According to an exclusive with EW Lizzo will be guest-starring in the season 34 finale.
Better still, the Grammy-winning, banger-generating singer who also plays a mean flute will be seen and heard in not just one but two roles in this season’s final episode.
You can get a peek at both of them via these first-look images.
Airing in May, “Homer’s Adventure Through the Windshield Glass” is a bit of a form-breaker for the long-running animated Fox comedy, as the entire episode takes place in the few seconds that Homer goes flying through the windshield of his car during an accident. “We had this idea for a long time, and it always felt like a pipe dream, but then we figured out a way to do it,” executive producer Tim Long tells EW. “Then the issue from a story point of view is: ‘Who is he going to talk to?’ We thought, ‘Well, his incredibly messy car is going to be filled with children’s toys and stuff.’ So she’s playing this happy little elf doll that comes to life and becomes his spirit guide.”
The producers had heard that Lizzo is a Simpsons fan (you saw her impressive Halloween costume a few months ago) and they reached out with an offer to guest star. When Lizzo signed on, Long penned the lyrics to a song while Flight of the Conchords’ Bret McKenzie wrote the melody. “The song is called, ‘It Was Marge, Bitch,’ and the bitch in question is Homer,” quips Long, who wrote the episode. “I can’t give you too much context without giving you too much story, but it is really in her wheelhouse — and she sang the hell out of it.”
The episode is inspired by two classic short stories that toy with time: Ambrose Bierce’s An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge and Jorge Luis Borges’ The Secret Miracle. The plot begins with Homer driving in his car, just before impact. “He’s really furious about something and we don’t know what,” says Long. “And as he’s flying through the air and he is talking to this little doll, we find out that he’s incredibly furious with Marge because she’s been hiding a secret from him.”
In the episode, “Lizzo says ‘bitch’ a lot and she does not suffer Homer very well,” says Long. “She ends up slapping and kicking him a lot to try to knock some sense into him. Which is very funny. And they end up developing a weird rapport that’s very, very sweet.”
The singer’s guest spot could have ended there, “but then we thought, ‘Well, if we have Lizzo, we should see Lizzo,'” says Long. “So we animated a little thing at the end where she is recording her part with the Simpsons. And that’s really funny, too. It’s sort of a weird ‘behind-the-scenes’ reality.”
That scene wound up involving not only Lizzo’s Sasha Flute, but her geeky Simpsons knowledge, which impressed the writers. “Obviously, she’s an incredible flautist and she brought her flute to the record session, and that was incredible to watch her play,” Long says. “She ends up jamming with Lisa. And what’s funny is that Lizzo is such a big Simpsons fan, she ad-libbed the line, ‘I’m gonna get my Sasha Flute and you grab your saxamaphone and let’s jam.’ Saxamaphone is such a deep-cut reference to The Simpsons that we were all like, ‘Wow.’ She knew all the Simpsons references. She recorded with Dan Castellaneta [who voices Homer] and I think everyone was starstruck — us by Lizzo and her by Dan. That was really special.”
