History of The Simpsons Simpson, Abraham Simpson, and Krusty the Clown. Homer's voice in the shorts is a loose impression of Walter Matthau, whereas it became more robust and humorous on the half-hour show, allowing Homer to cover a fuller range of emotions. Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, and Yeardley Smith performed the voices of Marge Simpson, Bart Simpson, and Lisa Simpson respectively. The crew began to string the clips together on tape to play for the show's live audience, and "The Simpsons" generated "the biggest laughs of the show" according to John Ortved, author of "". The writing staff of "Ullman" soon began to
The Simpsons Guy Appel then asked for permission from "Simpsons" executive producers Matt Groening, James L. Brooks and Al Jean to use their characters. This was approved; Appel was previously a writer-producer on "The Simpsons" for four seasons, and retained his former colleagues' trust. Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith and Hank Azaria guest star as their "Simpsons" characters, but Harry Shearer, the final main cast member of "The Simpsons", was unavailable. Asked how he felt about the crossover, Shearer replied, "Matter and anti-matter." "Family Guy" writers pitched several storylines for the crossover, including one in which the Griffins stay with