In his first appearance in the third episode broadcast, Homer s Odyssey, Mr Burns fawning assistant Smithers is black. This was a mistake on the part of the show s colourists - he was meant to be yellow. The Simpson s producers have chosen not to re-cast the voices of Troy McClure and Lionel Hutz following the murder of Phil Hartman by his wife. Instead, the characters have been retired from the series. In the first season of the show, episodes were animated from 12,000 individual drawings.
More recent episodes use double that number.
19 Just outside of Las Vegas is an exact replica of the Simpsons house. It was created by Pepsi in 1997 as the first prize in a competition. It was won by a 63 year-old grandmother. She chose to open the house as a tourist attraction. Despite the script being completed and the audio track laid down, for reasons unknown it was never animated.