Slashdot Mirror
Harry Shearer Walks Away From "The Simpsons," and $14 Million
Actor Harry Shearer, perhaps best known as the voice of several characters on The Simpsons, including that of Montgomery Burns, will be leaving the show's cast, according to CNN.
Showrunner Al Jean said Shearer was "offered the same deal as the rest of the cast, but turned it down." ... Shearer is not just walking away from Springfield, but also a large sum of money. The actor was offered a guaranteed $14 million for two years of work, according to someone with direct knowledge of the matter. The proposed deal also allowed for him to do other projects if he wished." That last part, though, seems to be in dispute, and central to Shearer's decision to leave; Shearer tweeted that it's because he "wanted what we've always had: the freedom to do other work."
It is still on?
Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress
Er, I mean "bogus!"
I thought the show was cancelled after the year 2000, it became complete bullshit after that anyway
Uhh...... no. Harry Shearer will always be know first and foremost as Derek Smalls from Spinal Tap.
"On the bass, Derek Smalls, he wrote this"
... they got. He will regret, just like that douchebag kid from Two and a Half Men
If he already have tens of millions of dollar for his past work, it's a lot easier to turn down $14 million.
I would do a lot harder work than just fucking voice-over for $14M for just two years.
It really pisses me off when I hear about people who turn down so much for doing so fucking little and yet I have to go to work every single fucking (work-week) day for a drop (of piss) in the bucket comparatively. And I will have to do so until I am old and useless and worn out, and just sitting around waiting to die.
A couple of things. Although he doesn't look it, other media have reported him as being 71-years old! He might just be slowing down. Other media are also reporting that the contract banned him from doing other things. It seems kind of strange that after 25+ years, the new contract prohibits this whereas the previous ones didn't. And then, didn't Fox originally say that this was the last year of The Simpsons? Harry might have started planning other projects to fill his time. I think he's still doing a weekly PBS show and works on documentaries and comedy releases. But certainly, prohibiting him from doing other projects would have been a sore point for someone as busy as Harry.
Sure, that's a lot of money to walk away from, but after 26 years of working on the same show, I'm sure he must have a few bucks stashed away somewhere...
If he can't be persuaded to stay, then this is a shame. It will be interesting to see who they replace him with
J Williamson
Surprisingly there are a lot of people on this thread who don't appreciate that there are things much more valuable than money-- (the best things?) Shearer is a smart and super talented guy who's in his 70s now and has had a long and extremely notable career and has earned the right to retire and enjoy life on his own terms. If he wants to do other stuff or if he just doesn't feel like doing Smithers any more for money, great. He doesn't have to be your (or Fox's) dancing monkey for the rest of his life.
Congrats, Harry. Thanks for the laughs so far, and looking forward to your next whatever.
nt
fox: if you stay for 2 more years of this 20 year old cultural dead horse we will pay you 14 million dollars.
Shearer: I want to be creative, to exercise my creative talent on other projects besides a few bit part voices.
fox: sure, you can do other projects.
Shearer: like what did you have in mind
fox: what if we added a new simpsons character
Shearer: thats still the simpsons.
Fox...whats your point..
Good people go to bed earlier.
Maybe hire some writers so the show could actually be funny again.
from slashdot to tmz ...
we pay these people way to much while children are starving
what an evil system, clearly we should be ashamed ourselves
He's 71 years old, and has worked on the show for 25 years. I'm sure he has more money than he can spend, and maybe he just wants to do something a little different with the remainder of his life and career. Hasn't there been enough Simpsons?.
I hate to shamelessly plug, but Harry Shearer was recently on WTF with Marc Maron - I think it gives a lot of insight into the guy and his career and all that good stuff..
Excellent.
I mean, Homer has been in a coma since the house blew from Bart messing with the thermostat. Everything since has just been Homer's dream sequences.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
He wants to reprise his role as the base player for Spinal Tap.
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
..in Albert Brooks' Real Life: https://cdn.thedissolve.com/ar...
Mission: To provide products that consume time and energy as entertainingly as permitted by the laws of thermodynamics.
Money, money, money. Come on, nobody quits over the little stuff. It's always the money.
There were only a couple good episodes this year..... I use to enjoy watching pretty well all the episodes, but it is more of a chore these days watching episodes - sometimes skipping through them waiting to find one gem in the rough.
It is close to the edge so it might just be the right opportunity to end the show.
If they do want to continue on but without those characters that are to be retired.... maybe they can do a spoof where god comes down and takes away all those with faith... leaving behind The Simpsons and taking Ned and the Reverend ... and even Skinner :p
With 573 episodes to pull from and even more studio tape they have sufficient material to clone his voice. All they need is some other anonymous slob to read through all the hours of old material which they can do for a lot less than 14 million dollars. The question is will they?
Or are they just going to use voice clips of him saying "Excellent..." every now and again and recycle him?
But I'm pretty sure it's actually been a ghost ship for about 15 years now. No one's at the wheel, the crew is long gone, the hull paint is only visible in splotches, the nameplate has faded to the point where you can't even make out its name--yet on it sails, forever, and ever, and ever. With no port and no end until the day if finally, mercifully sinks.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Finally they can finish work on Saucy Jack.
. .
Who Watches The Simpsons Anymore? I don't think I have seen an episode in 6 years or more.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Momma said there's only so much fortune a man really needs and the rest is just for showing off.
and Nancy Cartwright, the voice of Bart Simpson, has enough star power to try to "disconnect" him from listeners of that show.
Simpsons probably holds more double entendres per minute than any other piece of culture mankind has ever made. There's even triple and quadruple entendres belted out occasionally, but maybe I'm mixing them with relevant analogies. Speaking of analogies, so many things in life has a relevant Simpsons analogy. My first girlfriend and I used to speak in Simpsons quotes over dumb stuff in life. But after 8-9 seasons, the writers got lazy or there's new writers or something because it just wasn't as chock full of creativity.
Whoever wrote the contract should let the man have his creative freedom. If Harry Shearer walks, the guy writing an oppressive contract should be to blame.
By which you're referring to "Le Show" which covers items in the news and his very well researched documentary "The Big Uneasy" which shows how the Army Corps of Engineers made Hurricane Katrina far worse than it would have been and evades responsibility throughout. Speaking of showing, Shearer backs up his points by quoting and interviewing experts in the relevant fields of discussion and by quoting published hypocrisy from those in power. That's far more backing for his points than I see you giving your views which purport to know what he thinks. In short, you apparently don't think he's funny or insightful but "without actual good context" for anyone to see your views as anything but a name-calling accusation.
Digital Citizen
Seriously, this is a good show and he apparently is very good at what he did. Nothing to do with him nor trying to discredit this, but the compensation level is simply absurd. Thinking about nurses, teachers or whoever that is very good at their job makes $70K a year. That's a 100x. Uniqueness This doesn't include actor/voice-over who does NOT have a Simpson's gig, but could be just as talented, but doing odd gigs for $70/day. To me, top notch entertainers are getting paid for what 95% of those who didn't make it big (like sports).
Nah, 14 mil isn't enough to keep me going.
What a cunt.
This could be my big break . . . my ticket out of here!
Or not.
The word is ungrateful.
It's pronounced nu-cular, nu-cular.
There can be nothing better than The Simpsons. It mocks everything, including The Simpsons, better than anything else.
I don't see how the twenty-three or so characters Harry Shearer voiced are going to continue, but those are only voices, and maybe others can take up the slack.
The show itself must continue because it is the ridiculer of record for modern society.
The only other thing I remember him doing were minor parts on SNL and This is Spinal Tap. I guess the Simpsons must have been pretty good over the years if he can afford to walk away from $7M/year.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
As is clear from the summary the terms have changed and "what he always had" is not possible under the new contract.
They already did that joke in 1999.
No one can tell the diddley-ifference!
I wish you guys would stay relevant. How could he live on only $7 million per year?
The word is ungrateful.
It's pronounced nu-cular, nu-cular.
Meh, he lost his way in the foilage.
PLEASE PLEASE Don't break The Simpsons! 26 years of gold, and it's still amazing!
Ah, scottrocket, our little walking libary.
Silly Billys Toy Shop is now stocking the Lego Simpsons Series 2 Minifgures, read all about these new Minifgures and how Harry Shearer has missed out on all the Lego furor on Silly Billy's toy shop blog, http://www.sillybillystoyshop.com/blogging, hopefully Mr Shearer will not be too disappointed.
He gets paid $7 million a year for doing voices? How fucked up society is!
That Harry has quite a bit of money now and MAYBE, he just wants to do something else? Or retire? Or take a 2 year vacation somewhere?
Dude, just because someone is offered a bucket of money, doesn't mean it has any value to them.
I have a dislike for many SJW causes... I feel it's a disservice to associate what he's doing, which I think is a good cause, with the SJW tag.
So wait ... because you personally dislike some other social causes, you want to rename the term when it applies to causes you do like?
A bit of cognitive dissonance there. That's what the term is, so it applies. People are fighting for a cause they believe makes society better. You may or may not support that specific cause, but that doesn't change what they are doing. You may think the term SJW is a good thing or a bad thing, but it is what it is: they are fighting for social justice.
That reminds me of people who use the ACLU fighting for something is a bad thing if they dislike the issue, but a good thing if it is an issue they support; when they start talking about the ACLU you never can be sure if that is a cause they support or a cause they reject.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement