Under the starry skies of Hollywood on Friday, the animated world of the US’ longest-running television series, The Simpsons, came alive through music and lively performances from the cast on stage at Los Angeles’ Hollywood Bowl.
Simpsons creator Matt Groening started the first night of the three-night event reminiscing about Fox’s early censorship regulations, as the program prepares to enter its 26th season later this month.
Cast member Hank Azaria, who voices many of Springfield’s best-known residents, such as bartender Moe, Kwik-E-Mart owner Apu and police Chief Wiggum, hosted the evening and dressed as Apu to sing Who Needs The Kwik-E-Mart, accompanied by dancing hot dogs.
Premiering in 1989, donut-loving Homer and his dysfunctional family have been tapping into the changing US zeitgeist and satirizing popular culture for more than two decades.
On Friday, the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra played musical numbers from specific episodes and opening sequence couch gags while a giant screen played clips from the show.
Cast members Yeardley Smith, the voice of Lisa Simpson, and Nancy Cartwright, who voices Bart, held an “in memoriam” tribute for former Fox TV presidents, including Barry Diller and Kevin Reilly. Cartwright also made one of Bart’s famous crank phone calls on stage with Azaria answering as Moe.
Special guests included talk show host Conan O’Brien, a former writer on The Simpsons, who sang Monorail, dressed as his character Lyle Lanley, accompanied by the Los Angeles Gay Men’s Chorus.
Composer Hans Zimmer came on stage to perform his work from 2007’s The Simpsons Movie, and comedians Weird Al Yankovic and Jon Lovitz also performed musical numbers. The night ended with an array of fireworks.
The Simpsons is the world’s most-watched US television show, syndicated across more than 100 countries, and reaches more than 150 million viewers a week.
The anniversary celebrations this year have included a crossover with Lego building blocks in an episode, and a holographic Homer appearing at San Diego’s Comic Con in July.
Fox’s sister cable channel FXX hosted a 12-day “Every Simpsons Ever” marathon earlier this month, airing all 552 episodes back-to-back.
The series will launch its 26th season with an anticipated crossover episode with Fox’s animated series Family Guy, where the show’s Griffin family will meet the Simpsons in Springfield.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion