'Family Guy', created by Seth MacFarlane, is an American adult animated sitcom developed by David Zuckerman and Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company.
'Family Guy' premiered on January 31, 1999, and the show is produced by Fuzzy Door Productions. Family Guy features the family of Griffins, with parents Lois and Peter, children Stewie, Meg, and Chris, and their anthropomorphic pet dog, Brian.
Set in the backdrop of the fictional city of Quahog, Rhode Island, 'Family Guy' bases its humor on lampoon American culture. The metafictional cutaway gags are well seen in 'Family Guy' and the Griffin family.
For the past 20 years, the hit TV series 'Family Guy' has entertained the masses all over the world.
The show went through early cancellation but was revived later when the series got massive DVD sales and the re-run ratings were too good to make Fox give the series another shot.
20 seasons and running now, 'Family Guy' has always been at the center of every conversation, from the controversies to the eight Emmy Awards and its influence to sway pop culture.
Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of 'South Park' have some issues with Family Guy.
During the 10th season of 'South Park', there was a two-part episode named Cartoon Wars that openly disdained 'Family Guy''s humor. In the episode, the characters of 'South Park' are told that the writers of 'Family Guy' are a group of manatees and the cutaway jokes used in the series are not to be respected.
MacFarlane, however, defended the jokes used saying that the cutaway jokes are the hardest part to write in the series.
Apart from all these, there was a big controversy with 'Family Guy' when the writers killed off the fan-favorite character of Brian, the talking dog, in 2013. And it was not easy for fans when Brian Griffin was immediately replaced by another dog Vinny in the same episode.
There was a lot of fan outburst, even a petition on change.org, and only after two episodes, Brian was back at his rightful place beside the Griffin family.
It was basically a publicity stunt. William H. Macy was to voice the character of Brian, but as Brian was voiced by Seth in the first episode, Fox did not want to mess with the working combination.
Meg is played by Mila Kunis, however, the actress was not the first one to portray Meg Griffin, the outcast daughter in the family. In the first season, Lacey Chabert played the character.
Even Cree Summer was deemed to play Meg in the first episode but was fired for unexplained reasons. In the pilot episode, Meg was played by Seth's sister, Rachael.
Facts About 'Family Guy'
There is a lot to know about 'Family Guy' and its long run.
- The 'Family Guy' theme song is actually a tribute to the theme song heard in 'All in the Family'. The husband and wife in both the shows start the song on a piano.
- Lois actually had blonde hair in a single episode, the first one. It later changed to the signature red we see today.
- The character Quagmire was actually based on radio announcers from the '40s and '50s. Bob Hope inspired his appearance. Quagmire is around 61 years old, while Stewie Griffin is just one year old. Writers do not choose when Stewie is heard and understood by the family. They just go by the moment and whenever things turn funny.
- There was no malice when Lacey Chabert, the original voice of Meg, left the role after her contract expiry in the first year. Mila Kunis replaced her.
- Each episode has the phrase 'What the hell?' at least once.
- The next-door neighbor of the Griffins, Bonnie, stayed pregnant for around seven years. After such a long pregnancy, she gave birth to Susie and was voiced by Patrick Stewart.
Facts About The Characters In 'Family Guy'
There are a lot of characters in 'Family Guy'. Here we will talk about the most important ones.
- The character of Peter Griffin is based on a real person. Seth MacFarlane has always said that the character Peter Griffin is based on a security guard he met while in RISD. He said that the man had a thick Rhode Island accent and was very loud. ABC 6 news later found out that Paul Timmins was the inspiration for Peter Griffin. He is the former director of public safety at RISD.
- The actor who gave the iconic voice of Lois, Alex Borstein, had to fight to keep her role intact. After Fox ordered a 13 episode the first season, Fox decided that they wanted to take the character's voice in another direction. Alex Borstein had to re-audition for the role and later was able to keep her job. She now continues to provide the voice for Lois and has won recognition for it. She won Emmy Award in 2018 for Outstanding Character Voice-Over Performance for the show. She also plays talent agent Susie Myerson on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and has won an Emmy in the same year for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.
- Carrie Fisher has voiced multiple characters in Family Guy. She began by voicing the character of Peter's hard-nosed boss, Angela in 2005. In 'Family Guy''s Star Wars parody, she also voiced the character of Mon Mothma. The Star Wars parody was called It's a Trap. Carrie Fisher worked for multiple episodes, around two dozen, before she passed away in 2016.
- MacFarlane quickly realized that with each episode, the Star Wars jokes were starting to increase. So they decided to clear this with Lucasfilm and to their surprise, George Lucas approved all the jokes. The only term he had is that the characters in the animated program had to look exactly the same as the actual characters. This started the 'Family Guy' Star Wars trilogy. Many of Seth's characters make cameo appearances here like American Dad’s Roger, Futurama’s Bender, and Home Movies’ Coach John McGuirk.
- Seth MacFarlane does Brian's voice by talking normally.
- Even Brian's characteristics are based on MacFarlane, including his liberal political views and atheism.
- Seth Green also says that Chris Griffin's voice is inspired by Buffalo Bill from 'Silence of the Lambs'.
- Peter and Brian actually originated from the 1997 Cartoon Network short 'Larry & Steve' by Seth MacFarlane. It also showcased a man and a dog.
- The main cast of 'Family Guy' makes around $225,000 each per episode!
Facts About 'Family Guy''s Creators
Fox along with Seth MacFarlane are the main creators of Family Guy.
Seth MacFarlane, the creator of the show, received a job offer from Hanna-Barbara, the famed animation studio. This was right two weeks before he had to graduate from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).
Hanna-Barbara wanted him to move to Los Angeles and join their esteemed team. MacFarlane's professor at RISD submitted his thesis film, The Life of Larry, to a student film competition without MacFarlane knowing.
The student film competition was organized by Hanna-Barbara. He definitely won the competition and caught the company's eyes.
Being a part of this company, Seth MacFarlane became a part of many 90s animated TV shows, classics such as Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, and Cow and Chicken. While he was working at Hanna-Barbara, MacFarlane made a sequel to the first The Life of Larry, called Larry & Steve.
It takes the story back to the start with the same characters.
Larry adopted his talking dog Steve from the pound, and this became the focal point of the story. Larry is similar to Peter from the Griffin family.
His voice is similar too, while Steve is the same as Brian from the Family Guy. The short 'Steve & Larry' aired in 1997 on Cartoon Network.
- 'Family Guy' was first supposed to be a primetime show for MADtv. After the success of 'Steve & Larry', Seth was riding on the good life and as any budding animator would do, he turned towards primetime. It became a Saturday night sketch comedy show with some animated parts. Like 'The Simpsons' began their run with Tracey Ullman, 'Family Guy' also tried to do the same with MADtv with a series of shorts. But, the project failed as the company did not have any budget to do animation.
- The success of 'King of the Hill' was key for MacFarlane to pitch 'Family Guy' to Fox for the second time. For the first time, Fox rejected MacFarlane's proposal as they were skeptical about the success. Fox gave him $50,000 to make the first episode. He took six months to create the pilot episode with a runtime of seven minutes and it was enough to convince Fox to commission 'Family Guy'.
- The writer room of the series apparently has some bullies. The character Neil Goldman, the school nerd with glasses and acne was named after one of the writers. And apparently, it was the other writers in the room that decided to name the character on the real-life Neil Goldman.
- 'Family Guy' was canceled for the second time. But viewers were not ready for it and their signed petition of over 100,000 people brought it back again.
- It was not easy for a group of male writers to write for a teenage girl. Meg gets a lot of abuse in the show for this reason.
Funny Facts About 'Family Guy'
It's a funny show, so obviously there are some funny facts related to the show. Let's read about some of them.
- The show sometimes makes fun of Robot Chicken and Chris Griffin gets mad at it instantly. This is only because Chris Griffin is voiced by Seth Green who is the producer, lead voice actor, and co-creator of Robot Chicken.
- 'South Park' actually made an episode mocking 'Family Guy'. In a funny turn of events, the people behind 'The Simpsons' sent their 'South Park' counterparts flowers saying they were 'doing God's work'.
- MacFarlane developed an obsession with death as he named several episodes with the titles from an old radio suspense drama from the '40s. It was hilarious for the first few episodes, but it stopped being funny after around four episodes and they changed the names back to the conventional ones.
- It's funny if you see that 'Family Guy' was named Worst TV Show of the Week by The Parents Television Council 44 times. 'South Park' and 'The Simpsons' would totally agree.
- There is a big chicken that appears from time to time to fight with Peter. His name is Ernie. The fight started over an expired coupon.
