SETH MACFARLANE INTERVIEW

“I think we are all hardwired to laugh at fart jokes” Family Guy creator, Seth Macfarlane chuckles down the phone. “It’s a base of the brain thing. You hear a fart and you want to laugh and I don’t think there is anything wrong with that.”

Much though we tend to agree with Macfarlane’s analysis of the intricacies of modern comedy, there is much more to this animated amalgam of Monty Python Surrealism and American moral satire than just bodily function gags.

 “Monty Python were always definitely an influence. That random, left field comedy is what we like. And The Far Side.” MacFarlane agrees. It is this delicate mix of the puerile and the profound that has given Family Guy the power to literally return from the dead. Initially dropped from it’s American home at Fox TV, the subversive Griffiths family instantly became a cult hit, creating an underground following of DVD buying devotees that brought this hilarious cartoon back from the doldrums of cancelled series and broken dreams that have been the dumping ground for many a great cartoon including Futurama and the incomparable Ren and Stimpy.

Still, Macfarlane is by nature a lucky sod. Originally booked on to one of the hijacked planes that devastated America on 9/11 he only missed becoming another statistic in the war on terror because his agent messed up the reservation. “Thanks God for a terrible travel agent” is all he can manage now by way of explanation.

For those of you who have yet to have the pleasure, Family Guy is oft-described as The Simpsons on Acid. Featuring the life and times of the all American Griffiths family, this is a tale of simple folk, matricidal babies, talking dogs and broken dreams. Oh, and a few fart jokes thrown in.

Family Guy - The Freakin' Sweet Collection is available on DVD on 25^th April from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment