Seemingly unaware that success in the television industry can be used as a means to obtain wild personal fame and (we’re presuming) true happiness, Matt Groening tends to stay out of the limelight himself. As The Hollywood Reporter points out, he last did the late-night rounds in 2007 to promote The Simpsons Movie. But like a comet (ever-returning, loves Futurama), the man behind The Simpsons will stop by Late Night With Seth Meyers on Thursday, August 16, to promote his latest show, Netflix’s Disenchantment with Abbi Jacobson and Eric Andre.
None of which is to suggest Groening has been out of the news cycle lately. While he hasn’t sat across the desk from a host, he did sit down with the New York Times in July to weigh in on the ongoing criticism of the Simpsons character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, voiced with an Indian accent by exceedingly not Indian actor Hank Azaria. “I think particularly right now, people feel so aggrieved and crazed and powerless that they’re picking the wrong battles,” he said of the controversy, inspired in part by comedian Hari Kondabolu’s documentary The Problem With Apu. “I am sorry that The Simpsons would be criticized for having an Indian character that, because of our extraordinary popularity — I expected other people to do it. I go, maybe he’s a problem, but who’s better? Who’s a better Indian animated character in the last 30 years?”
