Springfield is celebrating its 800th anniversary.
On Sunday, “The Simpsons” will reach a major milestone, airing its landmark 800th episode (8 p.m. on FOX).
“I never went to bed thinking, ‘Maybe the show is going to end. I have to pack up and clean out all the crap in the office,'” showrunner Matt Selman told Page Six.
“The Simpsons” premiered in 1989 and is the longest-running American sitcom, animated series, and primetime scripted series.
Set in Springfield, it follows the antics of the iconic comic book family: Homer (Dan Castellaneta), Marge (Julie Kavner), Lisa (Yardley Smith), Bart (Nancy Cartwright), and baby Maggie.
The 800th episode follows the family’s trip to Philadelphia and includes a satire of the HBO Max medical drama “The Pit,” starring Noah Wyle.
Selman said he never feared cancellation because the show’s ratings were stable, and when the show came to Disney+ in 2019 when Fox merged with Disney, “a whole new generation of young fans fell in love with the show and it became their favorite show.”
Selman has worked on The Simpsons for more than 20 years, starting in 1997, starting as a screenwriter and moving to executive producer and showrunner in 2005.
For years, “The Simpsons” seemed to eerily predict future events, such as the Disney-Fox merger or the inauguration of President Trump.
“It’s disturbing,” Selman said. “It makes you think maybe we’re living in a simulation or something like that,” he joked.
“But I always say that the more unlikely thing is that I didn’t expect anything, because I think these things are coincidences. And if there are no coincidences, the chances are very low.”
The showrunner said, “It’s a pretty bizarre coincidence, though, that we predicted by chance.”
Over the years, “The Simpsons” hasn’t hit any major roadblocks, he said.
“The network isn’t that important creatively, so there may have been some things they wished they had put more effort into from a broadcast standards standpoint. I don’t remember them,” he explained.
He added that the team feels “lucky” that they haven’t experienced “creative setbacks, the kind of setbacks where you say, ‘Oh, I can’t do this, I can’t do that.'”
Selman admitted that The Simpsons is not trying to be South Park.
“We don’t want to do a show that’s unapologetic and dark and smart and funny and great that’s ripped from the headlines of the day. We want to do a show that’s ripped from the headlines from nine months ago.”
Asked how long he thought The Simpsons would last, he said, “I think 1,000 episodes is a good number. Let’s aim for 1,000 episodes. That would be a nice clean ending. But I don’t know, that would probably be a decision beyond my pay grade. But 1,000 episodes would be great.”
