Sherman Klump

Professor Sherman Klump (known as Julius Kelp in the original film and by his alter ego Buddy Love) is a fictional character portrayed by Jerry Lewis in The Nutty Professor, and by Eddie Murphy in the 1996 version and its 2000 sequel Nutty Professor II: The Klumps. Sherman is a jolly, kind hearted science teacher at Welman College. Although this was the main character Eddie played he also played the part of the rest of Sherman's family (excluding his youngest nephew, Ernie Jr, for obvious reasons).

Despite the weight difference between Eddie and Sherman there are small similarities between them, firstly age. In the first movie Sherman's age is revealed to be 35 which was the same age as Eddie in 1996 so he is presumed to be 39 in the sequel which was released in 2000. Secondly height, when Sherman drinks his fat reducing formula for the first time on a nearby computer screen his height is revealed as 5'10" which is roughly the same height as Eddie as according to IMDB he stands at about 5'9½ inches tall. Sherman Klump weighs 400 pounds (as his alter ego "Buddy" states in the first film). The major differences with Sherman and Buddy is their personalities and attitudes. Buddy is psychotically Rude, Obnoxious, Loud mouthed, blatantly insensitive, reckless, cruel, insulting, egomaniacal, self absorb, perverted, and sex crazed. Buddy fully aware of his faults and loves every minute of it.

Films

The Nutty Professor

Throughout the first film, the professor is portrayed as highly intelligent and generally liked by his students, but his occasional mishaps- such as when he accidentally opens every hamster cage in his lab when leaving it because his stomach shifted the release mechanism without him realizing it- and lack of confidence leave him victim to insults and criticism from the Dean of the university, especially since they now have only one possible source for grant money left to continue his research, their last supporter having left after she nearly swallowed one of the escaped hamsters. Having recently fallen in love with grad student and chemistry teacher Carla Purty (Jada Pinkett-Smith), Sherman uses his latest discovery, a weight-loss serum that rewrites the subject's genes, to lose weight in order to spend time with her, creating the ever-increasingly-arrogant individual known as Buddy Love due to the testosterone imbalance caused by the transformation causing Buddy to manifest as an independent personality rather than simply being a thin Sherman. When his student and assistant Jason learns what has happened, he realizes that Buddy is gaining increasingly greater freedom from the professor's influence, encouraging Sherman to take back control of his life, 'fighting' Buddy for control of the body before Buddy can drink enough serum to eliminate Sherman forever. At the conclusion, Sherman admits what has happened to the faculty staff after he transforms back to normal in public, concluding that he must learn to accept himself as he is rather than worry about his weight.

Nutty Professor II: The Klumps

In the second movie his kind personality is polluted by the Buddy Love gene in his DNA, causing him to occasionally say cheeky or insulting things to people without realizing, especially when talking to his new love interest Denise (Janet Jackson). In an attempt to eliminate this, he uses a risky experiment to extract Buddy's DNA from his system. Sherman later proposes to Denise and she accepts. But Sherman's experiment unfortunately results in Buddy manifesting as an independent entity while leaving Sherman gradually losing his intelligence due to the damage his brain cells have sustained as a result of Buddy being extracted from his system. Eventually, he is able to reabsorb Buddy by using a powerful version of his new youth serum to regress Buddy to amniotic fluid allowing him to 'drink' Buddy and regain his old intellect. Unfortunately, Buddy dies and evaporates into a public coin fountain. Denise and Cletus arrive just in time to help him when he loses his intelligence. Cletus forces Sherman to drink the water from the fountain, which still retains enough of Buddy's genetic pattern, and he regains all of his intelligence. A little while later, he and Denise are finally married and with Buddy dead, he can no longer take over Sherman's mind. He lives happily ever after with his wife.

In other media

Sherman Klump appears in the 3rd season Robot Chicken episode "Endless Breadsticks".

References