‘Family Guy’ Showrunners Rich Appel and Alec Sulkin Are All Out of Complaints

It might not seem like it, but Family Guy has been on air in four separate decades. Not only that, but the show has churned out over 400 episodes throughout its impressive run. After failing to find its footing with audiences, Family Guy was originally cancelled in May 2000 before getting a second-chance just a few months later. However, that second-chance was short-lived when the show appeared to receive its final death blow after yet another cancellation in May 2002. But like Ernie the Giant Chicken, you can’t keep a good fighter down and Family Guy came back from the dead in 2005.

Since its stumble out of the gate, Family Guy has shown no signs of slowing down. The show has become a staple in Fox’s Animation Domination block and boasts an impressive fanbase of loyal followers. A big reason for Family Guy’s ability to roll with the punches are the creative minds of showrunners Alec Sulkin and Rich Appel.

Bubbleblabber sat down with Sulkin and Appel to discuss the challenges of avoiding repetition, the source of their comedic genius, and which character is Kevin Garnett’s favorite.

Matthew Swigonski: How does it feel to be so established, knowing that this show died twice and was brought back multiple times?

Rich Appel: Well, I always say with pride that I hitched my wagon to the show long after it was a clear gravy train. I was not here during those first few years of struggle and cancellation. I came in Season 10. It’s a unicorn now more than ever, where you can plan ahead and work with the same team. I mean, that’s always a really hard thing about television. When you collect this great team and you know 90 plus percent of shows die after a year or two. Then you have to say goodbye. Alec has worked with some of these people for over 20 years. I’ve worked with him for 15. Really rare, and we do appreciate it.

Alec Sulkin: Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. It feels great. You feel very lucky. Over the years, I noticed that one of comedy writer’s favorite pastimes is complaining about everything. And the job is just another thing to complain about. But I feel like that has just washed away over the last few years. I think everyone who works here now just realizes that, ‘Hey, we’re in a good spot.’ So everybody shuts the hell up and just make each other laugh.

Rich Appel: [laughs] No, you open the door [to the writer’s room] and it’s just this rigid, post-apocalyptic world. Then you quickly close the door. Like, ‘I’m staying here. Thank you. No, no complaints.’

Matthew Swigonski: So what’s the biggest challenge that Family Guy faces now, as opposed to 10 or 20 years ago?

Rich Appel: Not repeating ourselves. I think there are so many voices out there and so many shows. And of course, how could I watch most of them? I don’t, and so there’s only been one or two times that we’ve had to kill an episode because someone has said, ‘South Park did this three weeks ago, right?’ And that’s depressing. I mean, I don’t want to out the showrunner of [a redacted animated show] but I’ll just say that he texted us something similar, having seen our premiere. And I was like, ‘Phew! Glad we were in first.’

Alec Sulkin: Yeah, I agree with Rich. It is definitely the biggest challenge now. Coming up with stories that don’t bump with stories that we’ve already told.

Matthew Swigonski: How does the idea creation process work on Family Guy? How does it go from concept to what we eventually see on TV?

Rich Appel: Well, we watch The Simpsons and then just come up with our version.

Alec Sulkin: Okay, let me brag about Rich here for a second. I think it’s a very good example of how stories get created. There have been a couple times over the last few years where something small has happened in Rich’s life that he’s been able to bring back and has resulted in excellent shows. We had one called “A Bottle Episode,” where I think it was based on a family member of Rich’s who went to an Airbnb and took a tiny bottle of shampoo with her when she left and then it became sort of a big deal. Like she was just this jewel thief or something. So that turned into a hilarious Lois episode. And there was another one, Rich. What was the other one with the coffee?

Rich Appel: The other one was my ex-wife, who I’m still very close to and who is an accomplished woman. She would go to Peet’s Coffee Shop and noticed that they would take Polaroids of the customers of the week. Where you’d get free coffee that week. But she was never picked. So she started gradually escalating. Tipping extra, complementing the barista’s artwork and what not? And it was like the Princess and the Pea, you know? Just like, ‘Wow, why did this matter psychologically to her?’ And then of course, I came in as my jovial self and I was the customer of the week within a day. So we took that, again with Lois, and then we built it in ways that maybe took liberties with what happened in real life.

Alec Sulkin: You know, it can be a small, funny story from your personal life or it can be sitting in a room with five other writers saying, ‘We want to do an episode with Brian and Stewie. What can we do? What haven’t they done?’

Rich Appel: And we have a large staff. And they’re creative, inventive people. So wherever inspiration comes from. Sometimes it’ll just be a one-liner. We have a writer, Travis Bowe. He was just kicking around ideas a few years ago and said something like, ‘Stewie wants to sit on Santa’s lap, and he’s crying. So, Meg puts him on her lap. She sits on Santa’s lap. He bounces up and down, and she has her first orgasm.’ Now at that moment, I knew two things: one, we’re doing that episode and two, I don’t know how.

But it’s just such an original idea that led to one of Alec’s thousands of funny, inspired moments. The key thing in that episode with standards was, ‘How do we show that moment of ecstasy?’ Then there’s Alec who had the idea that as we come in close on Meg’s face, we cut to a live action shot of Jimmy Connors’ famous set win, where he pumps his arms to the crowd. And Lois says, ‘Do you see Jimmy Connors? Every woman sees Jimmy Connors for the first time.’ And standards was fine with it. But again, it just came from Travis having that one liner.

Alec Sulkin: And we all got to meet Jimmy Connors.

Rich Appel: Jimmy Connors played himself in the episode and could not have been more funny. Looking back on it, I mean why would Jimmy Connors object to a script that says every time a woman has an orgasm she sees him?

Matthew Swigonski: Good point. Is there one episode or storyline that your family sees and goes, ‘What the hell are you guys thinking?’

Rich Appel: Our family? Well, that would presume all of our family watches.

Alec Sulkin: My mom loves to talk about how I work on the show, but does not like to watch the show itself.

Rich Appel: When The Cleveland Show premiered, I asked my mother, who is a supportive, devoted mother, ‘Did you see the premiere?’ And she said, ‘Oh my, I did. Such beautiful colors.’

Matthew Swigonski: You talked earlier about ideas or even entire episodes being thrown in the trash because you’re afraid of repetition. Do you ever come back to those ideas and try to recycle them?

Rich Appel: It’s hard to revive something that you had to decide at some point wasn’t good enough without feeling like you’re lowering your standards.

Alec Sulkin: Yeah, I mean, it’s actually kind of liberating in a way. I mean, yes, it can be a lot of wasted time and effort. But then you kind of feel like, ‘Alright, we don’t have to revisit that idea again. That idea is gone.’

Rich Appel: We’ve had moments where we thought an episode idea that we worked on for days that never came through for us might just be a cutaway, you know? It might just be a half page funny observation rather than a story.

Matthew Swigonski: We’re already into the new season of Family Guy, but are there any storylines, concepts, or entire episodes that you’re super excited about?

Alec Sulkin: It’s a really strong lineup this season. But one of the things that is slightly new this year is we’re doing a parody of popular Hulu shows, because we’re on Hulu now. And so they were nice enough to say, ‘Yeah, you can make fun of The Bear and you can make fun of Only Murders in the Building.’ That’s going to be a fun episode. I think it means that we’re at least keeping in step with the times. That we’re not just going to parody like Star Wars or Lawrence of Arabia. We’re gonna find new things and new ways to kind of do our show. So that one stood out for me.

Rich Appel: I think we have a line in there from Peter that’s like, ‘Now let’s make fun of all of these shows that have 104 Emmys.’ We have a White Lotus episode coming up. And in its way, it is a parody, but it’s also amazing how easily our characters fit into that world. There’s Stewie as a ‘Jennifer Coolidge, high-demanding, entitled guest.’ So it’s a fun episode in and of itself. I think it’s a pretty good take on White Lotus. We have one more where Peter and Brett Kavanaugh meet and bond over their love of beer and then swap places.

Matthew Swigonski: Okay, I can’t wait for that one.

Rich Appel: And we have Lois discovering, well for lack of a better word, masturbation. It’s Lois who talks to Meg about Chris when she walks in on him pleasuring himself. And she says, ‘Can you believe boys would do something like that?’ And Meg is like, ‘Mom girls do it, too.’ This is a revelation for Lois. I spent as much time with the standards people as I did in the writer’s room.

Matthew Swigonski: So what’s it like in those negotiations?

Rich Appel: I wish I could complain, because as Alec has pointed out, writers like to complain. But Fox is very easy to work with on this and we kind of know the line. There are certain things where you can’t be too explicit. But if you suggest things, sometimes you come up with euphemisms for stuff. It challenges us to be even funnier because the writers are very clever and the audience will know what we’re referencing.

So, there’s not been a lot of things that we really wanted and not been able to do. But then there are hilarious compromises. Like, what kind of breathing is too ecstatic and what kind of breathing could be, you know… I’ve given directions to Alex Borstein more than once like, ‘Let me hear what you would sound like if you just ran a 5k’ and she’ll pant and I’ll throw that in.

Alec Sulkin: I’ll toot Rich’s horn here for a minute because in a former life Rich was an ADA in Manhattan Southern District. So he’s basically Jack McCoy. So we have Jack McCoy litigating for the dick jokes that we want to make.

Rich Appel: If I can imprison a drug kingpin, I can get a dick joke on Fox!

Alec Sulkin: So Rich does an amazing job getting so much of the stuff that we think is funny onto the air.

Matthew Swigonski: If you could make a spin-off series on any one character, who would it be and why?

Rick Appel: It was Cleveland!

Matthew Swigonski: That was a trap question. That’s the only correct answer.

Alec Sulkin: It’s funny that you asked that. I mean, obviously, Stewie’s a great character and could deliver monologues for an hour and it would be hilarious. But when The Cleveland Show was being made, I remember I went to a basketball game with Seth MacFarlane, and because he’s Seth MacFarlane, we got to go back into the locker room and meet some of the players. And it was the Celtics game so we met Kevin Garnett, who’s famously a Family Guy fan. And Seth told Garnett about this plan to make this Cleveland spin-off. I’ll never forget Kevin looking up at him and saying, ‘Not Quagmire?’ [laughs] You know, The Cleveland Show was already basically done, produced, and ready to come out and Kevin Garnett was like, ‘Why not Quagmire?’

You can check out new episodes of Family Guy every Sunday on Fox at 8 PM.