Matt Groening Says “The Simpsons” Began as a Last-Minute Pitch for “The” “Tracey Ullman Show”, Admits He Thought It Would 'Fail' (Exclusive)
Matt Groening Says “The Simpsons” Began as a Last-Minute Pitch for “The” “Tracey Ullman Show”, Admits He Thought It Would 'Fail' (Exclusive)
Tereza Shkurtaj, Amanda Champagne-MeadowsSun, June 7, 2026 at 12:58 PM UTC
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Matt Groening; 'The Simpsons.'Credit: Eugene Gologursky/Getty; FOX -
On May 31, 2026, Matt Groening attended the Peabody Awards at The Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif.
During the event, the 72-year-old cartoonist and animator revealed to PEOPLE how he came up with The Simpsons "on the spot"
Decades later, the iconic show is still going strong, having celebrated its 800th episode in February 2026
Matt Groening is widely recognized as the creator of The Simpsons, the groundbreaking animated series that transformed television and became a global pop culture institution.
But while fans know and love the atypical family from Springfield, many may not realize the show's origins were rooted in a last-minute decision. During the Peabody Awards on May 31, Groening tells PEOPLE that the idea that would eventually make television history came together moments before a pivotal meeting with producer James L. Brooks about a series of animated shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show.
"Jim knows this story well," Groening, 72, recalls. "I was going to do something else."
Peter Liguori, James L. Brooks, Matt Groening, Peter Chernin, and Yeardley Smith.Credit: Lester Cohen Archive/WireImage
Looking back, Groening reveals that he made a split decision to pitch Brooks a completely new idea rather than one he had already been developing at the time, believing it wouldn't last, and so he didn't want to waste a good idea.
"I was going to do something else and just before I met with Jim…I thought to myself, you know, this is a Fox network, it's brand new, it's probably going to fail," he admits thinking. "I'd better make up something new so that if it doesn't work out, I have something else to fall back on."
When asked if he had any of the iconic characters — such as Bart or Homer Simpson — in mind before the meeting, he replies, "No, not at all."
That spontaneous pitch — which Brooks tells PEOPLE Groening made "on the spot" — ultimately led to The Simpsons shorts, which first debuted on The Tracey Ullman Show in 1987.
While Brooks initially told Groening the shorts would be about two minutes long, they were drastically whittled down.
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"The first thing he said was, 'You've got two minutes per episode.' And I went, 'Oh my gosh, how can you tell a story in two minutes? That's impossible,'" Groening remembers. "And then he called me back and said, 'I'm sorry, it's one minute.' And then he called me back and said, 'It's not one minute, it's four 15-second clips.' So the whole success of the Tracey Ullman Show shorts were based on 15-second cartoons."
After making roughly 60 of the shorts, Groening says they landed the official series. The Simpsons officially debuted in December 1989, evolving into a primetime phenomenon.
Over the decades, the series has become the longest-running scripted primetime television show in American history, attracting an impressive roster of guest stars, from actors and musicians to world leaders and athletes.
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Now more than three decades after its launch, the show's influence continues to span generations.
Earlier this year, Groening spoke to PEOPLE at The Simpsons' 800th episode party on Feb. 6, 2026, and reflected on the remarkable run of the series.
"You like to think that something's going to last forever, but in our case, apparently it does," he said. "So it's really wild. Could not have anticipated this amount of longevity and attention and enthusiasm."
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
