Edwin Aguilar Aguilar embodied triumph against the odds in a stark way. Born in El Salvador’s San Miguel province in 1974, he fled the country in 1982 to avoid being drafted as a child soldier in the army. Growing up in East L.A., he dodged gang life to win scholarships to art schools. Intimidated by the test to join The Simpsons, he passed and went on to become a mainstay of the show. In the 22 years he spent on the Fox show, Aguilar served in a wide range of roles, most notably character layout artist (1999–2021) and assistant director (2007–21). He also worked at Graz Entertainment, Hanna-Barbera, and Warner Bros. with Chuck Jones — an artist whose characters he’d idolized as a child in El Salvador.