Character
Apu first appeared in the season one episode "The Telltale Head". While creating the character, the writers decided they would not make him ethnic. They felt it would be too offensive and stereotypical and did not want to offend viewers. However, at a table read for an episode, Hank Azaria's reading of the line "Hello, Mr. Homer" received a huge laugh from the writers, so the concept stayed. Azaria took Apu's voice from the many Indian convenience store workers in Los Angeles whom he had interacted with when he first moved to the area. He also loosely based it on Peter Sellers' character Hrundi V. Bakshi from the film The Party, whom Azaria thinks has a similar personality to Apu. Apu's first name is an homage to the main character in The Apu Trilogy directed by Satyajit Ray. His surname is Nahasapeemapetilon, and it was first used in the episode "A Streetcar Named Marge". It is a morphophonological blend of the name Pahasadee Napetilon, the full name of a schoolmate of Simpsons writer Jeff Martin. In the season seven episode "Lisa the Vegetarian" it is revealed that Apu is vegan.
Apu married Manjula in the episode "The Two Mrs. Nahasapeemapetilons". Rich Appel first constructed the idea for Apu's marriage. Andrea Martin provided the voice of Apu's mother in the episode, recording her part in New York. She wanted to get the voice perfect, so in between takes she listened to tapes of Hank Azaria reading lines for Apu, to make sure her voice could realistically be Apu's mother's.
Read more about this topic: Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
Famous quotes containing the word character:
“Taught from their infancy that beauty is woman’s sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and, roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison. Men have various employments and pursuits which engage their attention, and give a character to the opening mind; but women, confined to one, and having their thoughts constantly directed to the most insignificant part of themselves, seldom extend their views beyond the triumph of the hour.”
—Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797)
“Whoever has the luck to be born a character can laugh even at death. Because a character will never die! A man will die, a writer, the instrument of creation: but what he has created will never die!”
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“An actor rides in a bus or railroad train; he sees a movement and applies it to a new role. A woman in agony of spirit might turn her head just so; a man in deep humiliation probably would wring his hands in such a way. From straws like these, drawn from completely different sources, the fabric of a character may be built. The whole garment in which the actor hides himself is made of small externals of observation fitted to his conception of a role.”
—Eleanor Robson Belmont (1878–1979)