Matt Groening- creator of The Simpsons and Futurama

American cartoonist, script writer, screen writer, producer, animator, voice actor, author, musician and comedian

NET WORTH : $500 million

CAREER

Groening’s first peek into the world of professional cartooning began with the cartoon sale of his comic Life in Hell to Wet magazine in 1978. The cartoon’s popularity peaked and soon it was being carried in over 250 weekly newspapers in the USA. The main focal point of Groening’s Life in Hell comic was anthropomorphic rabbits and a gay couple. Using these, characters, Groening took the liberty of exploring a wide range of topics including love, sex, life, work and death. The comics have dark streaks of expressions of angst, gloom, loathing, and fear of inevitable doom.

It caught the attention of James. L. Brooks who contacted Groening with a proposition- one that would involve him working in animation for the Fox variety show The Tracey Ullman show. Though his initial idea was to adapt the characters from his Life in Hell comic strip, he changed his mind and came up with an idea of a cartoon family.

The Tracey Ullman show

The Tracey Ullman show was an American variety television show that was hosted by the British comedian and pop singer- Tracey Ullman. The show premiered on April 5, 1987 as the Fox network’s second prime time series after Married… with children. The show had a glorious run till May 26, 1990. The show was produced by Gracie Films and 20^th century Fox for television. The show was famous for blending some of its sketch comedy shots along with various musical numbers; featuring choreography by Paula Abdul, American singer, choreographer, songwriter, dancer, actress and television personality.

Yes folks, you guessed it. This cartoon family was none other than The Simpsons. The Simpsons were originally part of the Tracey Ullman show when they debuted. Three seasons of this later, owing to the popularity of the cartoon family, Fox started broadcasting The Simpsons as a show of its own. Groening named The Simpsons family members after his own and the name of Bart Simpson alone was said to be an anagram of the word Brat-befitting to the role and character of Bart Simpson on the show. The show is said to be set in Springfield, a fictitious American town; with Homer, a safety inspector at Springfield nuclear plant being the head of the household. He’s married to Marge Simpson; the stereotypical all American housewife. They have three children; 10 year old Bart who is a typical rebellious troublemaker, Lisa, a 10 year old activist, and Maggie- a baby who barely speaks at all, but communicates effectively by sucking on her pacifier. The family owns two pets- a greyhound dog named Santa’s little helper and a Cat named Snowball. The highly successful satirical show on American lifestyle debuted on December 17,1989 and since then, 541 episodes have been aired.

J.K. Rowling as seen on The Simpsons

Lady Gaga on The Simpsons

Stephen Hawking on an episode of The Simpsons

The entire cast and crew of Sherlock on The Simpsons

Another unique aspect of The Simpsons is that it is probably the only cartoon based TV show to actually incorporate real celebrities into their sketched, cartoon world. Some examples of celebrities who have starred in The Simpsons include J.K. Rowling, Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Murdoch, Steve Martin, Lisa Kudrow, Neil Patrick Harris, Meryl Streep, Elizabeth Taylor, Dustin Hoffman, The Who, Benedict Cumberbatch (who plays Sherlock Holmes on the popular television series Sherlock) and even The Beatles! The Simpsons became so wildly popular that the makers decided to come out with a Simpsons Movie in 2007. The film was directed by David Silverman and Groening’s idea was eventually developed into a full blown movie plot.

Futurama- created by Matt Groening

In the year 1999, Matt Groening and David. X. Cohen came up with an idea for yet another animated series. The series was called Futurama and it spoke about life in the year 3000. Fry, a pizza delivery boy accidentally becomes cryogenically frozen and finally thaws in the year 3000, where he finds himself in New New York city. Fry finds that he has ended up at Pizza Express, a small intergalactic package delivery company that is run by his distantly descended nephew. Again, he is hired as a delivery boy. The series explores the life and adventures of Fry and his friends as they travel through the universe, making deliveries on behalf of Pizza Express.

The series became wildly successful and aired between March 28 1999 to August 20, 2003. When Comedy Central entered into an agreement with 20^th century Fox, Comedy Central commissioned 16 new episodes. Later, in June 2009, Comedy Central ordered a new season of Futurama, consisting of 26 new episodes that would be aired over two seasons.

AWARDS AND RECOGNITION

In 1990, Groening won the award for Outstanding animated program for an episode of The Simpsons titled Life in the fast lane. Groening went on to win awards for Outstanding Animated program for the Simpsons in the years 1991,1995, 197, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006 and 2008. In 2011 was when Futurama won an award for Outstanding animated show for its episode “The late Phillip. J. Fry.” The latest award Groening received was when The Teen choice award for animated series was won by The Simpsons.

PERSONAL LIFE

Matt Groening married Deborah Caplan in 1986 and they had two sons together; Homer and Abe. The couple got divorced in 1999 after 13 years of marriage. In 2011, Groening remarried an Argentinian artist named Augustina Picasso after a 4 year relationship and courting. This made him Picasso’s daughter’s stepfather. Currently, Matt is the brother-in-law of Hey Arnold! (a popular children’s cartoon show) creator, Craig Barlett who is married to Groening’s sister, Lisa.

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“I have felt for the last 10 years I have had this battle; I’ve been fighting so hard to have an education. It’s been this uphill struggle. I was Warner Bros’ pain in the butt. I was their scheduling conflict. I was the one who made life difficult.”
- Emma Watson

 Profession: Actor, Model

She is the smart, intelligent, know-it-all Hermione Granger of Harry Potter whom we all love. Emma Charlotte Duerre Watson is a British actress and model who made her mark in hollywood playing Hermione Granger in the popular Harry Potter film series. Today she is an experience actor and a seasoned model with a net worth of $60 million in her assets.

Early Life-

She was born on April 15, 1990 in Paris, France to British lawyers Jacqueline Luesby and Chris Watson.  She lived in Paris till she was five but moved back to England with her mother when her parents divorced. Watson attended the Dragon School and later Headington School in Oxford and was trained at the Oxford branch of Stagecoach Theatre Arts. Emma realized that she wanted to be an actress when she was just six years old. She is quite the lucky girl and landed her first acting at the young age of nine when she was signed for the role of Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter film series. After that there was no looking back.

Acting Career-

Watson says that if anyone else played Hermione, it would actually kill her. Emma played the role of Hermione Granger in all of the eight series of the Harry Potter franchise that lasted for a decade (2001-1011). Apart from Harry Potter, she has acted in various other projects such as the television film Ballet Shoes (2007) and My week with Marilyn (2011). She played the role of Sam in The Perks of Being a Wallflower(2012) and Nicki Moore in The Bling Ring(2013). She played herself in the 2013 American Comedy This is the End. Her most recent work is Noah. She plays Ila in this 2014 movie.

Fashion -

Apart from being a great actor, Emma is a much sought after model as well. She has been photographed by the world’s top fashion photographers like Karl Lagerfeld, Nick Knight, Patrick Demarchelier and Mario Testino. She made her modelling debut for Burberry’s autumn/winter campaign in 2009. She also appeared in Burberry’s 2010 Spring/Summer campaign alongside brother Alex Watson. Watson works as a creative advisor for fashion brand People Tree. The actress says, “I thought, if people are going to write about what I’m wearing, then I would wear young British designers who need the publicity.”

Awards-

Amongst many MTV Movie Awards and Teen Choice Awards, Emma has to her credit-

Young Artist Awards- Best Performance in a Feature Film – Leading Young Actress(2002) for- Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

Phoenix Film Critics Society Awards- Best Performance by a Youth in a Leading or Supporting Role – Female(2003) for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

National Movie Awards- Best Performance by a Female(2007) for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Capri Art Film Festival Awards- Best Ensemble Cast Award(2011) for My Week with Marilyn.

MTV Movie Awards- Best Cast (shared with Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Tom Felton)(2012) for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2.

People’s Choice Awards- Favorite Drama Movie Actress(2013) for Perks of Being a Wallflower.

What she does with her money—

Emma currently commands a salary of $15 million for all her on-screen performances. She has admitted that she has enough money for her to never work again but she wouldn’t want that. She feels that learning keeps her motivated.

Toyota Prius-

Emma Watson owns a Toyota Prius. It is a five seater roadster with bold outer styling and makes a powerful on road presence.

Causes-

Great Ormond Street Hospital

Emma Watson supports Great Ormond Street Hospital charity. It offers life saving medical treatments to more than 100,000 child patients witnessing the rarest, most difficult life-threatening conditions. A part of the hospital’s facility, the charity raises funds for the refurbishment of the hospital, support research of innovative medical treatments to develop cures for childhood illness and offering accommodation to the suffering children and their families.

Millennium Promise-

Emma Watson has also supported Millennium Promise. The mission is of this charity is to end extreme poverty by 2025. In support of this goal, Millennium Promise’s unique focus is to build coordinated action and collaborations among individuals, governments, corporations and non-governmental organizations to address the root causes and symptoms of extreme poverty.

Brands-

Emma trusts brands like Calvin Klein, Hermes Birkin, Loeffler Randall, Miu Miu Calf and Tom Ford and is often seen sporting products of these famous brands.

 Fun facts-

Emma Watson has a huge crush on harry Potter co-star Tom Felton who played Draco Malfoy in the movie. “For the first two movies, I had a huge crush on Tom Felton. He was my first crush,” the actress said. “He totally knows. We talked about it – we still laugh about it. We are really good friends now, and that’s cool.”

What she says-

“I’m going to do what I want to do. I’m going to be who I really am. I’m going to figure out what that is.”

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PROFESSION: Actor

Rupert Grint is famous all over the world for his portrayal of Ron Weasley in the brilliant Harry Potter series, authored by J.K. Rowling. This character, as everyone knows, was one of the three main characters in the entire series. Grint started acting as Ron in the Harry Potter series at the age of 11. Before that, he had acted only in school plays. He rose to fame and success with his co stars Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson. Apart from the Harry Potter series, Grint has starred in movies like Thunderpants, Driving Lessons, Cherrybomb, Wild Target and Into The White. He made his debut in the world of stage and theatre with Mojo, in 2013.

CHILDHOOD

Grint was born in Essex to the proud parents Joanna Grint and Nigel Grint, in the year 1988. He is the eldest of five siblings. While attending Dorothy Stringer High School, Grint developed a lot of interest in theatre. Because of this, he started participating in a lot of school plays. Rupert Grint acted professionally for the first time with the movie Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, in 2001. While asking him about his school, he says that he didn’t really like it as such.

CAREER

We all know Rupert Grint’s acting career started with the Harry Potter movie: Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. The entire series is based on a novel written by J.K. Rowling. Grint wanted to audition for his role as he too has ginger colored hair like Ron Weasley and also, he really admired the book series. An interesting fact is that out of the three main roles in the movie, Grint was the oldest of the three. When the first movie was released in 2001, it became the highest grossing film of that year. Not only was it commercially successful, it also brought a lot of fame and critical acclaim to all the cast members, specially the main three roles. The movie also brought a lot of awards along Grint’s way. He won the award for the Most Promising Young Newcomer. The other movies included in this series were-

- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

- Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Each and every movie of the entire season was successful and Rupert’s acting flourished with time and every movie brought him a lot of critical acclaim. J.K. Rowling said in her speech that Grint’s character is included in her “The Big Seven” list- a list which basically involved the names of Harry Potter film series cast members. The other actors included are Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Tom Felton, Matthew Lewis, Evanna Lynch and Bonnie Wright.

OTHER WORK

Grint started acting in films other than the Harry Potter series in the year 2002 with the movie Thunderpants.  It received mixed reviews by the critics but his acting was praised. Some other films include Cherrybomb, Wild Target, and Into The White. He also lent his voice in the film Postman Pat: The Movie- You Know You’re The One. He also appeared in Ed Sheeran’s song Lego House. Apart from this, he has been a few advertisements and magazine covers as well. He had the honor of carrying the Olympic Torch during the relay in 2012. He made his stage debut with Mojo in 2013.

PERSONAL LIFE

Grint has a close friendship with his co-stars Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson. He suffers from arachnophobia. He believes in giving back to the community and has donated money and even clothes for charitable purposes. In 2011, Rupert Grint was a part of the Make Mine Milk campaign, which basically aimed at promoting the habit of drinking milk daily.

ASSETS

- Hertfordshire Manor House

- Ice Cream Truck

- Hovercraft

- Range Rover

FUN FACTS

- His favorite character has always been that of Ron.

- He thinks that the slugs in CoS tasted very nice!

- He bought his family a house in a private island.

- He sent a video of himself, dressed as a girl, while rapping about how much he wanted the part of Ron Weasley.

- He likes to draw.

FUN QUOTES

- “After being in Harry Potter, I believe a bit more in magic than I did before.”

- “The characters in the book grow up with us. My voice has broken as well.”

- “It is always in the back of my mind that acting might come to an end for me when Harry Potter finishes. I don’t know if I am good enough to have a long career. I have got a bit of an inferiority complex about my acting. My self-esteem is quite low in that sense.”

- “I have known Emma Watson since she was 9, we have watched each other grow up, formed this sort of brother-sister bond, and suddenly I am leaning in to kiss her. Well, it felt completely wrong… but, you know, you try to sink into the character and divorce yourself from it. We ended up laughing hysterically afterwards.”

- “Yeah, my parents help me keep my feet on the ground.”

- “I always wanted to go into acting.”

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