Akbar and Jeff: Thoughts on Matt Groening's Cartoon Gay Couple

Hats, Huts, and Humanity

They’ve been together since the 1980s, when Matt Groening, the eventual creator of The Simpsons, added Akbar and Jeff to his Life in Hell series. Though he initially teased journalists by saying they could be twin brothers, gay lovers, or both, Groening quickly acknowledged that Akbar and Jeff are indeed a gay couple. Teetering fickly between adoring love for each other and utter frustration with each other, the couple’s odd brand of humor has resonated not just with gay men but with everyone who’s befuddled and bemused by the absurd ups and downs of human relationships. Indeed, the fez-hatted, big-nosed guys wearing Charlie Brown shirts speak to the masses despite being living in the shadows of The Simpsons.

My own exposure to Akbar and Jeff began in 1996, when someone at my college’s Writing Center pencil-sketched a giant spoof on the wall, something like: “Akbar and Jeff’s Writing Hut: Where the elite tread to have papers read.” As I learned, the entrepreneurial duo – when not busy vacillating between adulation and contempt for each other – skips around opening little huts, selling everything from reincarnation and liposuction to videos and tofu. Intrigued, I searched out the Life in Hell books and delighted (gaily, if you will) in the Akbar and Jeff cartoons.