‘The most alternative of the alternative broadcasts.’

Alternative broadcasts are generally pretty well established at this point, but they’re certainly not all the same, and they’re certainly not always easy to make. Each type of these alternative broadcasts comes with special obstacles. For ESPN, perhaps the most challenging they’ve done to date is theirs Simpsons Funday Football for this week Monday night football clash between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Dallas Cowboys.

AA participated in a conference call on this ESPN+/Disney+ alternate broadcast last week. That saw executives from ESPN, the NFL, The Simpsonsand Beyond Sports (a Sony-owned company plays a key role in the technology that translates player movements on the field and commentator movements in the stands into this 3D animated broadcast) talk to the media about what’s going on in this alternative broadcast and what to expect from it.

To begin with, while this broadcast was officially announced in October, ESPN executive vice president (league programming and acquisitions) Ros Durant said that it has been in the works for almost a full year. Durant said this started with an idea from vice president (programming) Tim Reed and went into intense planning in early 2024, and said it builds on ESPN’s previous alternate broadcasts (including the ManningCast, also available for this game on ESPN2 and ESPN+ and with guests Cris Collinsworth and John Legend, and last year’s animated Toy Story Funday Football) and even hits a potentially wider audience due to the multi-generational appeal of The Simpsons.

“The Simpsons resonate with fans around the globe, young and old and everyone in between,” Durant said. “Audience expansion is a top priority for us at ESPN, and I know it’s a top priority for the NFL, and it’s a distinctly Disney way that we do it on It brings together some of the strongest, most iconic brands – ESPN, Disney, NFL, The SimpsonsSony – all in the service of the fan.”

Reed said part of the selection of The Simpsons here came from the fact that this was a Monday primetime altcast rather than an early Sunday international window.

“One of the filters we use in terms of thinking about what IPs to look at, the fact that this game was in prime time was a big driver for that,” he said. “Last year we did Toy Story at 9:30 in the morning. I think part of that filter was knowing that we were in prime time, we were going to be a little bit older.

Reed said he is thinking The Simpsons is interesting to a wide range of demographics.

“Obviously it’s multi-generational. I’m a perfect example. I’m a die-hard The Simpsons fan. I’ve been that way all my life. I have 13- and 15-year-old boys who have seen all 35 episodes — 35 years of The The Simpsons on Disney+. Granted, they’re a focus group of two, but again, it’s something we’ll definitely enjoy together. Then again, I think that’s part of how we landed on it The Simpsons and why it might work this time.”

That’s also a big part of the appeal of this for the NFL. NFL Media executive vice president and chief operating officer Hans Schroeder said The Simpsons resonated with them as a potential fit for an alternative NFL broadcast due to the number of fans of the show across demographics and countries (which matters for this broadcast, which will be available in more than 100 countries on these Disney streaming platforms) .

“We are incredibly excited about Monday night and the opportunity we have with all the parties that have come together here to create Simpsons Funday Football,” Schroeder said. “You know, for us in the NFL — and Ros hit on some of these similar and common themes — we’re very focused on how we continue to innovate and create new experiences for our fans. New experiences that extend across screens and across new platforms, areas like Disney+ here.

“Opportunities to create more expansion globally in the number of more than 100 countries we will be in around the world as we bring this type of opportunity to engage with the NFL in a different way to our fans wherever they are and in new ways, is incredibly exciting for us. And then in a new content format, using The The Simpsons in an animated way. And all that iconic history, all that fandom there The Simpsons have, certainly here in the US, but also globally. They are truly a global franchise.

“So you bring those elements together, and for us what makes it so exciting is bringing those ingredients in a new way and telling the story of an NFL game in a whole new and different way.”

“The Simpsons…” @ESPNMusic & @APMMusic teamed up to create a new mixed soundtrack for ‘The Simpsons Funday Football’

Go behind the scenes to hear how @TheSimpsons theme song and Monday Night Football’s ‘Heavy Action’ were harmonized together pic.twitter.com/g0VqNpG7kj

— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) 9 December 2024

Meanwhile The Simpsons showrunner Matt Selman said this is a great opportunity for this franchise to connect with new and existing fans in a different way, especially with their voice talent on board recording new segments for this broadcast.

“The fact that we have all the actual The Simpsons voices to create original animation and content, Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith and Hank Azaria – for having them on board to provide this The Simpsons reality and The Simpsons authenticity, we couldn’t have done it without them,” he said. “Our voice talent is always excited to do these fun, new projects. Whether it’s a theme park ride or an NFL alt-cast, they know that the lifeblood of The The Simpsons replicating itself in the new technology that comes.

“So I just want to thank our cast for being so excited about the fun of this, that Spike (ESPN vice president of editing and animation Michael “Spike” Szykowny) and his team — I mean, Spike and Sparky, as you can imagine , came into this with a huge energy of just fun and excitement and possibility and not wanting to limit ourselves. And how can we be so creative and how can we be like The Simpsons and how can we be as subversive and have as much fun as possible given the extreme budget and time constraints we were under?

“Subversive” is a word that hasn’t always been widely used in the NFL, where the league is sometimes criticized for lacking a sense of humor. However, there have been some changes there over the years. The past half decade has seen teams delve into funnier social media presences, whether with show release videos or outright trolling. And the league-owned NFL Network has proven willing to offer many more jokes across that span, both beyond and (especially) on Good morning football. And Selman said the league was “unbelievably cool” with it The Simpsons team wanted to do, which will stand out from your typical NFL broadcast.

“We haven’t been maximally nervous about this, have we? It’s not maximal edge, but there’s a sense of playfulness and spoofiness of the NFL — which the NFL was incredibly cool with — where we’re having fun with the tropes of football and the clichés of football and doing laugh with the family watching. football experience in a way that these other shows wouldn’t really be able to because they’re not — they don’t have the satirical DNA.”

In conversation with Syzkowny, Selman said that much of the writing here came from Joel Cohen, a veteran The Simpsons author and well-known sports fan.

“We have to give a shout out, Spike, to Joel Cohen, the longtime Simpsons writer and super sports fan who wrote so much for this thing. And really—you know, if Spike emailed Joel in the middle of the night and said we need 50 questions for Marge to ask football players who don’t want to offend the NFL, Joel would write 100. It was really great.”

It also helps on the writing side that the specific game involved was picked early and wasn’t bent out of whack (due to this alternate broadcast) even when the Cowboys and Bengals put up underwhelming records. Schroeder said the matchup made a lot of sense for the NFL to focus on.

“From our point of view, this is one of those kinds of real big tentpole games on Monday night football the calendar, with where the Bengals and Joe Burrow have been, and with Dallas and the franchise they have,” he said. “I think the creative talent in here would tell a story about — no matter which two teams played, they would find good stories and narratives to play. But this year, especially this matchup and kind of how it translated back to The Simpsons and being such a tentpole match on the overall Monday night calendar was one I think we had a lot of excitement about.”

Selman said this matchup was also a natural fit for Homer and Bart Simpson.

“We were fortunate to have the Cowboys against the Bengals, which are just two iconic teams with great identities and great fan bases,” he said. “We were also just fortunate that the Cowboys are like a Homer Simpson-type, American team.

“And (Dallas head coach) Mike McCarthy is maybe a Homer-type guy, you’d imagine. And then you’ve got Joe Burrow on the other side, who’s a cool young, spiky-haired, blond bad boy — he’s like Bart. And it fits our character archetypes so perfectly.

If Homer is mad at Bart and has a hot dog dream while watching Monday Night Football, and then it’s basically McCarthy vs. Burrow, Homer vs. Bart, and it’s the simple father versus son choking, Homer choking Bart, dynamics that have been part of the show for 35 years.

“I don’t know if it would have worked as well if it was like the Titans against Jacksonville. We would have found something. We would have made it work.”

“Yes, Caramba!”@GMA visited ESPN headquarters to see how ESPN, @NFL, @Disney, @TheSimpsons, @NextGenStats & Sony’s @beyondsportsvr all plan to bring fans tonight’s Monday Night Football game in the iconic universe of The Simpsons

The Simpsons Funday Football
8p ET | Disney+ and ESPN+ pic.twitter.com/4g8CbkpQgL

— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) 9 December 2024

As mentioned by Selman there, the broadcast here will start with Homer eating too many hot dogs and having a fever dream. That dream will see him, Bart, and other residents of Springfield playing in a football game with Homer on the Dallas side and Bart on the Cincinnati side. Selman said the hot dog fever dream feels appropriate given how wild an idea this is and how supportive all the partners have been.

“The NFL and ESPN and Spike and everybody allowed this crazy hot dog fever dream to happen and all the ESPN talent that gave of themselves, their time, including a very special spoiler guy that I won’t name — or girl. I can just don’t wait to see people’s reaction.”

Read on for more on the ESPN talent involved, how animation will position them in the game, and why this broadcast stands out among alternative broadcasts.