George Meyer (scientist)

George Meyer (born 1956) is an American producer and writer. Meyer is best known for his work on '' The Simpsons'', where he served as a scriptwriter and gag writer (for which he is credited as a producer) and led the show's communal rewriting process for much of its earlier run. He has been publicly credited with "thoroughly shap ng... the comedic sensibility" of the show.

Raised in Tucson, Meyer attended Harvard University. There, after becoming president of the '' Harvard Lampoon'', he graduated in 1978 with a degree in biochemistry. Abandoning plans to attend medical school, Meyer attempted to make money through dog racing but failed after two months. After a series of short-term jobs he was hired in 1981 by David Letterman, on the advice of two of Meyer's ''Harvard Lampoon'' cowriters, to join the writing team of his show ''Late Night with David Letterman''.

Meyer left after two seasons and went on to write for ''The New Show'', ''Not Necessarily the News'' and '' Saturday Night Live''. Tired of life in New York, Meyer moved to Boulder, Colorado where he wrote a screenplay for a film for Letterman to star in. The project fell through and Meyer then founded the humor zine '' Army Man'' which garnered a strong following, although Meyer ended it after three issues. The producer Sam Simon was a fan and he hired Meyer to write for the animated sitcom ''The Simpsons'' in 1989. He has held a number of positions on the show and also cowrote ''The Simpsons Movie''. Meyer is in a relationship with the writer Maria Semple and the two have a daughter.

Early life and education

Born in Pennsylvania, United States in 1956, Meyer grew up in Tucson, Arizona. He is the eldest of eight children in a Roman Catholic family of German ancestry. His parents both worked in the real estate business. Meyer has made jokes about his somewhat unhappy childhood, stating that one common argument in his household was "which family member ruined a holiday", while his sister noted Meyer was frequently blamed for the family's problems. Due to its size, family activities were limited so Meyer watched lots of television and read ''Mad'' magazine. He is an Eagle Scout and an altar boy and wrote for the student newspaper. He grew up hoping to one day become either a priest or ballplayer. He was uninterested in television, only finding humor in '' Get Smart'' and ''Batman'', where he appreciated its "loopy, irreverent humor."

Meyer attended Harvard University, where he served as president of the '' Harvard Lampoon''. The fact that people took humor "very seriously" at the ''Lampoon'' "changed eyer'slife". In 1977, he and several other ''Lampoon'' staffers wrote ''The Harvard Lampoon Big Book of College Life'' (), a volume commissioned by Doubleday. Aside from the ''Lampoon'', his grades at Harvard were average and he suffered several bouts of depression. He graduated in 1978 with a degree in biochemistry and was accepted into medical school, but decided not to enroll.

Meyer commented on his Roman Catholic upbringing in a 2000 ''New Yorker'' profile:

People talk about how horrible it is to be brought up Catholic, and it's all true. The main thing was that there was no sense of proportion. I would chew a piece of gum at school, and the nun would say, 'Jesus is very angry with you about that,' and on the wall behind her would be a dying, bleeding guy on a cross. That's a horrifying image to throw at a little kid. You really could almost think that your talking in line, say, was on a par with killing Jesus.

Career

After college, Meyer moved to Denver, Colorado, planning to "scientifically" win a fortune through dog racing. However, he ran out of money after two weeks. He then worked in a variety of jobs including substitute teacher and salesman in a clothing store, and also won $2,000 on the game show '' Jeopardy!''. At one point he worked in a research lab as an assistant, studying glycoproteins "in the hope that they would prove the key to cell-cell recognition." Meanwhile, fellow ''Lampoon'' writers Tom Gammill and Max Pross suggested Meyer to comedian David Letterman who, along with head writer Merrill Markoe, hired him as a member of the writing staff on Letterman's new late night show. Letterman noted: "Everything in his submission, down to the last little detail, was so beautifully honed." Meyer wrote several recurring gags for the show, including "Crushing Things With A Steamroller". His ambitions for the show were grandiose; "I wanted to challenge the audience every night, stagger them with brilliance, blast them into a higher plane of existence," he later explained.

Meyer left to write for ''The New Show'' in late 1983, a short-lived variety series from '' Saturday Night Live'' creator Lorne Michaels. He shared an office with writer Jack Handey, whom he credited with giving him comedy advice. Following this, he joined the writing teams at ''Not Necessarily the News'', and ''Saturday Night Live'' beginning in 1985. He later called working on ''SNL'' an "exhilarating, frustrating, stressful, and indelible experience." Meyer's work was not well regarded among the ''SNL'' writers and producers. He said: "My stuff wasn't very popular at ''Saturday Night''. It was regarded as really fringey, and a lot of times my sketches would get cut. Sometimes they would get cut after dress rehearsal, and I would have the horrible experience of looking out and seeing a painter carefully touching up my set and getting it all ready to be smashed to pieces and sent to a landfill in Brooklyn. It was just a mismatch, although I didn't realize it at the time." He left the show in 1987.

Meyer moved to Boulder, Colorado because he "just wanted to get as far from the New York environment as ecould." There, he wrote a film script for Letterman; the project was dropped due to the success of Letterman's show, although several of its jokes were later used in ''The Simpsons'' when no other ideas could be found. He spent time "skiing, going to poetry readings, and trying to meet girls from the University of Colorado." He founded the humor zine '' Army Man''; he wrote the eight-page first issue almost wholly by himself, publishing just 200 copies which he gave to his friends. Meyer had been disappointed by the decline of '' National Lampoon'' and felt that there was no longer a magazine which has the sole purpose of being funny. With ''Army Man'' he "tried to make something that had no agenda other than to make you laugh." He claimed that " edidn't know what ewas doing," and reprinted material without obtaining permission, including a review of '' Cannonball Run II''. He added: "I like to think that ''Army Man'' was somewhere between a real publication and a very irresponsible, lawbreaking zine." ''Army Man'' gained a strong following and was listed on '' Rolling Stones "Hot List" in 1989. Meyer noted: "The only rule was that the stuff had to be funny and pretty short. To me, the quintessential ''Army Man'' joke was one of John Swartzwelder's: 'They can kill the Kennedys. Why can't they make a cup of coffee that tastes good?' It's a horrifying idea juxtaposed with something really banal-and yet there's a kind of logic to it. It's illuminating because it's kind of how Americans see things: Life's a big jumble, but somehow it leads to something I can consume. I love that." Meyer suspended publication with the third issue, after offers to take the magazine national made him fear that it would lose its best qualities. According to ''The Believer'': "In comedy circles, 'Army Man'' hastaken on almost mythological proportions." This was met with varying reactions from Meyer, who felt "embarrassed when people build it up as this monumental work of comedy. It was just a silly little escapade, never meant to be enshrined."

One reader was Sam Simon, a producer of the animated sitcom '' The Simpsons''. He sent Meyer a compilation reel of ''Simpsons'' shorts from Fox variety show '' The Tracey Ullman Show'' that preceded the development of the series. Meyer turned down the job initially, but was offered a second chance to work as a creative consultant in the fall of 1989, which he accepted. Simon hired Meyer along with ''Army Man'' contributors Swartzwelder and Jon Vitti; the earliest episode produced on which Meyer is credited is the first season episode "Homer's Night Out

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