Character Biography
Latka Gravas is an immigrant to America from an unnamed country. (In the show it is only ever referred to as "the old country", or some derivation thereof.) He immigrated as an adult, as a flashback scene shows Latka preparing to immigrate to America in the summer of 1977. Presumably, Latka's home country is in a far northern region, or at an extremely high altitude, as the scene establishes that they are in the middle of a fierce snowstorm in the middle of summer. Latka's mother, Greta Gravas, also immigrated to America, presumably a short time later. The statuesque Greta speaks better English than Latka.
Latka often speaks in his native language, which consists of phrases such as "Yaktahbay" (behind/butt ) and "nik nik" (sex), "Ibi da" ("yes" or "that is so"), and "Tank you veddy much". (Kaufman invented his own nonsensical language for Latka.) He works as a mechanic for the Sunshine Cab Company. He is very friendly and has a shy, childlike demeanor. His sweet personality makes him a favorite target of his loud, abrasive boss, Louie De Palma (Danny DeVito). The cabdrivers like Latka but are confused by his customs.
Latka also has multiple personality disorder. Being very love-shy, Latka wanted to fulfill his fantasy of being “an American fun guy taking each day in high gear". He studied Playboy and the voices of FM DJs. Latka developed an alter ego named "Vic Ferrari", a smooth-talking womanizer.
In one episode, he develops numerous personalities in addition to Vic, including a cowboy named Arlo and an Englishman named Jeffrey. He ends up taking on his co-worker Alex Reiger's (Judd Hirsch) personality, with profound insights into "his" life. Just when he is about to reveal to the real Alex the perfect solution for all his problems, he reverts back to Latka with the help of a psychiatrist.
Facing deportation in an early first-season episode aired in 1978, the cabdrivers hire a prostitute to marry Latka so he can stay in the United States. It is assumed that they were soon divorced.
In the second season, Latka meets Simka Dablas (Carol Kane), a woman from his homeland. Despite coming from different classes—she is a "mountain person" and he is a "flatlander"—they fall in love. At the end of the episode, Simka has to return to the homeland, but Simka returns in the fourth season and they rekindle their romance, finally ridding Latka of his Vic Ferrari alter ego. They get married at the end of the season.
A "latke" is a potato pancake, sometimes served with gravy, and a popular treat for the Jewish holiday of Chanukah. "Simka" (or, more accurately, "simcha" or "simkha") is the Hebrew word for "happiness"; in slang, "a simcha" is a major, happy life event such as a wedding or bar-mitzvah. Both Andy Kaufman (Latka) and Carol Kane (Simka) are Jewish.
Read more about this topic: Latka Gravas
Famous quotes containing the words character and/or biography:
“A person of definite character and purpose who comprehends our way of thought is sure to exert power over us. He cannot altogether be resisted; because, if he understands us, he can make us understand him, through the word, the look, or other symbol, which both of us connect with the common sentiment or idea; and thus by communicating an impulse he can move the will.”
—Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929)
“In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of our classical dictionary.... We moderns, on the other hand, collect only the raw materials of biography and history, “memoirs to serve for a history,” which is but materials to serve for a mythology.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)