Watch Larry King and Oprah Winfrey interview The Simpsons in these surreal vintage clips
At this point, The Simpsons is a comedy institution, but at the height of its genius, power, and popularity, it was nothing short of a pop-culture phenomenon. A whole lot of weirdness comes with that level of fame (including not one but two spin-off albums) and accordingly, The Simpsons’ history is filled with weird ephemera, including this fascinating glimpse of a black-haired, surprisingly non-ancient-looking Larry King interviewing Bart Simpson, who makes the whole situation weirder with a dramatic reading from William Blake’s “The Tygre.” Seriously. It’s, um, something.
King isn’t the only luminary to interview Springfield’s first fictional family. In animated form, Oprah Winfrey dropped by The Simpson household in 1992 for an animated chat (wordplay!) captured in terrible-quality home video for posterity by some generous soul on YouTube. It’s a singular meeting of pop-culture icons and one of the more surreal moments in the show’s oft-surreal history.