“Fox Cancel ‘The Simpsons?’ That’s Unpossible!”

History is repeating itself. In 1998, the six voice actors that comprise the main cast of The Simpsons, Dan Castellanetta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Harry Shearer, and Hank Azaria, were hard at work trying to get a pay raise for their voice work on Fox’s flagship show. Fox initially refused to meet their demands and drove a very hard bargain, going so far as to begin casting replacements. Series creator Matt Groening stood by his talent, and, in the end, Fox signed lucrative contracts with the voice cast. Now, thirteen years later, the actors and Fox find themselves at odds again, but this time the future doesn’t look so bright.

To say that The Simpsons is a monolith in the merchandising universe is a massive understatement. Unsurprisingly, The Simpsons franchise is estimated to be worth over a billion dollars, including merchandising and syndication rights for episodes. Not too shabby for a show that started out as filler in between skits on The Tracy Ullman Show.

So, what’s the problem? Fox keeping The Simpsons on the air means more episodes and more merchandise, which, simply put, means money for everyone involved. Not so fast. Go and pull up an episode of The Simpsons on Netflix. I’ll wait.

Oh, The Simpsons aren’t on Netflix? That’s weird. Well, I guess that means that other popular Fox cartoons aren’t on Netflix either. Wait, King of the Hill, Futurama, Family Guy, The Cleveland Show, and American Dad are all on Netflix? How does that make any sense?

Some seventeen years ago, when Fox created their current syndication contract for The Simpsons, streaming content online was nothing more than a pipe dream, if it was imaginable at all, and cable networks were a niche. As we’ve seen in the past few months, the streaming rights for shows are increasingly becoming a bigger and bigger deal (e.g., Netflix reportedly paid between $75-$100 million dollars for Mad Men alone). So, what can Fox do to cash in some of that sweet, sweet streaming money?

Cancel The Simpsons.

The Hollywood Reporter elaborated on the contract in a recent article. Under the constraints of the current syndication deal, Fox can only sell The Simpsons syndication rights to affiliates (i.e., your local Fox station). Excluded from the contract are cable channels and streaming services. Basically, the only way for Fox to get out of this current syndication contract is to cancel the show. And, really, this is win-win for Fox: they’ll still continue to make a massive amount of cash from the syndication rights and merchandising AND they won’t have to pay anyone to continue making the show for them.

This all comes as Fox is trying to trim the budgets on all of their shows. They’ve said that the actors need to take a 45% paycut in order to keep the show going. Right now, each of the actors are reported to earn $8 million each per-season. The actors have reportedly offered a compromise: they’ll take a 30% paycut in exchange for a small percentage of royalties from merchandising and syndication. Fox has apparently rejected the deal.

So, what’s the situation now? It looks like Fox has the upper hand here. Canceling the show won’t be a major financial loss for the entertainment giant, and, in fact, it’ll probably pad their wallets if anything; of course, this puts the actors in a dangerous situation. The voice cast of Futurama recently went to bat against Fox and walked away with relative success. The situation doesn’t look so bright for the cast of The Simpsons.

But what would a cancellation mean in the television world? It signifies a complete lack of respect on Fox’s behalf. If you weren’t aware, The Simpsons (and Married with Children) basically made Fox a competitive network. In fact, The Simpsons was the first Fox program to crack into the Top 30 list for weekly viewership. Since then, Fox has of course found other ways to draw viewers (NFL broadcasts and American Idol, for example), but the fact remains: The Simpsons gave a struggling network a serious foothold in primetime television. The Simpsons was also the show that gave birth to the modern era of animated primetime shows. Beyond that, think of the massive cultural impact The Simpsons has had on America, let alone the world. So many neologisms and cultural idioms can trace their way back to The Simpsons.

I realize that this sentimental/honorary argument doesn’t hold up against cold hard cash, but The Simpsons is a television institution. You can say what you want about the quality of the show in the last decade or so, but, even at its worst, The Simpsons is still a tradition. It’s one of the first shows to be renewed every year, sometimes even before the first round of freshman cancellations.

It’s going to be interesting to watch how this unfolds. As I said, Fox certainly has the higher ground in this situation. While there is definitely financial gain to be made in the expansion of The Simpsons‘ syndication, a sentimental argument can really be made. I’m one of those people that grew up with The Simpsons (in fact, the characters are older than I am). I know the show won’t last forever, but it would be nice to let the production crew decide a natural ending point, rather than have to work around one straddled upon them by money.

Sadly, I’m afraid that, in this day-and-age, money talks. Stay tuned to Comic Booked as we keep an eye on this tense situation.

Tags: Bart, comic booked, Dan Castellanetta, Fox, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer, Homer, Julie Kavner, Kyle Black, Lisa, Maggie, Marge, Nancy Cartwright, The Simpsons, Yeardley Smith

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Written by Kyle Black

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