“Lisa on Ice,” the eighth episode to air during the sixth season of The Simpsons, tells the story of Bart and Lisa vying for their parents’ attention while competing on rival hockey teams. It was based on the childhood of Mike Scully, then a new writer who had just replaced Conan O’Brien. He had grown up playing and watching hockey and channeled those experiences into a story that, despite (or perhaps because of) its humble concept, is remembered as a classic — we ranked it as the 35th-best Simpsons episode. There are great jokes (including an absolutely perfect Ralph line), thoughtful animation, a surprising amount of heart, and a heavy dose of irreverence. It’s everything you’d want from the seminal sitcom.
To mark the episode’s 30th anniversary, we spoke with Nancy Cartwright and Yeardley Smith (the voices of Bart and Lisa) and Scully, as well as David Mirkin (the showrunner of seasons five and six) and David Silverman (a consulting producer and animator), during a live oral history at Vulture Festival in November. Cartwright and Smith reflected on performing in such a sweet episode, Silverman revealed the lengths to which they went to get the animation right, and Scully and Mirkin explained how they nailed the episode’s perfect ending, which are four of the best minutes in the show’s history.
You can watch the panel below or listen to it in the latest episode of Good One: A Podcast About Jokes.
