25 Years: The Simpsons finally take the Bowl

By Debra Tash

Last night I went with my son and daughter in-law to the Hollywood Bowl.  Never experienced stacked parking, a practice of having your car wedged into a parking lot where there is no hope of escape until everyone starts to leave.  It’s kind of like socialized parking.  Nobody is better than anyone else, except that person who owns the car blocking the exit.

We saw The Simpsons Take the Bowl, a celebration of 25 years of the show being on the air, or nowadays, streaming on a digital device.  It was like being with my peeps. My husband never got the Simpsons.  But apparently nearly 18,000 people at the Bowl have and still do.  They recited dialog when clips were played, and swayed to musical numbers such as, “See My Vest”,  sung by the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles.

Kicking off the show was Matt Groening, the Simpsons’ creator.  He reconfirmed the fictional family he conjured up was based in part on his own clan.   The multi-talented Hank Azaria, voice of Apu and Chief Wiggum to name just a few of the characters he plays, acted as Master of Ceremonies.  There was a mix of animated clips and live stage performances topped by fireworks where Bart Simpson skateboarded high above the Bowl’s iconic stage. The closing number was Do the Bartman – written by the late Michael Jackson.

Conan O’Brien singing “The Monorail” a show he wrote for The Simpsons

What my husband also doesn’t get is that The Simpsons is more an institution than entertainment.

As I was walking out, swept along like a discarded plastic bag adrift on an ebbing tide (or something environmentally friendly like seaweed, if you prefer) I thought about 9/11.  That the three evening run of this show opened on 9/12 (on the heels of the 13th anniversary of that terrible day in 2001).  And why would I make such an odd connection after experiencing a fun, and very lively time spent with people I love?  Because I recalled how the New York Times sent out reporters just after 9/11 and they interviewed family members and recorded the short biographies of 1800 9/11 victims.  And many of those people who were lost shared a love of The Simpsons, an animated show that has become the longest running show in television history.  Not equating the two by any means, but only saying that for something that on its face is just a cartoon, The Simpsons have become part of the American culture, for better or worse, a common bond.  Maybe not for my husband, or millions like him, but for many of us who have been made to laugh, mostly at ourselves, and at times, when nothing seemed funny.

Hey people, “Don’t have a cow, man…It’s the Simpsons.”

Debra Tash is Editor-in-Chief of Citizensjournal.us, past president for Citizens Alliance for Property Rights, business executive and award-winning author, residing in Somis.

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