Marge Simpson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| The Simpsons character | |
 |
|
| Marjorie Bouvier Simpson | |
| Gender | Female |
|---|---|
| Job | Housewife |
| Relatives | Husband: Homer Children: Bart, Lisa, Maggie Parents: Clancy (deceased) and Jacqueline Bouvier Sisters: Patty and Selma Niece: Ling Bouvier |
| Voice actor | Julie Kavner |
| First appearance | |
| Ullman shorts | "Good Night" |
| The Simpsons | "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire" |
Marjorie "Marge" Simpson (née Bouvier) is a fictional character featured in the animated television series The Simpsons and is voiced by Julie Kavner. She is the well-meaning and extremely patient wife of Homer Simpson and mother of Bart, Lisa and Maggie Simpson. Her most notable physical feature is her blue hair, styled into an improbably high beehive; she is proud to have never met anyone with taller hair outside Graceland.[1] Marge was named after, and loosely based on, Margaret "Marge" Groening, mother of series creator Matt Groening.
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[edit] Personality
Marge’s image is typically that of a stereotypical sitcom mother, who is sometimes portrayed as naive and gullible. Despite having higher morals than most other characters, Marge has had her fair share of wild escapades throughout the show’s history. She was once a police officer in Springfield, took therapy for road rage, was jailed for shoplifting, became a gambling addict, showed alcoholic tendencies, was an unwilling participant in a cross-country police chase, overdosed on steroids, cheated on a cooking competition and developed amnesia. She has also sold prescription drugs at her garage sale which she was jailed for. In "The Joy of Sect", she escapes brainwashing by the Movementarian Church, showing a surprisingly strong will. Marge is the only member of the family who encourages church attendance.
Marge can be somewhat of a doormat for her husband and children, reasoning that they love her and mean well behind their various crazy schemes. Although she is usually considered the most "normal" of the wild Simpson family, a major character trait is her inability to see her family as overly strange, making her quite eccentric when compared to non-regular characters and people from outside Springfield. While she puts up with a lot from her family, even she has a breaking point; she has been known to fight with Homer — a few times to the point of leaving him (most notably in The Simpsons Movie where she taped her farewell message over their wedding video) — and does not shy from disciplining her children when needed.
Politically, Marge generally aligns with the Democratic Party. She once mentions that she voted for Jimmy Carter ("twice" according to Lisa) and supported the candidacy of their state's progressive governor Mary Bailey, and also claimed to have been extremely depressed when Lyndon B. Johnson died.
[edit] Talents
Marge is a talented painter. When she was a teenager she had an intense crush on Ringo Starr and painted a large number of portraits of him. She also wrote to him, but only received a reply 25 years later. After Homer discovered her old paintings, Lisa encouraged Marge to enroll in an art contest in which her portrait of a drunk Homer asleep on the couch won a local art competition. She was then hired by Mr. Burns to do a portrait of him. After many attempts, she almost gave up until a belated response from Ringo Starr, stating that she had talent, inspired her to continue. The resulting nude portrait even won Mr. Burns’ praise. She also seems to be good at making statues out of popsicle sticks, which was shown when Homer got a job as an ice-cream man and gave her all the spare sticks in Ice Cream of Margie (With the Light Blue Hair).
Marge is also an excellent cook. At the Simpsons' home, she is well known for her pork chops, which are Homer's favorite dish. She once started a pretzel business, which flourished with the aid of the mafia, but is never seen again. Furthermore, she has entered several cooking challenges but lost in most of them due to vengeful competitors and overheated ovens. In "All's Fair in Oven War", Marge cheats her way to the finals of a bakeoff but confesses after being prompted by Lisa. Although, she is an accomplished cook, her ability to improvise in her recipes is not showcased in the series - the only known change she ever made to a recipe was adding salt to her lamb chops. In "The Mysterious Voyage of Homer", she claims to not know what oregano is during the chili cookoff.
[edit] Appearance
As with many Simpson characters, Marge's age changes to serve the story. In first-season episodes "Life on the Fast Lane" and "Some Enchanted Evening", Marge is said to be 34, but her age was later changed to 38, possibly because she and Homer attended their twentieth anniversary high-school reunion in one episode. In the episode "Regarding Margie", Homer mentions that Marge is his age, meaning she could be anywhere between 36 and 40.
[edit] Hair
As a teen, Marge had waist length hair that she always wore down, but got the idea to wear it in her trademark beehive for senior prom in the episode "The Way We Was"; this is sometimes contradicted by more recent episodes that show Marge as a child, where she is portrayed with her hair worn tall. In the episode "Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(Annoyed Grunt)cious", her hair is shown close to her knees, consistent with the logic that a lot of hair would be needed to create her tall beehive. In "That 90's Show", Marge is shown in college with her hair much shorter than usual, cut just above the shoulders. It was revealed by Homer in "Secrets of a Successful Marriage" that Marge dyes her hair with blue dye #56, stating "She’s been gray as a mule since she was seventeen." Because of her unusually large hairstyle, her height is reported to be 8'6", as noted by Apu Nahasapeemapetilon in the episode "Marge in Chains". In "The Way We Weren't", her hair was blue before she met Homer and was brunette at one time due to Marge ironing a piece of her hair for a long time. In The Simpsons Season Four DVD commentary, Groening states that the original idea behind Marge's hair was to conceal large rabbit ears. The gag was intended to be revealed in the final episode of the series, but was scrapped early on due to inconsistencies, and also to the fact that rabbit ears would be too fictitious even for the Simpsons. [2]
[edit] Character
[edit] Creation
Groening first conceived the Simpson family in the lobby of James L. Brooks' office. He had been called in to pitch a series of animated shorts, and had intended to present his Life in Hell series. When he realized that animating Life in Hell would require him to rescind publication rights for his life's work, Groening decided to go in another direction.[3] He hurriedly sketched out his version of a dysfunctional family, and named the characters after various members of his own family, with Marge being the name of his mother.[3] Marge then made her debut with the rest of the Simpsons clan on April 19, 1987 in the Tracey Ullman short "Good Night".[4]
[edit] Voice
Marge's voice is performed by Julie Kavner, who also does the voices of Marge's mother Jacqueline and sisters Patty and Selma. Kavner had been part of the regular cast of The Tracey Ullman Show. Voices were needed for the shorts, so the producers decided to ask Kavner and fellow cast member Dan Castellaneta to voice Marge and Homer and rather than hire more actors.[5][6] Part of Kavner's contract says that she will never have to promote The Simpsons on video because she does not want to "destroy the illusion for children".[7] In The Simpsons Movie, some scenes in the movie, such as Marge's video message to Homer, were recorded over one hundred times, leaving Kavner exhausted.[8]
[edit] Reception
Julie Kavner received a Primetime Emmy Award in 1992 for voicing Marge in the episode "I Married Marge".[9] In 2004, Kavner and Dan Castellaneta (the voice of Homer) won a Young Artist Award for "Most Popular Mom & Dad in a TV Series".[10] For her performance in The Simpsons Movie, Kavner received a nomination for "Best Voice Acting in an Animated Feature" at the 2007 Annie Awards, but lost to Ian Holm in Ratatouille.[11][12] Kavner's emotional performance in the movie got positive reviews and one critic said she "gave what must be the most heartfelt performance ever".[13] On May 11, 2008, (Mother's Day), CityNews published an article entitled "Top 10 Greatest TV Mom's of All Time", and Marge ties for number eight alongside Roseanne Conner, from Roseanne and Lorelei Gilmore, from The Gilmore Girls, also being the only animated character. [14]
[edit] References
- ^ Lisa's Rival
- ^ Matt Groening, The Complete Fourth Season DVD (2004) commentary for episode Selmas Choice. 20th Century Fox
- ^ a b BBC. (2000). 'The Simpsons': America's First Family (6 minute edit for the season 1 DVD) (DVD). UK: 20th Century Fox.
- ^ Richmond, Ray; Antonia Coffman (1997). The Simpsons: A Complete Guide to our Favorite Family. Harper Collins Publishers, pg. 14. ISBN 0-00-638898-1
- ^ Luaine Lee. "D'oh, you're the voices", The Age, 2003-02-27. Retrieved on 2008-08-18.
- ^ Lynn Elber. "D'oh!: The Voice of Homer Is Deceivingly Deadpan", Associated Press, 2008-08-18. Retrieved on 2007-07-29.
- ^ Peter Sheridan. "Meet the Simpsons", Daily Express, 2004-05-06. Retrieved on 2008-02-09.
- ^ Sheila Roberts. "The Simpsons Movie Interviews", Movies Online. Retrieved on 2007-08-01.
- ^ Primetime Emmy Awards Advanced Search. Emmys.org. Retrieved on 2008-02-09.
- ^ "25th Annual Winners and Nominees", Youngartistawards.org. Retrieved on 2008-01-18.
- ^ "For Your Consideration", Annie Awards, December 3, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-12-03.
- ^ Peter Debruge. "'Ratatouille' nearly sweeps Annies", Variety, 2008-02-08. Retrieved on 2008-02-09.
- ^ Randy Shulman. "Homer's Odyssey", Metro Weekly, 2007-07-26. Retrieved on 2007-07-26.
- ^ June Cleaver Chosen As All Time Top TV Mom. CityNews. Retrieved on 2008-05-11.
[edit] External links
- Marge Simpson at TheSimpsons.com
- Marge Simpson at the Internet Movie Database
