Mike Scully

As the Executive Producer of The Simpsons, an animated television series about a dysfunctional family, Mike Scully has openly stated that his goal when taking over this role was to "not wreck the show." He now sees his role as being "a fancy title for Head Writer. I'm responsible for overseeing all aspects of the show, but the main one is the writing." Before writing for television, he was involved in writing comedy for stage performers and harboured dreams of a musical career. He says, "I'm a frustrated musician, basically. If I wasn't a writer, that's what I would have been. Not a very good one, but..."

"There's one web site where they're always calling for me to be fired, where they really hate me. They find targets and they'll go after you. I think their expectations are unrealistic. People want everything to stay the same. I think it's easier for people to go in and just criticise and say what they hate about something, rather than find out what they like."

The Simpsons Archive - "I think [the dedication of the fans] is fantastic. Even the ones who have negative opinions, the fact that they will get on and take the time to watch the show, take notes, get on the computer and post their opinion and talk to other people about it: Even if it's a negative opinion, that's still very impressive to me that the show gets them to do that."

The Official Simpsons Site - "I wrote a lot of Lisa's shows. I have five daughters, so I like Lisa a lot. I like Homer, too. Homer comes very naturally to me: I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing. A lot of my favourite episodes are the ones when Homer and Lisa are in conflict with each other... They're very human, I think that's their appeal."

Yakov Smirnoff: Famous Russian Comedian - "I wrote for Yakov for several years. He was the first comedian to buy a joke from me. It was the beginning of a long-standing relationship and friendship. Now he lives in Branson, Missouri. He owns his own theatre there, where he performs several times a day. Basically, it's like Las Vegas with no gambling, but there's shows every day and every night. Firstly, Yakov had a sitcom called 'What a Country', and I wrote on that for a year. I've always enjoyed writing, I've always been fascinated with television and I figured the worst that could happen is I would just fail miserably and I could go back to Massachusetts again and do something else with my life."

Lucky Town: Bruce Springsteen - "I'm a huge, huge fan: I have been since I was 16. The first time I heard his very first album, and a lot of it was about gangs in New Jersey and being on the street, there were so many things in it that I should not have been able to relate to because I didn't live that lifestyle. Yet, at the same time, there was something that really spoke to me in that. I know a lot of his songs were written due to conflict with his father, and that is the one common thread we have. My father never understood me either, growing up, and always thought that I was just too silly, and that you can't go through life making jokes and that kind of stuff, and then I wound up doing this. I think Springsteen had the same thing with his music and his father."