Lois Griffin (née
Pewterschmidt) is a
fictional characterA character is the representation of a person in a narrative or dramatic work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr through its Latin transcription character, the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its...
from the
animated series Family GuyFamily Guy is an American animated television sitcom, created by Seth MacFarlane, for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series centers on the Griffins, a dysfunctional family which consists of Peter, Lois, Meg, Chris, Stewie, and their pet dog Brian...
. She is the wife of
Peter GriffinPeter Löwenbräu Griffin is a fictional character, and the protagonist of the FOX animated comedy series Family Guy. Peter is the patriarch of the Griffin family. He is married to Lois, and is the father of Meg, Chris, and Stewie...
and the mother of
MegMegan "Meg" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated television series Family Guy. She is the oldest child of Lois and Peter Griffin at 17 years old, sister of Chris and Stewie. Meg attends James Woods High School as a senior, where she unsuccessfully struggles for acceptance and...
,
ChrisChristopher Cross "Chris" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated series Family Guy. He is the oldest son of Peter and Lois Griffin, brother of Stewie and Meg Griffin. Chris is voiced by Seth Green.- Character personality :...
, and
StewieStewart Gilligan "Stewie" Griffin is a fictional character in the animated series Family Guy voiced by Seth MacFarlane. Previously obsessed with world domination and matricide, Stewie is the youngest child of Peter and Lois Griffin...
. She is voiced by former
MADtvMADtv is an American sketch comedy television series. It licenses the name and logo of Mad, but otherwise has no connection with the humor magazine outside of animated Spy vs. Spy and Don Martin cartoon shorts and images of Alfred E. Neuman that the show featured during the late 1990s. Its first TV...
cast member
Alex BorsteinAlexandrea "Alex" Borstein , also known as "a.bo", is an Emmy- and Screen Actors Guild Award-nominated American actress, singer, voice actress, writer and comedian...
.
Role in Family Guy
Family Guy uses a
floating timelineA floating timeline is a device used in fiction, particularly in comics and animation, to explain why characters created years or even decades ago seem to have aged little or not at all since their inception....
in which the characters do not age, and as such the show is always assumed to be set in the current year. In several episodes, events have been linked to specific times, though sometimes this timeline has been contradicted in subsequent episodes. Lois Griffin is the wife of
PeterPeter Löwenbräu Griffin is a fictional character, and the protagonist of the FOX animated comedy series Family Guy. Peter is the patriarch of the Griffin family. He is married to Lois, and is the father of Meg, Chris, and Stewie...
and is the mother of
MegMegan "Meg" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated television series Family Guy. She is the oldest child of Lois and Peter Griffin at 17 years old, sister of Chris and Stewie. Meg attends James Woods High School as a senior, where she unsuccessfully struggles for acceptance and...
,
ChrisChristopher Cross "Chris" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated series Family Guy. He is the oldest son of Peter and Lois Griffin, brother of Stewie and Meg Griffin. Chris is voiced by Seth Green.- Character personality :...
and
StewieStewart Gilligan "Stewie" Griffin is a fictional character in the animated series Family Guy voiced by Seth MacFarlane. Previously obsessed with world domination and matricide, Stewie is the youngest child of Peter and Lois Griffin...
.
Lois was born into the wealthy Pewterschmidt family from
Newport, Rhode IslandNewport is a city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island, United States, about 30 miles south of Providence. Known as a New England summer resort and for the famous Newport Mansions, it is the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport which houses the United States...
.
Peter GriffinPeter Löwenbräu Griffin is a fictional character, and the protagonist of the FOX animated comedy series Family Guy. Peter is the patriarch of the Griffin family. He is married to Lois, and is the father of Meg, Chris, and Stewie...
, her husband, was a towel boy at the family country club; Lois eventually fell in love with him, due to his low-class, easy-going manner, which she found more appealing than the stuffy, uptight suitors in her social circle. Lois was crowned Miss Teen
Rhode IslandRhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...
, and wished to pursue a career in modeling. However her father thought that was beneath the dignity of the family. She also aludes to going to
Kent State UniversityKent State University is a public research university located in Kent, Ohio, USA. The university has eight campuses around the northeast Ohio region with the main campus in Kent being the largest...
when she says that, "...one time, the
National GuardThe term National Guard originally referred to a French citizen militia . The term is now used in many countries. According to the country, national guard may now refer to an organized militia, a military force, a paramilitary force, a gendarmerie, or a police force:- Americas :* National Guard of...
came and shot some of my friends."
She teaches
pianoThe piano is a musical instrument which is played by means of a keyboard. Widely used in Western music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music, and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
to supplement the family income, though she spends most of her time caring for her family, and has rarely been seen teaching piano in recent seasons.
ChrisChristopher Cross "Chris" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated series Family Guy. He is the oldest son of Peter and Lois Griffin, brother of Stewie and Meg Griffin. Chris is voiced by Seth Green.- Character personality :...
, her middle child, was always overweight, even at birth, while her youngest son
StewieStewart Gilligan "Stewie" Griffin is a fictional character in the animated series Family Guy voiced by Seth MacFarlane. Previously obsessed with world domination and matricide, Stewie is the youngest child of Peter and Lois Griffin...
is intent on
killing herMatricide is the act of killing one's mother. As for any type of killing, motives can vary a great deal.- Known or suspected matricides :* Amastris, queen of Heraclea, was drowned by her two sons in 284 BC....
, although she seems not to notice; on one occasion, when Lois noticed Stewie acting up, she assumed it to be a result of Stewie lacking fatherly attention from Peter. In a dream sequence, she finds Stewie's 'secret lab' while putting away clothes. She mentions that she smoked cannabis when she was pregnant with him, which could explain his obsession to kill Lois and his uncanny intelligence. Lois doesn't really mind her eldest child and only daughter,
MegMegan "Meg" Griffin is a fictional character from the animated television series Family Guy. She is the oldest child of Lois and Peter Griffin at 17 years old, sister of Chris and Stewie. Meg attends James Woods High School as a senior, where she unsuccessfully struggles for acceptance and...
, though she makes attempts in keeping with the apparent popular perception of Meg.
Lois has a younger sister, Carol, who has had nine husbands, at least eight of whom have left her, and had a boy by her eighth husband. Lois also has an older brother, Patrick, whom she discovers for the first time in "
The Fat Guy Strangler"The Fat Guy Strangler" is the seventeenth episode of season four of Family Guy, which originally aired on November 27, 2005. Lois discovers she has a long-lost brother, Patrick...
". Lois took Patrick out of the asylum in which he was interned, refusing to believe that he was a serial killer until Brian confronted her with evidence. Lois's discovers in the episode "
Family Goy"Family Goy" is the second episode of the eighth season of Family Guy. The episode aired on October 4, 2009 on Fox. The episode was watched by 9.67 million viewers.- Plot :...
" that her mother is a Holocaust survivor, thus making Lois and her children Jewish by heritage.
Creation
When he was still in college,
Family Guy creator
Seth MacFarlaneSeth Woodbury MacFarlane is an American animator, composer, writer, producer, actor, singer, comedian, voice actor, and director best known for creating the animated sitcoms Family Guy, American Dad! and The Cleveland Show, for which he also voices many of the characters...
created a cartoon short entitled
Life of Larry. The short centered around a middle-aged man named Larry and his
anthropomorphicAnthropomorphism is the attribution of human characteristics to non-human creatures and beings, phenomena, material states and objects or abstract concepts. Examples include animals and plants depicted as creatures with human motivation able to reason and converse and forces of nature such as...
dog Steve. In 1999, when MacFarlane was working for Hanna-Barbara Studios, writing for shows such as
Johnny BravoJohnny Bravo is an American animated series created by Van Partible. It premiered on July 7, 1997 on Cartoon Network and ran for 67 episodes and 4 seasons...
,
Dexter's Labaratory and
Cow and ChickenCow and Chicken is an American animated series, created by David Feiss. The series shows the adventures of a cow, named Cow, and her chicken brother, named Chicken. They are often tormented by the Red Guy, a usually pants-less devil-like character who poses as various characters to scam or hurt...
, he made sequel to
Life of Larry, which
Cartoon NetworkCartoon Network is a cable television network created by Turner Broadcasting which primarily shows animated programming. The original American channel began broadcasting on October 1, 1992 with the Bugs Bunny short Rhapsody Rabbit being its first-ever aired program...
broadcast in 1995. The short caught the eye of
20th Century FoxTwentieth Century Fox Film Corporation , also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox, is one of the six major American film studios...
representatives, who asked him to create a TV series revolving around the characters. MacFarlane received a US$50,000 budget to develop a pilot for the show, which was, as MacFarlane stated in a 2006 interview, " about one twentieth of what most pilots cost".
In three months, MacFarlane created the Griffin family and developed a pilot for the show he called
Family Guy.
Design
Lois's design came from the show from
Larry shortsThe Larry shorts are two animated films made by Seth MacFarlane in the 1990s, which led to the development of Family Guy as a prime-time TV show from 1999 onwards.-The Life of Larry :...
, as the other characters of the show.
Voice
Alex BorsteinAlexandrea "Alex" Borstein , also known as "a.bo", is an Emmy- and Screen Actors Guild Award-nominated American actress, singer, voice actress, writer and comedian...
voices
Lois GriffinLois Griffin is a fictional character from the animated series Family Guy. She is the wife of Peter Griffin and the mother of Meg, Chris, and Stewie...
,
AsiaAsia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.6% of the earth's total surface area and with approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population.Asia is traditionally defined as part of the...
n correspondent Tricia Takanawa, Loretta Brown and Lois' mother Barbara Pewterschmidt. Borstein was asked to provide a voice for the pilot while she was working on
MADtvMADtv is an American sketch comedy television series. It licenses the name and logo of Mad, but otherwise has no connection with the humor magazine outside of animated Spy vs. Spy and Don Martin cartoon shorts and images of Alfred E. Neuman that the show featured during the late 1990s. Its first TV...
. She had not met MacFarlane or seen any artwork and said it was "really sight unseen". At the time, she was doing a stage show in
Los AngelesLos Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the municipality of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123.445 inhabitants...
, in which she played a redhead mother, whose voice she had based on one of her cousins. The voice was originally slower, when MacFarlane heard it, he replied "Make it a little less annoying...and speed it up, or every episode will last four hours".
Aside from her role as the voice performer for Lois and several other characters throughout the series (including a brief appearance as Ms. Swan in a 2005 episode), Borstein is also a
producerThe primary role of a television producer is to control all aspects of production, ranging from show idea development and cast hiring to shoot supervision and fact-checking...
and staff writer.
Personality
Lois's
moralsMorality has three principal meanings.In its first, descriptive usage, morality means a code of conduct or belief concerning matters of what is moral or immoral...
can seem questionable at times. She went through a brief period of
kleptomaniaKleptomania is the condition of not being able to resist the urge to collect or hoard things. People with this disorder are compelled to steal things, generally objects of little or no significant value, such as pens, paper clips, tape, traffic cones, signs, and small toys...
in the episode "
Breaking Out Is Hard to Do"Breaking Out Is Hard to Do" is the ninth episode of the fourth season of Family Guy. It originally broadcast on July 17, 2005, guest-starred Dat Phan and Brian Tochi, and was written by Tom Devanney. The episode sees Lois becoming addicted to the rush of shoplifting; she, however, is soon arrested...
", for which she went to
prisonA prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Other terms are penitentiary, correctional facility, and jail , although in the United States "jail" and "prison" refer to different subtypes of correctional facility...
. She also showed a
gamblingGambling is the wagering of money or something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money and/or material goods. Typically, the outcome of the wager is evident within a short period....
addiction when the family went to an
IndianNative Americans in the United States is the phrase that describes indigenous peoples from North America now encompassed by the continental United States, including parts of Alaska and the island state of Hawaii. They comprise a large number of distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of...
casinoA casino is a facility that houses and accommodates certain types of gambling activities. Casinos are most commonly built near or combined with hotels, restaurants, retail shopping, cruise ships and other tourist attractions...
in "
The Son Also Draws"The Son Also Draws" is an episode of Family Guy from season one. The title is an allusion to Ernest Hemingway's novel The Sun Also Rises. The episode guest-stars Bobby Slayton as Leonard Cornfeathers.-Plot summary:...
" during the first season. Various episodes have hinted that Lois is a drug user, but this is shown most clearly in "
Deep Throats"Deep Throats" is the twenty-third episode of season four of the television series Family Guy. It was written by Alex Borstein and directed by Greg Colton. Appalled at parking charges introduced by Mayor West, Brian decides to expose the corruption of the Mayor, despite the prospect of potentially...
". She revealed that she smoked
marijuanaCannabisalso known as marijuana or marihuana, and ganja , among many other namesrefers to any number of preparations of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a psychoactive drug...
when she was pregnant with Stewie, a claim backed-up by series creator
Seth MacFarlaneSeth Woodbury MacFarlane is an American animator, composer, writer, producer, actor, singer, comedian, voice actor, and director best known for creating the animated sitcoms Family Guy, American Dad! and The Cleveland Show, for which he also voices many of the characters...
on a DVD commentary. Also, when asked by Peter where she got a tattoo on her lower back, she replied, 'I don't know Peter,
methMethamphetamine also known as metamfetamine , dextromethamphetamine, methylamphetamine, N-methylamphetamine, and desoxyephedrine) is a psychostimulant and sympathomimetic drug. Methamphetamine enters the brain and triggers a cascading release of dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine...
is a hell of a drug' (
Prick Up Your Ears"Prick Up Your Ears" is the sixth episode of season five of Family Guy. The episode was originally broadcast on November 19, 2006 with guest stars on the show such as Drew Barrymore, David Cross, and Gary Cole. In this episode Lois discovers that Chris’ school has removed the sex education...
). She also hints that she engaged in similar activities when a younger Meg was around. When Meg is thought to have become pregnant, Lois tells her to "smoke and drink a lot" (when Meg doesn't want to have an abortion, which Lois hinted at beforehand) She also mentions, "but don't start then chicken out half way or you end up with Chris," which implies she smoked and consumed alcohol while pregnant with Chris.
Lois had an extramarital affair with former President
Bill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He was the third-youngest president; only Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy were younger when entering office...
, which resulted in the temporary separation between her and Peter, although the relationship was later rekindled after Peter himself engaged in a sexual liaison with Clinton.
In "
A Very Special Family Guy Freakin' Christmas"A Very Special Family Guy Freakin' Christmas" is the 16th episode of Season 3 of Family Guy, guest starring the members of Kiss as themselves...
", she has a
nervous breakdownMental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
when just about everything goes wrong, throws a destructive tantrum, and is subdued with a
tranquilizerA sedative is a substance that induces sedation by reducing irritability or excitement.At higher doses it may result in slurred speech, staggering gait, poor judgment, and slow, uncertain reflexes...
shot by a police sniper. Lois explains her role as a mother and homemaker by saying that
feminismThe term Feminism can be used to describe an academic discourse, or to describe a political, cultural or economic movement aimed at establishing more rights and legal protection for women...
is about choice, that she chose not to have a job, and that she should not be stereotyped as a housewife. In the episode "It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One", she gets into an argument with Mayor Adam West, threatens to run against him for mayor of Quahog, and wins the
electionAn election is a formal decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy since the 17th century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the executive and...
. However, she eventually quits after discovering the difficulty of ignoring special interests and maintaining her
integrityIntegrity as a concept has to do with perceived consistency of actions, values, methods, measures, principles, expectations and outcome. People use integrity as a holistic concept, judging the integrity of systems in terms of those systems' ability to achieve their own goals...
while in politics.
Commendations
Lois won 32nd place on the best 100 cartoons ever made by inthe00s.com , she also appeared in several T.V Guides..
Merchandise
Alongside t-shirts, Lois has been included in various other
Family Guy-related merchandise, including
air freshenerLittle Trees are disposable air fresheners in the shape of an abstract evergreen tree, marketed for use in cars. They are made of a material very similar to beer coasters and are produced in a variety of colours and scents. They are most commonly seen hanging from rear-view mirrors on front...
s,
baseball capA baseball cap is a type of soft cap with a long, stiff bill that may either be curved or flat. The back of the cap may have a plastic, Velcro, or elastic adjuster so that it can be quickly adjusted to fit different wearers....
s,
bumper stickerA bumper sticker is an adhesive label or sticker with a message, intended to be attached to the bumper of an automobile and to be read by the occupants of other vehicles - although they are often stuck onto other objects...
s, cardboard standups,
refrigerator magnetA refrigerator magnet is an ornament attached to a magnet that is used to post items such as shopping lists or report cards on a refrigerator, or simply as decoration. Refrigerator magnets come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, including for example, images die-cut to a specific shape or tiny...
s, key rings,
buttonIn clothing and fashion design, a button is a small disc, typically round, object usually attached to an article of clothing in order to secure an opening, or for ornamentation...
s, dolls,
posterA poster is any piece of printed paper designed to be attached to a wall or vertical surface. Typically posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly textual. Posters are designed to be both eye-catching and convey information...
s, figurines,
clockA clock is an instrument used to indicate, measure, keep, and co-ordinate time. The word clock is derived ultimately from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell"...
s,
soapstoneSoapstone is a metamorphic rock, a talc-schist. It is largely composed of the mineral talc and is rich in magnesium. It is produced by dynamothermal metamorphism and metasomatism, which occurs in the areas where tectonic plates are subducted, changing rocks by heat and pressure, with influx of...
carvings,
Chia PetChia Pets are a brand of collectible animal figurines originated by the San Francisco, California-based company Joseph Enterprises Inc. Chia Pets are traditional Mexican animal-shaped clay figures covered with chia, where the chia sprouts resemble the animal's fur. Chia Pets achieved widespread...
s,
bowling ballA bowling ball is a round ball made from urethane, plastic, reactive resin or a combination of these materials which is used in the sport of bowling. Ten-pin bowling balls generally have a set of three holes drilled in them, one each for the ring and middle finger, and one for the thumb; however,...
s and
boxer shortsBoxer shorts are a type of undergarment worn by men. The term has been used in English since 1944 for all-around-elastic shorts, so named after the shorts worn by pugilists, for whom unhindered leg movement is very important.Reasons for a preference for boxers can be attributed to their variety...
.