Then there is the cast of hundreds which populates their world - classmates, teachers, shopkeepers, businessmen, local authorities, neighbours, friends and family. Then people got a strange kind of addiction to it. Now we have probably three times as many jokes and plot twists, about six jokes a page. In America we've aired about 155 episodes and we're always trying to outdo ourselves to keep it fresh. Last year we had a special 3-D show on Hallowe'en.
Most shows have maybe a couple of readings before recording.
We have about eight rewrites which means things have to be funny for us on eight occasions. But there has also been an exploration of the characters. The dumber Homer was made, the more laughs he got. The scriptwriters seemed to loosen Marge up a bit too. It always has been more centered around Homer, I think, but also, Homer's grown up, his life takes him to different palces and into different situations with different types of people.