American animator Matt Groening: biography, creativity and interesting facts

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:53

The infantile loser Fry, the rude merry fellow Homer, the notorious hooligan Bart - millions of people on our planet follow the virtual life of these popular "cartoon" characters. All of them were created by one person. We will tell you about it in this article.

Matt Groening: childhood and adolescence

The Simpsons and Futurama - in the modern world it is difficult to find a person who has not heard about these iconic animated series. Their creator is Matt Groening. Who is this person? Where was he born and how was his childhood? Let's figure it out!

Famous American animator Matt Groening was born February 25, 1954 in Portland (Oregon), the son of an advertiser and a former teacher. The future genius of animation studied no matter. But already from the school bench he began to draw funny cartoons and funny caricatures, for which he often visited the principal's office.

After graduating from high school, Matt entered Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. However, according tothe animator himself, this study did not bring him anything useful. However, while in college, Matt was active in the university newspaper as its editor-in-chief. There, by the way, he published his first mini-comics.

After graduating from college, Matt Groening moved to Los Angeles. There he dreamed of becoming a writer, but things turned out a little differently for him.

Finding yourself and the first small successes

"Animation is a special activity that is ideal for those who can't really write or draw" (M. Groening).

In the period before his worldwide recognition, Matt changed many professions. In particular, he managed to work as a courier, journalist, driver, literary critic, dishwasher, record seller. He called this period of his biography "life in Hell". Weighed down by the prosaic and difficult everyday life in Los Angeles, Matt Groening begins to draw comics again. And he calls them accordingly – Life in Hell.

An anthropomorphic rabbit named Binky became the main character of the sketches from "hell life". And he, apparently, was also a resident of the "damned" Los Angeles. Groening multiplied his drawings on a photocopier and distributed them among friends and acquaintances. At first, his comics were appreciated only in very narrow, avant-garde circles. But two years later they began to be published in the weekly newspaper Los Angeles Reader (although for this Matt had to get a job in this publication).

By the way, while working at the Los Angeles Reader, Groening met his futurewife Deborah Kaplan (marriage broke up in 1999). It was she who advised Matt to publish selected comics as a separate book. The collection was released in 1984 and sold a huge circulation of 22,000 copies. This was followed by other books - "School is Hell", "Work is HELL", "The Big Book of Hell" and others. They are still available in bookstores today.

What happened next? And then there were The Simpsons!

Unprecedented success… yellow

The idea of the animated series, bringing in one billion dollars annually, was invented and designed by Matt in just half an hour! In 1985, the work of a novice animator interested the famous producer James Brooks. He invited Groening to his place and offered to work on small animation sketches for the Tracey Ullman variety show.

Matt Groening didn't want to use characters from his "Life in Hell" for these sketches for fear of losing the copyright to his comics. Therefore, literally on the go, he sketched on paper the Simpson family - five yellow heroes with angular and rather ugly features. Brooks approved the idea. And so the famous The Simpsons was born.

Matt Groening produced 48 episodes of The Tracey Ullman Show. Looking at the early Simpsons is now quite funny, because they are not at all like modern and loved by millions of heroes. Compare for yourself:

But even such "The Simpsons" were quite well appreciated by the public. So in December 1989, FOX took the risk of airing13 full half-hour episodes of the new animated series.

What you need to know about The Simpsons: the most interesting facts

The Simpsons is the longest-running animated series in television history with 28 seasons and over 600 episodes. Until now, it has been broadcast in more than a hundred countries around the world. In The Simpsons, absolutely everything is ridiculed in a rather harsh form, up to modern television!

We have selected for you the most curious facts about this animated series:

• Almost all the characters in the series are yellow.
• The Simpsons characters do not age and look exactly the same as in the first season.
• The Simpsons gave English a lot of neologisms. The most popular of them is the exclamation "Dow!".
• All characters in the animated series have four fingers on their hands (five - only God).
• It takes 6 to 8 months to produce one episode of The Simpsons.
• About 200 artists and animators work on the series (half of them live in South Korea).
• The script for each new release is rewritten at least 12 times.
• Barbara Bush called the show "the dumbest thing she's ever seen" in 1990. True, she later apologized for her words.
• But the Vatican, on the contrary, described the plots of The Simpsons as quite realistic and reasonable.
• According to statistics, the average age of The Simpsons viewer is 30 years old.

Matt Groening: films and major works (list)

In 1999, when Groening was at the height of his world fame, FOXaired another creation of the animator - "Futurama". This project, unlike The Simpsons, has already been completed (a total of seven seasons have been drawn and released). With the help of the animated series "Futurama" Matt Groening realized his cherished childhood dream - to create an ideal and fantastic world of the future.

Recently it became known that Matt is preparing to release another product - an animated series for adults called "Disappointment". The premiere is scheduled for 2018.

All cartoons and other works by Matt Groening are listed below:

• Life in Hell comic series (1978-1984).
• The Simpsons (1987-…).
• Futurama (1999-2013).
• Disappointment (2018).

Matthew Abram Groening: 10 Interesting Facts

• Yes, that's exactly what the full name of the famous animator (Matthew Abram Groening) sounds like.
• Matt has a personalized star on the Walk of Fame.
• Many people make the mistake of pronouncing Matt's last name, calling him Groening. As the cartoonist himself clarified in one of his interviews, it is Groening that is correct to say (consonant with the English word complaining).
• Graining grew up in a large family (his parents had five children).
• Ethnically, Matt is half Canadian, religiously agnostic.
• Matt Groening is left-handed.
• Matt is a huge fan of Godzilla, a fictional character in comics and movies.
• At one time, Groening drew erotic comicscontent.
• When the main character of The Simpsons is in profile, his ear and hair resemble two letters: M and G. So the cartoonist decided to modestly encrypt his initials.
• Matt voices one of his characters, namely baby Maggie Simpson. In particular, he reproduces her funny nipple smack.

I've always dreamed of sneaking into popular culture and turning it upside down. Perhaps I succeeded!”. This quote by Matt Groening is the best way to complete the story of the outstanding animator of our time.