Matt Groening: Life Is Swell

“Wow,” says Groening. “Yeah, I have an older sister, Patty, who was a beatnik, or hung out with what I considered beatniks. I remember, as a little kid in the early ’60s, going over to one of her friends’ houses, and the guy was an artist who had a mannequin’s leg sticking out of the wall. For me, that was my introduction to the avant-garde.”

“Just plastered in place?”

Illustration by Matt Groening The Simpsons ™ and © 2007 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Mmmm . . . movie promotional tie-ins are sprinklicious. (Photo by Michelle Ngo)

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• The Simpsons (TV Show)
• Matt Groening
• The Simpsons Movie
• Sitcoms
• Animated Sitcoms

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“Yeah. It was like an art piece. This was like, 1962. Imagine Theodore Cleaver, from Leave It to Beaver, going over to somebody’s house and seeing a mannequin’s leg. It would be . . . well, first of all, it would be an entire episode. And, for me, it was, you know, the rest of my life.”