Cate Blanchett, David Harbour to guest star in 'The Simpsons'

Hollywood stars Cate Blanchett and David Harbour are heading to Springfield with the actors set to voice guest star on "The Simpsons".

The long-running animated comedy will see the Oscar winner Blanchett voice a canine psychologist named Elaine, who will appear next year in an episode that is likely to be the season 31 finale.

In "The Way of the Dog", Elaine agrees to help Santa's Little Helper, who is suffering from depression.

"She determines if there's a trauma in his past that they have to go solve, which actually goes back to the first episode of the series," "The Simpsons" executive producer Al Jean told Entertainment Weekly.

"Stranger Things" star Harbour will play an alternate version of Mr Burns, voiced by Harry Shearer, in a season 32 episode.

In a take on Undercover Boss, Mr Burns notices some graffiti on the wall at the nuclear power plant and decides to go undercover to root out the problem.

"Like 'Mission: Impossible', they give him a whole new body and face and voice so that this people in the plant won't possibly recognise him.

"He's supposed to be a blue-collar guy from another part of the plant, but everything he says is like Mr Burns. He wants to go to karaoke and sing songs from the 1890s, but the guys don't see through it," Jean added.

"The Simpsons" airs Sundays on Fox.