Simpson and Delilah
"Simpson and Delilah" is the second episode of The Simpsons
Plot
learns of Dimoxinil, a new "miracle breakthrough" for baldness, but cannot afford its $1,000 price. Lenny suggests Homer use the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant's medical insurance plan to pay for it. After applying the drug, Homer wakes up the next day with a full head of hair. Mr. Burns scans the security monitors to find someone to promote to an executive position. Mistaking Homer for a young go-getter with a mane of hair, Burns chooses him.When Homer has trouble finding a secretary who is not a seductive young woman, a man named Karl persuades Homer to hire him. Karl soon proves indispensable to Homer and gives him a makeover to replace his cheap polyester suit and bad hairstyle. When he forgets his own wedding anniversary, Karl hires a singing telegram service to serenade Marge with "You Are So Beautiful".
At an executive board meeting, Burns asks Homer to suggest a way to increase worker productivity. After Homer suggests providing more tartar sauce in the lunch room, workplace safety improves and accidents decrease. When Smithers observes that accidents have decreased by the exact number that were caused by Homer's incompetence, Burns correctly accuses him of petty jealousy.
After Homer receives the key to the executive washroom, Smithers is angry that he is now in Burns' good graces while his loyal service is forgotten. Smithers learns that Homer committed insurance fraud to receive Dimoxinil and attempts to get him fired. Karl takes the blame and writes a $1,000 check to repay the company, forcing Smithers to fire him instead. Homer is nervous about giving a speech at the plant, but reasons that everything will be fine as long as he has a full head of hair.
Homer catches Bart using his Dimoxinil in a misguided attempt to grow a beard, causing him to drop the bottle and spill its contents. By the next day, Homer has lost all his hair. Before the meeting, Karl appears with a prepared speech for him to deliver and reassures Homer he will do fine. Homer gives a brilliant speech on the Japanese art of self-management, but the audience refuses to take him seriously because he has no hair and now dwindles to people. Burns threatens to fire Homer, but sympathizes with him since he also suffers from male pattern baldness and knows what the condition does to a man. He demotes Homer to his former position.
At home that night, Homer tells Marge he is afraid she will love him less now that he is bald again. Marge reminds him that his job as a safety inspector has always provided for the family. Marge and Homer sing "You Are So Beautiful" together in each other's arms.
Production
Homer's hair product Dimoxinil is a spoof on a similar product, Minoxidil, which fascinated the writers. The production staff tried to give Homer a new hairstyle in each scene after he grows hair. The character Karl was played by openly gay actor Harvey Fierstein. Groening had originally intended to design Karl to look like Fierstein, who objected to the idea because he felt he did not "look like gay people, how they're supposed to look." Fierstein suggested that the character be made "blond, and tall, and gorgeous, and skinny, and a beautiful place to live."In contrast to Albert Brooks, Dustin Hoffman, and Michael Jackson, who did not allow their real names to be used, Fierstein was one of the very few early guest stars who was not embarrassed or reluctant to be associated with the show and welcomed his name in the credits.
The episode features a kiss between Homer and Karl, which occurred a decade prior to US television's first real man-on-man kiss on Dawson's Creek. In the episode, Karl is implied to be homosexual; creator Matt Groening says that when people began asking "was he gay?" the day after the episode aired, his response was "he's whatever you want him to be." However, Groening points out, "he does kiss Homer: He does give him a nice pat on the butt" which is "beyond any other cartoon" had done at the time.
Karl was originally supposed to return for a cameo appearance in the season 14 episode "Three Gays of the Condo". In the script, Homer was thrown out of the house by Marge, and encountered Karl. The purpose of the appearance was to introduce a gay couple that Homer would live with. Fierstein however felt that "the script was a lot of very clever gay jokes, and there just wasn't that Simpsons twist" and turned the role down.
Cultural references
The episode's title is a play on the biblical story of Samson, an Israelite judge with superhuman strength. All of his power was lost when his long hair was cut, similar to what happens to Homer when he loses back his hair. In the Bible, Delilah is Samson's lover, who betrays him by ordering a servant to cut his hair in his sleep and turns him over to Philistine lords.Dimoxinil is an obvious play on Minoxidil, which at the time of this episode was much more costly and not available over the counter.
The scene in which Homer is running through town after he got his hair is a reference to the film It's a Wonderful Life. The scene in which Homer receives the key to the executive washroom is a reference to the movie Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?. When Homer meets Mr. Burns in the executive washroom, Burns shows his admiration for German World War II General Erwin Rommel, saying he watched a documentary on the 'Desert Fox' the night before. Burns exclaims "now there was a man who could get things done!"
Reception
During the second season, The Simpsons aired Thursdays at 8p.m. on Fox, the same time as The Cosby Show on NBC. The supposed "Bill vs. Bart" rivalry had been heavily hyped by the media. The first airing of "Simpson and Delilah" had a 16.2 rating and 25% share, while The Cosby Show had an 18.5 rating. However, viewer-wise, The Simpsons won with 29.9 million viewers. It is one of the highest rated episodes of The Simpsons. "Bart Gets an F", the season premiere and episode that aired the week before, averaged an 18.4 Nielsen rating, had 29% of the audience and was watched by an estimated 33.6 million viewers.This episode was placed twenty-third on Entertainment Weekly's top 25 The Simpsons episodes list. The Daily Telegraph characterized the episode as one of "The 10 Best Simpsons TV Episodes."
Dan Castellaneta, the voice of Homer, named it his favorite episode of the show together with "Lisa's Substitute" and "Homer the Heretic".
When The Simpsons began streaming on Disney+ in 2019, former Simpsons writer and executive producer Bill Oakley named this one of the best classic Simpsons episodes to watch on the service.
Harvey Fierstein is number two on TV Guide's "All-time Favorite Guest Voices." Entertainment Weekly named Fierstein's role as Karl as one of the sixteen best guest appearances on The Simpsons. Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, the authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, praised Fierstein's performance, saying the episode was "brought to life by the superb character of Karl, helped no doubt by Harvey Fierstein's unique vocal drawl."