s home state?
Most likely repeatedly; this is one of the most often discussed subjects on Simpsons-related forums.
Yes, it’s a running gag that other states are mentioned, eliminating them as the one where Springfield is in, so that maybe they’ve gone through all of them by now. See here.
Like I said, the Simpsons are on a floating timeline, so it’s possible that Springfield was in North Takoma in Season X, in Illinois in Season Y, and in Kentucky in Season Z.
It’s in AZ. They are withing driving range of Las Vegas, and there is a seaport (technically, a squidport). While AZ stop before the gulf, it fits generally.
QED
But in season 12, Springfield’s area codes are 636, which is in suburban St. Louis, and 939, (Puerto Rico). Zip codes for Springfield include 49007 (Kalamzoo, Mi), 90701 (Artesia, CA) and 80085 (not a real zip code, but Moe comments that it spells BOOBS on a calculator.)
I mean, they have winter with snow and all that.