Norm Peterson: Wears Milkbone Underwear

[BizBuzz]

Hillary Norman "Norm" Peterson is a character on the American television show Cheers, portrayed by George Wendt. Norm's real first name is Hillary, named after his grandfather.

 

Norm appeared in all 275 episodes of Cheers between 1982–1993 and was initially the only customer featured in the main cast (to be later joined by Cliff Clavin, Frasier Crane, and Lilith Sternin). Sam Malone, Carla and Norm are the only characters to appear in every episode of Cheers.

 

Norm also made one guest appearance each in the three other sitcoms set in the Cheers universe: the Frasier episode "Cheerful Goodbyes", the Wings episode "The Story of Joe" and the spin-off The Tortellis.

 

Description via Wikipedia

[Inquisitionist]

I guess yelling out HILL!  wouldn't have the same impact as NORM!  :-)

 

Last night, I finally watched the Jeopardy episode (thanks, BizBuzz!), which had an unrelated opening scene.  Some guy comes back to Cheers for the first time in over 20 years and comments to Woody about how much things have changed, even the tile that used to be on the wall "behind Norm." 

[BizBuzz]

Behind Norm, he he

 

What's going on, Mr. Peterson?
The question is, 'what's going 'in' Mr. Peterson?' A beer, please, Woody.

[SpiritSong]

What are you up to, Norm?

My ideal weight, if I were 11 feet tall.

[Trini]

Vote for "Norm!" on the PTV homepage!  :)

[GreatKazu]

I am trying to figure out if such an episode existed from this series. Was there an episode that had a scene where Sam, I believe, was working in another bar somewhere, and when a guy walked into the bar, the customers yelled out his name just like they did at Cheers when Norm walks in. Tell me there is such a scene.

[Inquisitionist]

I think it was Norm himself who walked into another bar that Sam worked at temporarily and was greated with "Norm!"  Sam looks at him and Norm says something like "I hae a life."  But I'm sure others can respond more definitively.

 

George Wendt and Tim Kazurinsky sang "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" at the 7th inning stretch of the Cubs game I attended last week.  The two of them are starring in a new stage production here called Funnyman.  The Chicago Tribune critic says:

 

As Wendt's character, Chick Sherman, notes in the play: "Nobody takes comics seriously until they do something serious." Great comics come to see that.

 

Wendt — who has recovered from some health problems but has yet to move around the stage with total ease — is doing something serious here, all right. Graham has given him plenty of fodder for an actor with his particular trajectory: Chick, a consummate craftsman, now has to deal with shoddy new material; irritating, over-educated young directors with no respect for the old-school craft; and, well, the ghosts of a long career in show business and all the sacrifices that has engendered, and all the bad personal decisions it tempted.

 

[ae2]

Norm tells a lot of stories, particularly about his wife, and I think most of them are untrue. Or at least stretched beyond the truth.

I'm watching Cheers straight through for the first time. Caught reruns frequently when I was a kid so I'm familiar enough with it, but this is the first time I've watched with any continuity.

By season 2 we've heard a lot from Norm, particularly about his antipathy toward his wife.

But I tend to think a lot of this is not real. He likes to stretch the truth and tell stories to try to fit in and be funny. I'm not sure how the seasons precede, we'll probably hear more about this in the future, but a few quick searches didn't provide much about this sort of theory so I figured I'd post it here.

It also contributes toward the overall idea that the characters on the show are largely meant to be representative of typical bar stereotypes.

Cliff's the know-it-all.

Norm's the ever-present, down on his luck sad sack.

And so on.

[readster]

As season 2 proved, Norm loves his wife, but many people think she is a controlling nag, but instead of looking like he is just a guy in love with his wife. He decided to make fun of her, as season 5 started, we saw the change in Norm. He would stretch the truth once in a while, but he didn't cater to the rest of the "guys" in the bar with his outlanish stories. I know Fraiser even brings up a point in season 3 with: "Who are you trying to impress with these stories?" Norm replies: "I don't know anymore, I just don't know what else to do anymore." Basically saying you get stuck doing something, you just keep doing it. Something that always bothered me with Norm up until season 7. He was constantly between a job and always at the bar drinking and spending at least on a regular basis $20 a week. Until he went into internal decorating in season 7, he was never steadily employed. So, why no one ever said: "Why don't you save some money." or "I'll buy you a drink today." Never came up with didn't make much sense.