Treehouse of Horror XII - Production

Production

“Treehouse of Horror XII” was directed by Jim Reardon and co-written by Joel H. Cohen, John Frink, Don Payne and Carolyn Omine. It is the twelfth episode of the annual Treehouse of Horror Halloween specials, and, due to Fox’s contract with Major League Baseball’s World Series, the episode was pushed back to November 6, 2001 on the Fox network, airing six days after Halloween. As with the rest of the Halloween specials, the episode is considered non-canon and falls outside of the show’s regular continuity. This was the first Halloween special where the writers did not have “scary names” in the credits. This was due to the terrorist attacks on September 11, after which the staff were “trying to be sensitive”, and, according to producer Ian Maxtone-Graham, the Halloween names would all reference the attacks had they been kept. Mike Scully, who worked as show runner for the episode, stated that the “scary names” were removed because they had also “turned into shameless plugs” for side projects done by The Simpsons’ staff members.

The first segment, “Hex and the City”, was written by Joel Cohen. The gypsy fortune teller in the segment was portrayed by Tress MacNeille while the leprechaun was played by Dan Castellaneta. Current show runner Al Jean stated in the DVD audio commentary for the episode that the leprechaun seen at the end of the segment was “as much as had ever laughed” at the color screening for the episode. He stated that the way the leprechaun moved and the way Reardon directed it was “just so funny”. The leprechaun has reappeared many times since the episode, becoming one of few characters on The Simpsons to “leap from Halloween to regular shows”.

“House of Whacks” was co-written by John Frink and Don Payne. Payne, who conceived the story of the segment, based it on Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey. The segment would originally end with the Ultrahouse killing Homer, and, for compensation, the family would program the house with Homer’s personality. The Ultrahouse was portrayed by Pierce Brosnan, however he was not the staff’s first choice for the role. The role was originally intended for Sean Connery, and over the course of production, the staff wanted Lyle Lovett for the role. The decision remained until “someone who worked for decided it was somehow insulting to have him play a house”, according to Scully. At this point, the staff settled on Brosnan. Scully stated that “Brosnan wound up doing a great job” and that working with him was “really funny”. Originally, the Ultrahouse would have a pompadour and play the guitar, however they changed its mannerisms to suit Brosnan’s performance better. Matthew Perry also made a guest appearance, playing himself as one of Ultrahouse’s voice options. Regular cast member Dan Castellaneta portrayed Dennis Miller in the segment (a special ending credit had to be made to avoid confusion with viewers who thought the real Dennis Miller did voicework on the show). One scene was cut from the segment. The scene would take place during Marge’s call to the police station, where police chief Clancy Wiggum, while answering Marge’s call, is being shot at by “RoboCops”.

The third segment, “Wiz Kids”, was written by Carolyn Omine. Omine stated in the DVD audio commentary for the episode that the segment was “a really hard sell”, since only about four of the writers had read Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, the book the segment was based on, while the rest of the writers did not know about the book and thought viewers would not know who Harry Potter was. At the time of the episode’s production, four books had been written in the Harry Potter book series and the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone would be released at the end of November, the same month that this episode aired. Two scenes were cut from the segment; one of them would serve as an extension of Montymort and Slithers plotting their scheme, followed by a scene showing Bart combing his hair, while the other scene would show Groundskeeper Willie riding an enchanted lawn mower. The latter scene was cut for time.