| Bruce Limberis | |
|---|---|
 | |
| The Performance Artist | |
| Name | Bruce Harvey-Oswald Limberis (née Straightman) |
| Age | 52 (revealed in "Underage Peter") |
| Job(s) | Bowling Alley Shoe Counterman (as of "A Thug's Life") Waiter at The Drunken Clam |
| Relatives | Phil Straightman (father) Candy Straightman (mother) Jeffrey Hitlerdidnothingwrong (ex-husband; deceased) Dennis Limberis (second husband) Liza Judy Barbara (daughter) |
| Nicknames | That Guy Bruce Almighty (By Meg) The Brucer (By Jeffery) |
| Voice | Mike Henry (Season 1 - Season 19) John Roberts (Season 20 - Present) |
| Episodes | See Bruce Episode List |
Bruce Harvey-Oswald Limberis (born March 4th 1964) (né Straightman) (temporarily Hitlerdidnothingwrong) is a man in Quahog, known for his many. many, many jobs. Every day, he gets hired and fired again, only to go and find another new job. Despite this, he's occasionally been shown to have the same job in one episode as he did in another. For instance: He's been shown on numerous occasions to work as a bartender at The Drunken Clam, which can arguably be considered his primary career. In Season 16 onwards, he's been shown as a bowling shoe attendant at a bowling alley, which has been his main job since getting it.
He is one of the few people in Quahog, who actually has a lot of respect for Meg Griffin. He is good friends with her, and she meets him every time she goes to the bowling alley. They've even given each other the nicknames, "The Megalodon" and "Bruce Almighty". As of "Meg's Wedding", he was once married to a man named Jeffrey Hitlerdidnothingwrong and the two raised their daughter Liza Judy Barbara they got in "Fertilized Megg". However, Jeffrey died in "The Fat Lotus" and shortly afterward, Bruce remarried Dennis Limberis.
Biography[]
Bruce first appeared in "Do and Die", as the assistant to Adam West in his run for mayor. With him spending the whole episode by his side, introducing him to Quahog, helping him advertise himself, put up flyers and all that political junk. He got fired, upon Adam winning of the election, for eating all of the peppermints in the yummy dish.
He then would be seen working multiple other jobs. Particularly as a babysitter "Peter's in Charge", a librarian in "Brian in Love", and is seen worked at the costume shop Exotic Entertainment in "Chitty Chitty Death Bang" and "Good Ol' Fargy Love".
Bruce had his first big role was in "Meg for Mercy", when he was hired as Meg's skating coach to help her train for the upcoming Ice-Skating Tournament. Due to this being so early in the series, Bruce wasn't entirely rounded off yet and had more of a ruder, more annoyed personality towards Meg. Constantly putting her down and even bluntly admits his dissatisfaction with Meg's progress, something Bruce wouldn't do.
His first true big role with his more recognizable personality was in "Employee for Fire". When he ran into a then-unemployed Peter Griffin at the Unemployment Office and helped Peter find a new job. Bruce said that he got fired from all his jobs all the time, so he has plenty of experience with getting jobs. Which he did again for him (alongside Jeffrey) in "Flights of Disaster" when Peter (again) when through unemployment.
In "The Fat Man and the Sea", he became a fisherman for Hennessey O'Callaghan's fishing business and fought alongside Peter and Seamus to catch the legendary Pendragon fish for the hefty reward given by Hennessey. Though compared to Peter and Seamus, Bruce was more laid-back in catching it than the others. Around the end of the episode, the Pendragon fish wrecked his boat with him on it, making him jobless.
Continuing off from the previous episode, in "A Cheater Runs Through It", Bruce met Jeffery when the latter found him helplessly floating on a piece of his destroyed boat and started dating him.
He worked as a director in "A Star is Born... Kind Of" for Meg's movie, Woman of the Stars, and had Jeffery being his assistant movie director.
In "You May Now Kiss the Uh ... Guy Who Receives", Bruce and Jeffrey wholeheartedly protested for the legalization of gay marriage in Quahog so they could get married alongside Brian. However, even after it got legalized, they still didn't get married until fifteen seasons later for some reason.
He worked at the school board in "No Chris Left Behind" and his name was finally revealed for the first time in the series. When it was, he was very delighted to finally be mentioned by name and said "Oh, hey! You said my name!" He then went on a tangent, babbling about his stupid date with Jeffrey.
In "Breadlosers", Bruce helped Peter find a job when he - yet again - goes through a period of unemployment just like he did with Peter in the last episode. He later joined Quahog's new obesity surge Peter started with Jeffery and at the end of the episode was shown to be helping multiple residents who followed in the surge lose their weight by being their fitness trainer.
In "A Thug's Life", Bruce became friends with Meg. Wanting to see him more, Meg told him that he could work at the bowling alley so she could see him every day when she went to bowl with her friends. Bruce got a job there but got fired after his first day. Meg staged a protest and the boss let Bruce keep his job. Bruce has worked there ever since but he still gets second jobs, which he gets fired from every day.
In "Better Off Meg", Bruce worked at the bowling alley and greeted his friend Meg when she came in.
In "Meg's Wedding", Bruce officially got married to Jeffrey but not before dating Meg like a weird creep. He also came out to his parents, which they eventually accepted as they attended his wedding.
In "Fertilized Megg", Bruce and Jeffrey were able to have a baby thanks to Meg being the surrogate for their baby. With the baby being a little girl, they named Liza Judy Barbara.
In "The Fat Lotus", Bruce and Jeffrey went on vacation to The Bahamas, where they met a fellow gay guy named Dennis Limberis, who became really good friends to both of them. During their vacation, Jeffrey fell off a yacht and was eaten by sharks and Bruce almost immediately moved on from his head ex-husband and remarried Dennis.
Appearance[]
Bruce Limberis is an adult Caucasian man with shaggy brown hair and a mustache and three speckled freckles on each cheek. He wears a yellow hoop earring on his right ear. He also wears a blue jean jacket, a brown vest, tan khakis, a brown belt with a golden buckle, and black shoes. He has a soothing gay voice and talks with kind of a cowboy accent.
Personality[]
Bruce Limberis is a very calm and timid homosexual man, with a chipper and cheery demeanor. He is very welcoming and friendly and talks with a very relaxing and soothing voice. Bruce tends to go on little tangents about his personal life and monologue about pointless things, which are actually pretty funny. Whenever something bad happens in front of him, he says his catchphrase, "Oh noooo!". Overall, Bruce is a very lenient and mellow guy who pretty much never gets mad about anything unless you do something horrible to really piss him off, such as in "Baby Not On Board", when Peter defecated on the floor at his massage parlor. This made Bruce so angry that he kicked him out. Also, in "A Thug's Life", Bruce got mad at Connie for bullying Meg and beat the snot out of her, scaring her away, proving that you can't really piss him off by annoying him but you can infuriate him very easily by bullying one of his friends or loved ones, which honestly makes him a pretty empathetic and selfless hero.
Job Employment[]
See: List of Bruce's Jobs
Bruce has had several jobs over the course of the series, and in fact his nickname "Performance Artist" comes from the fact of him constantly performing multiple jobs. In most of the episodes he appears in, he keeps getting a new job in every episode that he loses off-screen. In "Employee for Fire", it was revealed that the reason he keeps changing jobs is because he keeps getting fired, due to various different reasons though most of the time it all boils down to incompetence, tardiness, laziness, and stupidity, which of course makes him a good friend to Peter Griffin. However, Bruce keeps his chin up and always continues monster trucking no matter how many times he gets fired and being an American citizen, there's always an opening for something new no matter how many times he screws up. Eventually, in "A Thug's Life", Bruce was able to get a steady job as a bowling attendant at the Quahog Bowling Alley. However, that didn't mean he still didn't dabble in side jobs, which he'd continue to get fired from all the time.
Love Life[]
While Bruce was seen to not have a love life, as even when he did is in love with his boyfriend, Jeffrey, who usually adds onto his catchphrase by saying "I knooow!" in a similar tone. For a long time, Bruce didn't propose to Jeffrey because he was still in the closet, with fear that his very Christian parents, Phil and Candy Straightman wouldn't be accepting of his sexuality. However, in "Meg's Wedding", Bruce finally did come out to his parents and they were okay with it so he got married to Jeffrey and the two are now husbands. Well, at least they were until Jeffrey died in "The Fat Lotus" and Bruce remarried one of his new gay friends, Dennis Limberis.
Relationships[]
Friends[]
- Peter Griffin - Bruce is good friends with Peter and helps him when he's in need. For instance, when Peter lost his job in "Mo' Jobs", Bruce helped put in a good word for him at is current job to help him get hired where he works.
- Meg Griffin - Bruce and Meg are like the best of friends. Meg started talking to Bruce when he started his first stable job, working at the snack bar at The Quahog Bowling Alley, where she bowled like every single week, starting with "A Thug's Life". They have each other fun nicknames like "The Megalodon" and "Bruce Almighty". Bruce is like one of the few people in this world that actually respects Meg and treats her like a human being. In "Meg's Wedding", Bruce used Meg as a beard for introducing her to his homophobic parents, Phil and Candy Straightman but Meg thought that Bruce would be happier if he was married to Jeffrey, as this was his true love. In "Fertilized Megg", Meg was the carrier for Bruce and Jeffrey's baby, Liza Judy Barbara.
Lovers[]
- Jeffrey Hitlerdidnothingwrong - Bruce first met Jeffrey in "A Cheater Runs Through It" and they quickly became boyfriends. The two of them started dating and they fell in love with each other. Together, they have the collective catchphrase of Bruce saying "Oh nooo!" and Jeffrey saying "I knooow!" in response to that. They had been dating for a really long time but had been putting off getting married because Bruce wasn't out to his religious parents, Phil and Candy Straightman. In "Fertilized Megg", Bruce and Jeffrey had a baby girl named Liza Judy Barbara, using Meg as their carrier. Their marriage ended in "The Fat Lotus", when Jeffrey fell off a yacht and was eaten by sharks.
- Dennis Limberis - Bruce got remarried to Dennis in less than a day after the death of Jeffrey in "The Fat Lotus".
Bruce's Name[]
For the first six seasons of the show, Bruce's name had never been mentioned in dialogue even once. According to The Freakin' Sweet Collection DVD commentary for "Do and Die", the writers of the show had a name for him from the start, but by complete accident, they just never happened to bring up his name in any of the scripts. They mention how it was completely unintentional and they assumed that had mentioned it during one of the episodes, but they didn't and they didn't notice. In fact, his name was so unknown, that when he received a toy figure in the World of Family Guy toyline, he wasn't even given his real name and was labeled under "Performance Artist" (which is the name we call him for all episodes before his name was revealed).
In "No Chris Left Behind", they acknowledged this by finally having Principal Shepherd mention his name, "Bruce". When Bruce heard this, he made a meta-joke, exclaiming "Oh, hey! You said my name!" in excitement. From then on, the writers made sure to bring his name up in other episodes plenty of times so nobody would forget.
In "Dog and Dumber", Bruce said that his last name was "Straightman", which he said was very ironic, given the fact that he was gay. However, he did play the "straight man" in comedic interactions, so it sort of made sense.
In "Meg's Wedding", it was revealed that Bruce's middle name was "Harvey-Oswald". Later in the same episode, Bruce got married to Jeffrey Hitlerdidnothingwrong and underwent his last name, making his new last name "Hitlerdidnothingwrong".
In "The Fat Lotus", Jeffrey died and Bruce got remarried to Dennis Limberis, implying that his new surname is "Limberis". (rhymes with "Embarrass").
Episode Appearances[]
See: Bruce Episode List
Trivia[]
- It has been hinted that he may be homosexual throughout the series, such as in "McStroke" when a mustachioed Peter walks by. He has a friend named Jeffrey and in "Road to the North Pole", he declares in "All I Really Want For Christmas" that he wants to marry Jeffrey. Seth MacFarlane confirmed Bruce's homosexuality in an interview with LGBT website The Backlot, citing him as an example of a positive gay character on the show.
- By long unnoticed accident, Bruce's name failed to come up at any time for the first five seasons of the show, despite him being a major character. Many fans went rampant about this and the writers finally noticed this during the production of season 6 and finally revealed his name in "No Chris Left Behind". Principal Shepherd said his name, and Bruce happily celebrated someone finally saying his name.
- In the The Cleveland Show episode "BFFs", Peter described Bruce as "That one gay guy in town who has like a thousand jobs" and Cleveland reminded him "It was mentioned once his name was Bruce.", taking another jab as this funny phenomenon.
- Throughout the series, Mike Henry has given certain anthropomorphic creatures the same voice as he's given Bruce, droning through a monologue, where he hilariously talks in his funny Bruce voice. This includes:
- Jaws from "Brian Griffin's House of Payne"
- A Xenomorph from "Peter's Daughter"
- Mayor Bee in "It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One"
- A Mutant Rat in "Family Gay"
- He is an alcoholic, participating in Alcoholics Anonymous meetings Peter attends in "Friends of Peter G".
- Bruce is admits he's 52 in "Underage Peter", after having long-lied to Jeffrey, saying that he was 39.
- In the courtroom scene in "The Simpsons Guy", the openly gay Bruce is seated next to the closeted gay Waylon Smithers.
- In "Dog and Dumber", it was revealed that Bruce's last name is "Straightman".
- However, when marrying Jeffrey in "Meg's Wedding", he underwent the last name "Hitlerdidnothingwrong".
- It was also revealed in this episode that his middle name was "Harvey-Oswald".
- In "The Fat Lotus", Bruce got remarried to Dennis Limberis, making his new last name "Limberis".