Since word got out about Sam Simon’s cancer, this co-creator of “The Simpsons” and fervent philanthropist has heard from many people online asking to help rid him of his sizable wealth.
“Some people just want a million dollars. Or help with college tuition. And the rest have business propositions,” he chortles. “Like that should be my legacy: to lose money on your movie or your moisturizer line.
“I’m bedridden,” says Simon, milking the scenario for all its tragicomic worth, “weighing whether to dole my money to people lined up outside the house!”
He laughs, flashing a piano-keys grin. Then he gets serious.
“I’m supporting the charities that I supported during my lifetime,” he states, “and I want to continue to do that.” With every cent of his fortune.
Simon, 58, isn’t exactly bedridden. For this recent interview he has presented himself, sporty in sweater and slacks, to meet with a reporter in the guest house of his swank estate in Pacific Palisades.
He pads into the kitchen and makes himself a coffee before firing up a robust Cuban cigar, then alternately sits and reclines on a wall-length banquette that looks out on his lawn of statuary, including one of the original casts of Auguste Rodin’s “The Thinker.”
Fitting. Sam Simon has had much to think about since his advanced colon cancer was diagnosed last November after a year of inconclusive tests and mysterious discomfort.
Having defied that diagnosis’ original death sentence — he was given three to six months to live — Simon continues to push ahead with no whiff of “Why me?”
“Instead, I think, ‘This is a really bad situation — and what else can I do to get out of it?’”
What he’s doing right now is mobilizing a dozen lines of attack, some traditional, some wacky. But he says one of his new medications weighs him down with fatigue.
“Is this Monday?” he wonders aloud. “I think I’ve been sleeping since Friday. I’d rather be nauseous than tired, I think.”
Pick your poison. Simon is living the nightmare of anyone who so far has been spared cruel evidence of one’s own mortality. But Simon seems to frame it mostly with a laugh or a shrug.
Maybe that befits a world-class wag who has long thumbed his nose at authority and other human vanities, who has lampooned the human condition with insight and humor for an audience of millions, and been richly rewarded for his labors.
Simon grew up comfortably in Beverly Hills, but his father was in the garment industry, not show biz, which puts him at a loss to account for his comedic gifts (never mind Groucho Marx lived across the street).
After turning his drawing talent into a job at an animation studio that made cartoons for kids, Simon submitted a script, on spec, to the glorious ABC comedy “Taxi.” His script was bought and produced, and Simon, in his 20s, was hired as a staff writer and soon rose to be the showrunner.
From there he joined a new NBC sitcom called “Cheers,” where he was staff writer for its ascendant first three seasons.
In 1987 he became a writer and executive producer on the Fox comedy series “The Tracey Ullman Show,” teamed alongside James L. Brooks, the comedy legend with whom he had worked on “Cheers” and “Taxi,” and, of course, cartoonist Matt Groening. They became the founding fathers of “The Simpsons.”
Article source: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/simpsons-creator-finds-funny-cancer-fight-20093334