The Principal and the Pauper

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The Simpsons episode
"The Principal and the Pauper"
The real Skinner (left) and the faux Skinner (right)
Episode no.	180
Prod. code	4F23
Orig. airdate	September 28, 1997
Show runner(s)	Bill Oakley Josh Weinstein
Written by	Ken Keeler
Directed by	Steven Dean Moore
Couch gag	The Simpsons are dressed as astronauts and sit on the couch just as it blasts off into space.
Guest star(s)	Martin Sheen[1]
DVD commentary	Bill Oakley Josh Weinstein Ken Keeler Steven Dean Moore
Season 9 September 21, 1997 – May 17, 1998
"The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson" "The Principal and the Pauper" "Lisa's Sax" "Treehouse of Horror VIII" "The Cartridge Family" "Bart Star" "The Two Mrs. Nahasapeemapetilons" "Lisa the Skeptic" "Realty Bites" "Miracle on Evergreen Terrace" "All Singing, All Dancing" "Bart Carny" "The Joy of Sect" "Das Bus" "The Last Temptation of Krust" "Dumbbell Indemnity" "Lisa the Simpson" "This Little Wiggy" "Simpson Tide" "The Trouble with Trillions" "Girly Edition" "Trash of the Titans" "King of the Hill" "Lost Our Lisa" "Natural Born Kissers"
List of all The Simpsons episodes
Seasons 1 · 2 · 3 · 4 · 5 · 6 · 7 · 8 · 9 · 10 · 11 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20

"The Principal and the Pauper" is the second episode of The Simpsons' ninth season. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on September 28, 1997.^[2] In the episode, Seymour Skinner begins to celebrate his twentieth anniversary as principal of Springfield Elementary School when a man arrives claiming that Skinner has assumed his identity. Principal Skinner admits that his real name is Armin Tamzarian, and that he had thought the true Seymour Skinner, a friend from the army, had died in the Vietnam War. Armin decides to leave Springfield forever, only to return later in the episode. The episode was the last written by Ken Keeler and was directed by Steven Dean Moore. It guest starred Martin Sheen as the real Seymour Skinner. Although it was produced by Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein as part of the season eight production code, it aired during the ninth season.^[3]

"The Principal and the Pauper" has become one of the most controversial episodes of The Simpsons. Many fans and critics reacted negatively to the fact that Principal Skinner, who had been a recurring character since the first season, was suddenly revealed to be an impostor. The episode received criticism from series creator Matt Groening and Harry Shearer, the voice actor of Principal Skinner. Despite this, Keeler considers the episode to be the best work he has ever done for television. The episode received generally negative reviews in several articles and books on The Simpsons.

Contents 1 Plot 2 Production 2.1 Concept 3 Controversy 3.1 Reaction from the production staff 4 Reception 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Plot

On the eve of his twentieth anniversary as school principal, Seymour Skinner is lured to Springfield Elementary for a surprise party by his mother, Agnes. The celebration goes positively until a strange man arrives, claiming to be the real Seymour Skinner. Principal Skinner soon admits to being an impostor, and that his real name is Armin Tamzarian. Armin then tells the story of the events that led him to steal Seymour Skinner's identity.

Armin was once a troubled young man. At one point, he stole an old woman's purse, and while making a getaway on his motorcycle, hit a pedestrian who happened to be a judge. As punishment, Armin was sent to the Army to fight in the Vietnam War. There he met and befriended the real Sergeant Seymour Skinner, who became his mentor and helped him find meaning in his troubled life. Skinner told Armin that his dream was to become an elementary school principal after the war. Later, Skinner was seen caught in an explosion, declared missing, and presumed dead. Armin took the news of the apparent death to Skinner's mother, Agnes. Upon meeting him, however, Agnes mistook him for her son, and Armin could not bear to deliver the message. He instead allowed Agnes to call him Seymour, and took over Seymour's life from that point on.

After this revelation, the people of Springfield begin to distrust Armin. Armin decides that there is no longer any place for him in Springfield, and quits his job. The real Skinner is then offered the chance to realize his dream and take over as school principal. He takes the job, but the townspeople soon realize that they prefer Armin over the real Seymour Skinner. Armin, however, has already left Springfield and gone to Capital City. Marge heads to Capital City with Edna Krabappel, Agnes and the Simpson family. After Agnes orders Armin to return home, Homer convinces Mayor Quimby and all the other citizens to allow Armin to resume his assumed identity of Principal Skinner. The real Sergeant Skinner is unhappy about this, and refuses to give up his job and his dignity just because they prefer Armin over him. In response, the townspeople banish the real Skinner from town by tying him to a chair on a freight train car. Judge Snyder declares that Armin will again be referred to as Seymour Skinner, that he will return to his job as school principal, and that no one shall mention the name "Armin Tamzarian" again, under penalty of torture.

[edit] Production

"The Principal and the Pauper" was the last episode written by Ken Keeler, who had also pitched the original idea for the episode. Keeler named the fake Seymour after Armin Tamzarian, a claims adjuster who assisted him after a car accident.^[4] Tamzarian, who later became a lawyer, was unaware that his name was used until after the episode was completed.^[5] Martin Sheen was selected to voice the real Seymour Skinner because the producers loved his performance in Apocalypse Now, feeling his voice would be an appropriate fit for a Vietnam veteran.^[6] One of the possible titles of the episode was "Skinnersby", a reference to the film Sommersby.^[7] The title of the episode is a reference to the book The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain.^[3]

[edit] Concept

“	This [episode] is about a community of people who like things just the way they are. Skinner's not really close to these people—you know, he's a minor character—but they get upset when someone comes in and says, 'This is not really the way things are,' and they run the messenger out of town on the rail. When the episode aired, lo and behold, a community of people who like things just the way they are got mad. It never seems to have occurred to anyone that this episode is about the people who hate it.	”
—Ken Keeler[4]

The producers decided to try different concepts and ideas for the episode. During their time as showrunners, Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein liked to make episodes that pushed the boundaries. "The Principal and the Pauper" was proposed in the same vein, although they feel part of the problem is that it did not initially present itself as being such an episode.^[5] Principal Skinner was a favorite character of show runners Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein, and they felt that the episode would be an interesting exploration of who he was.^[6] Keeler based the script on the Tichborne Case, although internet fans commonly believe that it is actually based on the story of Martin Guerre.^[4] Keeler feels that the episode is about people who hate change and how they will try to keep things the way they are, even if the change has little to do with them. The new Skinner was made to be a nice guy, but just not quite the Skinner they all knew, which is why people were against him.^[4] In the original draft, there were two sentences that Keeler felt illustrated this point even better and would have made all of the difference in the episode. However, they were cut for time.^[4] The writers wanted the episode's ending to fully reset to the point before Skinner is revealed as an impostor so that the audience need not consider the Tamzarian back story part of Skinner's character.^[5]

[edit] Controversy

"The Principal and the Pauper" caused much controversy amongst fans and critics, who reacted negatively to the twist that Principal Skinner was an impostor.^[8][9] Skinner had been a recurring character since the first season, and after years of development his character was suddenly changed. The episode ended with a self-referential deus ex machina, which left viewers to either "reset" or accept the change.^[9] Bill Oakley considers it the most controversial episode of his tenure as executive producer.^[5]

[edit] Reaction from the production staff

According to Bill Oakley, there was little opposition from the staff at the time of the episode production, although Harry Shearer, the voice of Principal Skinner, was "a little peeved."^[5] It has since been both defended and criticized by several members of staff. In the DVD commentary for the episode, it is defended by Oakley, Weinstein and director Steven Dean Moore.^[7] Keeler said, "I am very, very proud of the job I did on this episode. This is the best episode of television I feel I ever wrote."^[4]

Others have criticized it, including Harry Shearer, the voice of Principal Skinner.^[9] In a 2001 interview with the Dallas Observer, Shearer recalled that after reading the script, he told the writers, "That's so wrong. You're taking something that an audience has built eight years or nine years of investment in and just tossed it in the trash can for no good reason, for a story we've done before with other characters. It's so arbitrary and gratuitous, and it's disrespectful to the audience."^[10] In a later interview, Shearer added "now, [the writers] refuse to talk about it. They realize it was a horrible mistake. They never mention it. It's like they're punishing [the audience] for paying attention."^[11] In the introduction to the Season 9 DVD boxset, series creator Matt Groening describes "The Principal and the Pauper" as one of his least favorite episodes, although he does not elaborate on that comment.^[12]

The episode has been referred to several times in later episodes of The Simpsons. A clip from the episode was used in season 11's "Behind the Laughter" as an example of the show's increasingly "gimmicky and nonsensical plots".^[13] It was referenced by Lisa in the season 15 episode "I, (Annoyed Grunt)-Bot", when she tells Skinner "I guess it is, Principal Tamzarian", after he complains about Lisa naming her new cat Snowball II, who had died earlier in the episode, and pretending that nothing had changed.^[14]

[edit] Reception

"The Principal and the Pauper" finished 41st in the United States in the ratings for the week of September 22–28, 1997, with a Nielsen rating of 9.2. This was better than the Fox Network's ratings average of 6.4 that week^[15] and was the second highest rated show on the Fox, following King of the Hill.^[16]

In his book Leaving Springfield, John Alberti notes that the episode was "reviled by many of the fans [...] for its dispensing with series continuity."^[8] Chris Turner writes in Planet Simpson that he feels the episode marks the abrupt end of the "Golden era" of the show that began in the third season and that it "remains to this day among the weakest episodes in Simpsons history". Turner also writes that "such a blatant, continuity-scrambling plot twist of this sort might've been forgivable if the result had been as funny or sharply satirical as the classics of the Golden Age, but alas it's emphatically not".^[9] In an article in The Observer, Giles Richards notes this "Golden Age" referred to by Turner and disagrees with Turner's assessment that the show plateaued after "The Principal and the Pauper".^[17] In Paul A. Cantor's Gilligan Unbound: Pop Culture in the Age of Globalization, he calls the decision of The Simpsons producers to develop the Armin Tamzarian story "a fit of madness".^[18] Alan Sepinwall writes in a 2003 article in The Star-Ledger that the episode "was so implausible that even the characters were disavowing it by the end of the episode".^[19] In a 2006 article in The Star-Ledger, Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz cite the episode when asserting that the quality of The Simpsons episodes "gets much spottier" from season nine.^[20]

The authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, have praised the episode, calling it "one of the series' all-time best episodes, mainly because it shows us a human side, not just of Principal Skinner, but of his hectorish Mom as well. [...] Martin Sheen steals the show though in a brief but important slice of Simpsons history."^[3]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• "The Principal and the Pauper" episode capsule at The Simpsons Archive
• "The Principal and the Pauper" at the Internet Movie Database