The Simpsons Has Maintained Promise to Paul McCartney

Lisa Simpson has been a vegetarian for over 25 years, and it’s all due to a promise made to Paul McCartney. If you’re a Simpsons historian you may recall that in the seasn seven episode “Lisa the Vegetarian,” McCartney and his then-wife Linda appeared on the show and (along with Apu) helped Lisa commit to vegetarianism. Yeardley Smith, who voices Lisa, appeared on the Allrecipes Podcast and revealed that Lisa becoming and staying a vegetarian for life was a condition of McCartney’s appearance.

Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr have all appeared on The Simpsons over its decades-long run, but only one of the Beatles made the show keep a promise.

In the season seven episode, “Lisa the Vegetarian,” Paul, his then-wife Linda, and “the fifth Beatle” Apu helped Lisa commit to being a vegetarian — and reveal that if you listen to “Maybe I’m Amazed” backwards, there’s a ripping lentil soup recipe. But mostly the vegetarian thing. The Simpsons staff was able to book McCartney only after agreeing to a unique stipulation, and before you ask, it has nothing to do with marrying a carrot.

“The wonderful story about Lisa becoming a vegetarian is that Paul and Linda McCartney said they would not come on the show unless Lisa remained a vegetarian for the life of the series,” Smith said (per The Hill). “And we’ve kept our promise.”

Smith noted that McCartney “always checks” to make sure that they’ve kept the promise and that the one time they’ve ever come close to breaking it was the season 24 episode “Penny-Wiseguys” when Lisa tried eating bugs. She noted, “The saving grace was that even after she ate the bugs, she then reversed course and went, this isn’t for me. I’m going back to my vegetarian ways. So, I feel like ultimately we kept our promise, even if she stuck her toe in unknown waters.”

You can listen to the full episode below: