In the 2017 documentary The Problem With Apu, comedian Hari Kondabolu likened The Simpsons’ Apu Nahasapeemapetilon to a minstrel, and examined how the caricature of an Indian man voiced by Hank Azaria impacts South Asian representation on television. Now, The Simpsons has responded to the doc, showing Marge and Lisa Simpson in conversation about an old children’s book Marge has edited to be less offensive — and, it turns out, less good. “Well, what am I supposed to do?” Marge asks. “It’s hard to say. Something that started decades ago and was applauded and inoffensive is now politically incorrect,” Lisa answers. “What can you do?” To underline the point, the show pans to a bedside photo of Apu,
Kondabolu replied to The Simpsons’ clip via his Twitter: “In The Problem with Apu, I used Apu & The Simpsons as an entry point into a larger conversation about the representation of marginalized groups & why this is important,” he wrote. “The Simpsons response tonight is not a jab at me, but at what many of us consider progress.”
Hank Azaria, who declined to be interviewed for Kondabolu’s documentary, previously said that The Problem With Apu “made some really interesting points and gave us a lot to think about and we really are thinking about it.”
