Frasier Crane
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| Cheers character | |
| Frasier Winslow Crane | |
|---|---|
| Gender | Male |
| Hair color | Brown (going bald) |
| Eye color | Blue |
| Role in Cheers | Customer/Psychiatrist |
| Portrayed by | Kelsey Grammer |
Frasier Winslow Crane is a character on American television sitcoms Cheers and Frasier. Frasier's character was introduced on Cheers in 1984 as a psychiatrist love interest for Cheers barmaid Diane Chambers (Shelley Long) who calls him to help Sam Malone combat his recent relapse into active alcoholism.
He was played by Kelsey Grammer for twenty years, tying the record for the longest running character on prime-time American television with James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillon on the show Gunsmoke. Grammer received Emmy Award nominations for portraying Crane on three different NBC shows, including a 1992 guest appearance on Wings.
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[edit] Biography
While Frasier first appeared on Cheers, many of the details of his early life are introduced or elaborated on Frasier.
[edit] Early life, and life on Cheers
It is established in Frasier that Frasier Crane was born in Seattle in 1952 to Hester Rose Crane (a psychiatrist) and Martin Crane (a police detective).
In the episode "Back Talk" it is revealed that Frasier shares a birthday with one of Queen Elizabeth's children. In the episode "Are You Being Served?" it is revealed that he was named after one of his mother's lab rats. Frasier has one sibling, a younger brother named Niles.
As a child, Frasier was unusually sensitive, and as such was a frequent target for bullies. His closest companion when growing up was his even more sensitive brother, with whom he was intensely close yet fiercely competitive. During his school years, he developed interests in - and frequently excelled at - the fine arts, cooking, and other intellectual pursuits. He was keen on and drawn to the theatre, appearing in several amateur school productions, and seems to have considered acting as a future vocation, but inspired by his mother, he developed a fascination for psychiatry. This may also have been partially inspired by his father being a detective. He studied at Harvard and Oxford University, and speaks French, German, Italian, and Spanish. He drives a black BMW 7 Series.
While the rest of the family stayed in Seattle, Frasier settled in Boston, a time in his life that corresponds to the show Cheers. According to the Cheers storyline, Frasier's first wife, whom he married while still quite young, was Nanette Guzman, later a well-known children's entertainer who appears both on Cheers (played by Emma Thompson) and on Frasier (played by Laurie Metcalf and Dina Spybey). The marriage lasted nine months.
Soon after Frasier's first appearance on Cheers it is revealed that he is dating Diane. They ultimately get engaged, but this relationship ends when Diane abandons him at the altar. Frasier nevertheless becomes a regular fixture at the bar, and would eventually marry again, this time to Lilith Sternin, a fellow psychiatrist. Together, they have a son, Frederick, but this marriage too ends in heartbreak when Lilith cheats on Frasier with a colleague. Following their divorce, Lilith gains primary custody of Frederick. At one point during the divorce he considered suicide, but the thought of his son stopped him from completing the act.
At some point during Frasier's life in Boston, around 1987, his mother Hester dies, which seems to lead to a period of estrangement from his brother and father. On Cheers, for example, he claims that his father is dead (in the episode "Cheers Fouls Out" (season 9, episode 2), when he stated "both my parents died when I was in my early thirties"), a claim explained in Frasier (in the second season episode, "The Show Where Sam Shows Up") as being prompted at the time by a recent vicious argument with his father. Nevertheless, following his divorce from Lilith, Frasier moves back to Seattle.
[edit] Life on Frasier
The strained relationship with his father and brother continues on Frasier's return to Seattle. In the episode "You Can Go Home Again," which depicts Frasier's recent arrival in Seattle, his father bitterly comments that his son's visits became remarkably infrequent following his mother's death, and neither Martin nor Niles seem particularly welcoming to him. Frasier gets a job at KACL radio as a radio psychiatrist.
Soon after his return to Seattle, Frasier invites his father, who has become unable to live alone, to live with him. To help out, he hires his father a physical therapist, Daphne Moon. Although frequently at loggerheads and remaining drastically different personalities, the next eleven years see the two men's relationship growing stronger and stronger. Frasier also develops a much closer relationship with his brother, as well as with Daphne and with the producer of his radio show, Roz Doyle.
During this period, although Frasier's radio career, intellectual pursuits and reputation are quite strong, his romantic life is frequently disastrous. The final episode ends with Frasier flying to Chicago to pursue a relationship with Charlotte (Laura Linney), which had ended prematurely when circumstances forced Charlotte to move back to Chicago.
[edit] Personality
Crane is well-to-do, with upper class, intellectual tastes and a snobbish, uptight demeanor. He is something of an epicure, and enjoys the finer things in life, such as wine, good food and expensive tailoring. He is also an aficionado of the arts, including opera, classical music, theatre, and antiquities, and possesses some esoteric and obscure interests, such as Mongolian Throat Singing, and obscure African artifacts. His large ego, coupled with his Harvard and Oxford education, make him extremely confident in the advice he gives on his radio show. He is also somewhat self-absorbed and narcissistic, a consequence (or a cause) of his lonely childhood. He is extremely pompous and verbose, prone to making grand, melodramatic declarations regarding his intentions and making the most of every opportunity to make a speech. Frequently, his pomposity and snobbery is undercut and belittled by the other characters he encounters, and is often the cause of many of the misfortunes and crises that occur in his life. Although he shares many traits with Niles, he does not have as many allergies, is more realistic and easy going.
Frasier is passionate about psychiatry. A staunch Freudian, he strongly believes that "there are no accidents" and that every action (and dream) carries with it a meaningful and unconscious subtext. This frequently leads him to obsessively overanalyse and fret about minor details regarding his life and relationships, which frequently creates problems in his life. When obsessing so, he is frequently prone to ignore the (usually wise and appropriate) advice given to him by his family and friends (in particular his father, Martin) and pursue his own course of action, which more often than not leads to disaster. His habit to overanalyse is so severe, that he once spent an entire episode fretting about a dream with homo-erotic implications, only later realising (with Martin's help) that the dream did not possess any significant implications regarding his life; it was merely a consequence of his subconscious attempting to give himself a challenging patient (himself) following a dearth of them on his show.
Whilst rarely heeding the advice given to him by others, Frasier himself is full of advice to impart, and offers the benefit of his counsel to the extent that he frequently meddles in the affairs and relationships of others, much to the chagrin of his family and friends. Although this approach can be beneficial (such as his influence in bringing together his brother Niles and Daphne Moon) and forms the basis of his successful career, his advice and plans can frequently backfire on him, and can frequently lead to complicated, tangled, embarrassing scenarios. For example, in the above situation of bringing Niles and Daphne together, he is targeted by Daphne's fiancee for a lawsuit because of his actions. Frasier's meddling - and the adverse consequences it frequently leads to - is not intended maliciously, however; he is extremely well-meaning and eager to please, and desires nothing more than to be liked and popular (possibly as a result of his lonely childhood, in which he was the frequent victim of bullying).
[edit] Romance
There are some differences between the Frasier on Cheers and the character on the subsequent show. On Cheers, Frasier is generally inept with women, while on his own show he occasionally manages to date and beds beautiful women despite numerous "dry spells". However, the relationships rarely last beyond a single episode.
| Cheers characters |
|---|
| Main characters: Woody Boyd | Diane Chambers | Cliff Clavin | Frasier Crane | Rebecca Howe | Sam Malone | "Coach" Pantusso | Norm Peterson | Lilith Sternin | Carla Tortelli Recurring characters: Robin Colcord | Evan Drake | Eddie LeBec | Loretta Tortelli | Nick Tortelli |
| Frasier characters |
|---|
| Main characters: Frasier Crane | Niles Crane | Martin Crane | Daphne Moon | Roz Doyle | Bob 'Bulldog' Briscoe | Eddie the dog Recurring characters: Maris Crane | Lilith Sternin | Bebe Glazer | Gil Chesterton | Gertrude Moon | Noel Shempsky | Kenny Daley Other characters Minor characters on Frasier |
