The father-son wrg duo Rob and Johnny LaZebnik teamed up (wh an assist om Christe Baranski) to at last create an openly gay romantic life for Waylon Smhers on “The Simpsons.”
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THE SIMPSONS: WHEN SMHERS' GAY CLU FIRST STARTED
Both episos were penned by longtime seri wrer Rob LaZebnik, who revealed to the New York Post he had an assist om his gay son, Johnny, the creatn of both episos. "While lettg Smhers e out of the closet was a major achievement for visibily back 2016, the father-son duo wanted to do more than jt make another one-dimensnal gay uple and relatnship. "So often, gay romanc are a subplot or allud to or shown some kd of montage or as a punchle, " Johnny ntued.
"And what I thk I was really exced about, wh this episo, we get to see -- whout spoilg too much -- the begng, middle and who knows how ends of a gay relatnship, of really gettg to the nty-grty of how gay people date, how they meet, what 's like, " he said. "I haven't played a lot of gay characters, but every time I do , brgs back certa feelgs I had as a young actor where I uldn't be gay.
'SIMPSONS' CHARACTER SMHERS COM OUT AS GAY
) “I like that Smhers didn’t have to have a big ‘Sprgfield, I’m gay! If there are two thgs I know tuively, ’s what a ‘Simpsons’ joke should sound like and what a gay joke should sound like.
“I squeezed as much siry gay-culture stuff as I uld, ” Johnny said. ” As they worked on the script together, “my dad would pch the very niche, extremely filthy gay jok, ” Johnny said. ”“My dad wrote , ” Johnny tweeted, “which prov how well he knows the gay muny.
The Simpsons ma another one of s late-perd, seemgly random shifts narrative on Sunday night by makg Waylon Smhers, whose glass-closet homosexualy has been one of the show’s longt nng gags, e out. At least one reactn to the episo has argued that Smhers’ not g out ( the sense of sayg aloud that he was gay) was a major misstep, but I’d argue that stoppg the entire episo for Smhers to liver a speech would have been jt about the only thg that uld have ma more empty-lorie sentimental.