Family Guy is an American
animated television sitcom created by
Seth MacFarlane for the
Fox Broadcasting Company. The series centers on the Griffins, a
dysfunctional family consisting of parents
Peter and
Lois; their children
Meg,
Chris, and
Stewie; and their pet dog
Brian. The show uses frequent
cutaway gags, often in the form of
tangential vignettes which parody
American culture.
MacFarlane conceived
Family Guy after developing two animated films,
The Life of Larry and
Larry & Steve. MacFarlane redesigned Larry, the films' protagonist, and renamed him Peter, also redesigning Larry's dog Steve, who developed into Brian. Shortly after the third season of
Family Guy aired in 2003, Fox cancelled the series. However, favorable DVD sales and high ratings on syndicated reruns convinced the network to renew the show in 2004. The series takes place in a fictional town in
Rhode Island based off MacFarlane's upbringing and education.
Family Guy has been nominated for eleven
Primetime Emmy Awards, of which it won three. The show has also been nominated for eleven
Annie Awards, winning three times. It has garnered three
Golden Reel Award nominations, winning once. In 2009, it was nominated for an Emmy for
Outstanding Comedy Series, the first time an animated series was nominated for the award since
The Flintstones in 1961.
Family Guy has also received negative criticism, including three lawsuits, and low reviews for its similarities to the animated series
The Simpsons.
Many
tie-in media have been released, including
Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, a
straight-to-DVD special released in 2005;
Family Guy: Live in Vegas, a soundtrack-DVD combo released in 2005, featuring music from the show as well as original music created by MacFarlane and
Walter Murphy; a
video game and
pinball machine, released in 2006 and 2007, respectively; and, since 2005, six books published by
HarperCollins based on the
Family Guy universe. In 2008, MacFarlane confirmed that the cast was interested in producing a feature film and that he was working on a story for film adaptation. A spin-off series,
The Cleveland Show, premiered on September 27, 2009 as a part of the "Animation Domination" lineup on Fox. The eighth season of
Family Guy premiered on September 27, 2009.
History
Seth MacFarlane created a short film in 1995 entitled
The Life of Larry, while studying at the
Rhode Island School of Design.
The short featured a middle-aged slob named Larry Cummings, his cynical talking dog, Steve, supportive wife Lois, and pudgy teenage son Milt.
The film begins with a live-action segment where MacFarlane, as himself, briefly describes the show and its characters.
After being hired at
Hanna-Barbera, MacFarlane was given a chance in 1996 to direct a
sequel entitled
Larry and Steve,
a seven-minute short
broadcast as part of
Cartoon Network's
World Premiere Toons.
The film stars MacFarlane, who reprises his role as Larry Cummings and his talking dog Steve, among various background characters, and
Lori Alan, who provided additional character voices.
MacFarlane conceived the idea for the
Family Guy in 1999, developing it out of his two short films. MacFarlane's shorts caught the attention of Fox, who gave him $50,000 to make a pilot. McFarlane completed the 11 minute pilot after six months of hand animation. Pleased with the pilot, Fox gave the green light to the
Family Guy series. Although Fox initially announced
Family Guys cancellation following the second season, Fox decided to make a third season, after which they canceled the series near the end of 2003. However, reruns on
Adult Swim drove up interest in the show, and its DVD releases did quite well, selling over 2.2 million copies in one year, which renewed network interest.
Family Guy returned to production in 2004, making four more seasons (for a total of seven) and a
straight-to-DVD special,
Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story. The show celebrated its official
100th episode during its sixth season in November 2007, resulting in the show's
syndication. The show is contracted to continue producing episodes until 2012.
Production
Staff
Family Guy has had many executive producers in its history, including creator Seth MacFarlane,
Daniel Palladino,
Lolee Aries, and
David Zuckerman.
David A. Goodman joined the show as a co-executive producer in season three, and eventually became an executive producer.
Alex Borstein, the voice of
Lois, has also worked as both an executive and supervising producer, for the
fourth and
fifth seasons.
The
Family Guy writing staff collaborate on which ideas and characters to use for each episode. If a majority of the writers agree on an episode idea, it is then approved by MacFarlane , who must receive an endorsement from Fox before beginning production. For the first months of production, the writers shared one office lent to them by the
King of the Hill production crew. In interviews and on the DVD commentary of season one, MacFarlane explained that he is a fan of 1930s and 1940s radio programs, particularly the radio thriller anthology "
Suspense", which led him to give early episodes ominous titles pertaining to death and murder like "
Death Has a Shadow" and "
Mind Over Murder". McFarlane later explained that the team dropped the naming convention after individual episodes became hard to identify and the novelty wore off. Since the
Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show controversy, the writers have been required to tone down the show's crude humor for television broadcasts. In 2009, Fox refused to air an episode dealing with abortion.
During the
2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, official production of the show halted for most of December 2007 and various periods afterwards. Fox continued producing episodes without creator Seth MacFarlane's final approval, which he termed "a colossal dick move" in an interview with
Variety. Though MacFarlane refused to work on the show, his contract under Fox required him to contribute to any episodes it would subsequently produce. Production officially resumed after the end of the strike, with regularly-airing episodes recommencing on February 17, 2008.
Voice cast
Seth MacFarlane voices four of the show's main characters:
Peter Griffin,
Brian Griffin,
Stewie Griffin and
Glenn Quagmire. MacFarlane chose to voice these characters himself, believing it would be easier to portray the voices he already envisioned than for someone else to attempt it.
MacFarlane drew inspiration for the voice of Peter from a security guard he overheard talking while attending the
Rhode Island School of Design. Stewie's voice was based on the voice of English actor
Rex Harrison,
especially his performance in the 1964 musical drama film
My Fair Lady. MacFarlane uses his regular speaking voice when playing Brian.
MacFarlane also provides the voices for various other recurring and one-time only characters, most prominently those of the "Griffins neighbor
Glenn Quagmire, news anchor
Tom Tucker and Lois father
Carter Pewterschmidt.
voices
Lois Griffin, Asian correspondent
Tricia Takanawa,
Loretta Brown and Lois' mother
Barbara Pewterschmidt.
Borstein was asked to provide a voice for the
pilot while she was working on
MADtv. She had not met MacFarlane or seen any of his artwork and said it was "really sight unseen".
At the time, Borstein performed in a stage show in Los Angeles, in which she played a redhead mother whose voice she had based on one of her cousins.
The voice was originally slower, but when MacFarlane heard it, he replied "Make it a little less annoying...and speed it up, or every episode will last four hours".
primarily plays
Chris Griffin and
Neil Goldman.
Green stated that he did an impression of the
"Buffalo Bill" character from the thriller film
The Silence of the Lambs during his audition. His main inspiration for Chris' voice came from envisioning how "Buffalo Bill" would sound if he were speaking through a public address system at a
McDonald's.
Mila Kunis and
Lacey Chabert have both played the voices of
Meg Griffin.
Chabert voiced Meg Griffin for the first production season (15 episodes). However, because of a contractual agreement, she was never credited.
Chabert left the series because of time conflicts with her role on
Party of Five and schoolwork. Kunis won the role after auditions and a slight rewrite of the character, in part due to her performance on
That '70s Show.
MacFarlane called Kunis back after her first audition, instructing her to speak slower, and then told her to come back another time and enunciate more. Once she claimed that she had it under control, MacFarlane hired her.
Kunis described her character as "the scapegoat." She further explained, "Meg gets picked on a lot. But it's funny. It's like the middle child. She is constantly in the state of being an awkward 14-year-old, when you're kind of going through puberty and what-not. She's just in perpetual mode of humiliation. And it's fun."
Mike Henry voices both
Cleveland Brown and
Herbert, as well as some minor recurring characters like
Bruce the performance artist and
The Greased up Deaf Guy. Henry met MacFarlane at the Rhode Island School of Design and kept in touch with him after they graduated.
A few years later, MacFarlane contacted him about being part of the show; he agreed and came on as both a writer and voice actor.
During the show's first four seasons, he was credited as a guest star, but beginning with
season five's "
Prick Up Your Ears" he has been credited as a main cast member.
Other recurring cast members include:
Patrick Warburton as Joe Swanson;
Adam West playing himself as mayor
Adam West;
Jennifer Tilly as Bonnie Swanson;
John G. Brennan as Mort Goldman;
Carlos Alazraqui as
Jonathan Weed;
Adam Carolla and
Norm Macdonald as Death;
Lori Alan as
Diane Simmons; and
Tara Strong as many additional voices, most notably Meg's singing voice.
Setting
MacFarlane resided in Providence during his time as a student at
Rhode Island School of Design, and the show, as a consequence, contains distinct Rhode Island landmarks similar to real-world locations.
MacFarlane often borrows the names of Rhode Island locations and icons such as
Pawtucket and
Buddy Cianci for use in the show. MacFarlane, in an interview with local
WNAC Fox 64 News, stated that the town is modeled after
Cranston, Rhode Island.
Several times every episode, the actual
Providence skyline can be seen in the distance.
The three buildings that are depicted are, from left to right and furthest to closest,
One Financial Center,
50 Kennedy Plaza, and the
Bank of America Tower. This ordering of buildings and the angle at which they are viewed indicates that Quahog is primarily west of downtown Providence if it is to have a real-world counterpart. However, in a few episodes Quahog is shown to have a coastline, which only Cranston and Providence possess. This is supported by the fact that the real-world "31 Spooner Street" is located in Providence, immediately west of
Roger Williams Park.
Production issues
Cancellation and renewal
After only two episodes of the second season,
Family Guy was taken off the network's permanent schedule and shown irregularly thereafter. The show returned in March 2000 to finish airing the second season which contained 21 episodes. The third season contained 21 episodes and began airing from July 11, 2001 to February 14, 2002. During its second and third-season runs, Fox frequently moved the show around different days and time slots with little or no notice and consequently, the show's
ratings suffered. When
Family Guy was shown in the
UK, and when the
DVDs were subsequently released there (November 12, 2001), the seven episodes of the second season that were produced for season one were included with the first season, balancing them out with 14 episodes each. This resulted in later DVD releases to be labeled inconsistently as compared with original American season (e.g. the
Family Guy: Season 6 DVD features Season 5 episodes).
Fox publicly announced that the show had been canceled at the end of the second season in 2002. In spite of the announced cancellation, in 2003 Fox decided to make the third season.
Family Guy also had to deal with a very tough time slot (Thursday nights at 8:00 p.m.
ET), competing with
Survivor and
Friends. The situation was later referenced in the show in an episode titled
Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story. During the third season, Fox announced that the show was canceled for good.
The series was renewed later in 2005 for its fourth season due to strong DVD sales and its
syndication on basic-cable networks.
Lawsuits
In March 2007, comedian
Carol Burnett filed a lawsuit against 20th Century Fox, claiming that it was a trademark infringement for her
Charwoman cleaning character to be portrayed on the show without her permission. Besides that, Burnett stated that Fox violated her publicity rights. She asked for $6 million in damages. On June 4, 2007, United States District Judge
Dean Pregerson rejected the lawsuit, stating that the parody was protected under the First Amendment, citing
Hustler Magazine v. Falwell as a precedent.
On October 3, 2007,
Bourne Co. Music Publishers filed a lawsuit accusing the show of infringing its copyright on the song "
When You Wish Upon a Star", through a parody song entitled "I Need a Jew" appearing in the episode "
When You Wish Upon a Weinstein". Bourne Co., the sole United States copyright owner of the song, alleged the parody pairs a "thinly veiled" copy of their music with
antisemitic lyrics. Named in the suit were Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp., Fox Broadcasting Co.,
Cartoon Network, MacFarlane, and Murphy; the suit sought to stop the program's distribution, and unspecified damages. Because "I Need a Jew" uses the copyrighted melody of "When You Wish Upon a Star", without commenting on that song, Bourne argued that it was not a
First Amendment–protected parody per the ruling in
Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.. On March 16, 2009, United States District Judge
Deborah Batts held that
Family Guy did not infringe on Bourne's copyright when it transformed the song for comical use in an episode.
In December 2007,
Family Guy was again accused of
copyright infringement upon actor
Art Metrano filing a lawsuit regarding a scene in
Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, in which
Jesus performs Metrano's signature "magic" act involving absurd,
faux magical hand gestures while humming the distinctive tune "
Fine and Dandy". Metrano's suit claims this performance is protected under terms of the United States'
Copyright Act of 1976. 20th Century Fox, MacFarlane, Callaghan and Borstein were all named in the suit which is ongoing.
Characters
The show revolves around the adventures of the family of
Peter Griffin, a bumbling, but well-intentioned,
blue-collar worker. Peter is an
Irish American Catholic with a prominent
Rhode Island and
Eastern Massachusetts accent. His wife
Lois is a stay-at-home mother and piano teacher, and has a distinct
New England accent from being a member of the
Pewterschmidt family of wealthy
socialites. Peter and Lois have three children:
Meg, their teenage daughter, who is frequently the butt of Peter's jokes due to her homeliness and lack of popularity;
Chris, their teenage son, who is overweight, unintelligent and, in many respects, a younger version of his father; and
Stewie, their diabolical infant son of ambiguous sexual orientation who has adult mannerisms and speaks fluently with an upper-class affected English accent and stereotypical
archvillain phrases. Living with the family is
Brian, the family dog, who is highly
anthropomorphized, drinks
martinis, smokes
cigarettes, drives a car, and engages in human conversation, though he is still considered a pet in many respects.
Many recurring characters appear alongside the Griffin family. These include the family's neighbors: sex-crazed airline-pilot bachelor
Glenn Quagmire; mild-mannered deli owner
Cleveland Brown and his wife (ex-wife as of the fourth-season episode "
The Cleveland–Loretta Quagmire")
with their hyperactive son,
Cleveland Jr.;
paraplegic police officer
Joe Swanson, his wife
Bonnie and their baby daughter
Susie. (It should be noted that Bonnie is pregnant with Susie from the show's beginning until the
7th episode of the 7th season); paranoid
Jewish pharmacist
Mort Goldman, his wife Muriel and their geeky and annoying son Neil; and elderly homosexual
ephebophile Herbert. TV news anchors
Tom Tucker and
Diane Simmons, reporter
Tricia Takanawa and
Blaccu-Weather meteorologist Ollie Williams also make frequent appearances. Quahog mayor,
Mayor Adam West (voiced by and named after the real
Adam West) also appears regularly.
Hallmarks
Cutaway
In the majority of episodes, the plot is interrupted by at least one
cutaway segment. The segment usually has little to do with the actual story of the episode and usually is a general pop culture reference. Many of the cutaways feature
guest stars, at times using live-action footage such as
Conway Twitty in three separate episodes,
Will Ferrell in the episode "
Jungle Love", and occasionally a mixture of live-action and animation, as in a
tap dance duet between Stewie and
Gene Kelly in "
Road to Rupert". Such cutaways have been criticized heavily by both critics and other cartoonists, who claim the show relies too much on "cutaway gags as opposed to plot-driven humour".
Music
Family Guy uses music in many of its episodes, mostly in the form of musical numbers. These musical numbers are used as both part of the plot, like in the episodes "
Brian Sings and Swings" and "
From Method to Madness", as well as for comedic effect or satire, such as in "FCC Song" from "
PTV" and "Vasectomy" from "
Sibling Rivalry". During the opening sequence of the
59th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards, Stewie and Brian performed a duet titled "You can Find It On TV", which poked fun at television shows in 2007. Two
Family Guy songs have been nominated for (but did not win) an Emmy for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics: "My Drunken Irish Dad" from "
Peter's Two Dads", nominated in 2007, and "You've Got a Lot to See" from "
Brian Wallows and Peter's Swallows" in 2002. Many of the musical numbers are included in
Family Guy: Live in Vegas along with several original songs.
Reception and achievements
Critical reception
thumb|200px|Cover of issue 458 of [[Mad Magazine, showing the
Family Guy characters crossed over with characters from
The Simpsons.|alt=Cover of a magazine. The caption along the bottom in bold blue reads "We Salute
Family Guy, TV's Most Original TV Series" in all caps. Centered is the Griffin family slightly altered to resemble characters of the Simpsons family from the animated series
The Simpsons. Along the top is
Mad Magazines’ logo: the word "MAD" in red caps.]]
Family Guy
has received many positive reviews from critics. Catherine Seipp of the National Review Online called it a "nasty but extremely funny" cartoon. Caryn James of the The New York Times, called it a show with an "outrageously satirical family" and "includes plenty of comic possibilities and parodies." The Sydney Morning Herald named Family Guy
the "Show of the Week" on April 21, 2009, calling it a "pop culture-heavy masterpiece". Frazier Moore from the Seattle Times called it an "endless craving for humor about bodily emissions". He also called it "breathtakingly smart" and said a "blend of the ingenious with the raw helps account for its much broader appeal". He finished up by calling it "rude, crude and deliciously wrong". The series has also attracted many celebrities, including Emily Blunt, who has stated that Family Guy
is her favorite series and has expressed strong interest in becoming a guest star on the show.
However, Family Guy
has also received its share of negative treatment. For example, Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly has frequently panned the show, grading it with a "D", and naming it the worst show of the 1999-2000 television season. The series has frequently been criticized for using story premises and humor similar to those used in episodes of The Simpsons. The Simpsons
depicted Peter Griffin as a "clone" of Homer Simpson in a Halloween special, and as a fugitive accused of "Plagiarismo" in the episode "The Italian Bob". Family Guy
is also mocked in a two-part episode ("Cartoon Wars Part I" and "Cartoon Wars Part II") of South Park, in which characters call the show's jokes interchangeable and unrelated to storylines; the writers of Family Guy
are portrayed as manatees who write by pushing rubber "idea balls" inscribed with random topics into a bin. MacFarlane responded to the criticism, saying it was completely founded and true, even giving reference to many skits and jokes that were meant for previously scripted episodes and later cut and recycled in future episodes.
Other cartoonists who have publicly criticized Family Guy
include John Kricfalusi, creator of Ren and Stimpy: "If you're a kid wanting to be a cartoonist today, and you're looking at Family Guy
, you do not have to aim very high. You can draw Family Guy
when you're ten years old. You do not have to get any better than that to become a professional cartoonist. The standards are extremely low". In addition, the show's penchant for irreverent humor led to a controversy over a sequence in which Peter Griffin dances, in musical revue fashion, around the bed of a man with end-stage AIDS, delivering the patient's diagnosis in song.Awards
Family Guy
and its cast have been nominated for eleven Emmy Awards, with three wins. MacFarlane won the Outstanding Voice-Over Performance award for his performance as Stewie, Murphy and MacFarlane won the Outstanding Music and Lyrics award for the song "You Got a Lot to See" from the episode "Brian Wallows and Peter's Swallows", and Steven Fonti won the Outstanding Individual Achievement in Animation award for his story-board work in the episode "No Chris Left Behind".
The show has also been nominated for eleven Annies, and won three times, twice in 2006 and once in 2008. The show has also been nominated for a Golden Reel Award four times, winning once.
In the 1000th issue of Entertainment Weekly, Brian Griffin was selected as the dog for "The Perfect TV Family." Wizard Magazine rated Stewie the 95th greatest villain of all time. British newspaper The Times rated Family Guy
as the forty-fifth best American show in 2009. Family Guy was named the seventh of the top one-hundred animated series by IGN.Other media
Video game
Family Guy Video Game! is a 2006 action game released by 2K Games and developed by High Voltage Software. It appears on the Xbox and PlayStation 2 consoles, and the handheld PlayStation Portable. The game's story reflects the episodic structure of the series with adventure game play. The game received very mixed reviews, averaging 50% for PS2, 51% for PSP, and 53% for Xbox on review aggregator Metacritic, receiving praise for its humor but being criticized for its short playtime and "uninteresting gameplay".Spin-off
In 2009, a spin-off series titled The Cleveland Show premiered on Fox. The Hollywood Reporter initially announced that there were plans to produce a spin-off of Family Guy
to be focused on Cleveland. The project was created by MacFarlane, Henry and American Dad! show runner Rich Appel. Cleveland references this at the end of the episode "Baby Not On Board". Film
On July 22, 2007, in an interview with "The Hollywood Reporter", MacFarlane announced that he may start working on a feature film, although "nothing's official." In September 2007, Ricky Blitt gave TV.com an interview confirming that he had already started working on the script. Then in TV Week on July 18, 2008, MacFarlane confirmed plans to produce a theatrically released Family Guy
feature film sometime "within the next year". He came up with an idea for the story, "something that you could not do on the show, which [to him] is the only reason to do a movie." He later went to say he imagines the film to be "an old-style musical with dialogue" similar to The Sound of Music, saying that he would "really be trying to capture, musically, that feel." Merchandise
As of 2009, six books have been released about the Family Guy
universe, all published by HarperCollins since 2005. The first book based on Family Guy
, Family Guy: Stewie's Guide to World Domination (ISBN 9780060773212) by Steve Callahan, was released in April 26, 2005. Written in the style of a graphic novel, the plot follows Stewie's plans on ruling the world, despite his only being a child. Other books include Family Guy: It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One (ISBN 9780752875934), which covers the entire events of the episode "It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One", and Family Guy and Philosophy: A Cure for the Petarded
(ISBN 9781405163163), a collection of seventeen essays exploring the connections between the series and historical philosophers.
Family Guy
has been commercially successful in the home market. The show was the first to be resurrected because of high DVD sales.[ The first volume, covering the show's first two seasons, sold a total 1.67 million units, topping TV DVD sales in 2003, while the second volume sold another million units.]Family Guy Presents Blue Harvest
, the DVD featuring the Star Wars
special "Blue Harvest", was released on January 15, 2008 and premiered at the top of United States DVD sales.[ The DVD was the first ]Family Guy'' DVD to include a digital copy for download on the iPod.
