Patty Bouvier

Patricia "Patty" Bouvier, (voiced by Julie Kavner), is a fictional character on The Simpsons. She and Selma are Marge's two cynical chain-smoking older twin sisters, who work at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and have a strong dislike for Homer. Selma is the older of the two as she was born two minutes before Patty. Creator Matt Groening has said that he named the Simpsons after his own parents and two younger sisters; he has an older sister named Patty who is an art dealer. Julie Kavner has said that she had difficulty coming up with the voices for Marge's sisters, until producer James L. Brooks suggested that she voice Patty and Selma as characters "that suck the joy out of everything."

Distinguishing features
Both twins have a similar look, but there are several easy ways to distinguish them. According to Marge, Selma is "the one who likes Police Academy movies and Hummel figurines, and walking through the park on clear autumn days." These are some of the easily noticeable physical differences:


 * Patty has an afro, while Selma's similarly textured hair is parted in the middle.
 * Patty wears a short-sleeved pink dress and pink shoes while Selma wears a sleeveless blue dress and blue shoes
 * Patty wears orangle triangular earrings while Selma wears purple circular earrings. In early series Selma wore S shaped earrings.
 * Patty wears orange circular necklace pearls while Selma wears purple oval necklace pearls.

Personalities
According to the episode "Black Widower", Selma lacks the senses of taste and smell due to a childhood bottle rocket accident (one shot up her nose). Both twin sisters tend to be cynical and are noted for their addiction to tobacco smoking. They have a strong, mutual (and reciprocated) dislike for their brother-in-law. She was born on April 26 1956.

Unlike Homer, who usually makes a perfunctory (if not particularly sincere or committed) effort to be polite to his sisters-in-law out of respect for his wife, Patty and Selma have no hesitation in treating Homer with open rudeness and contempt. There were several instances where they did not seem to care when Homer faced a life-threatening situation. For instance, in "Homer's Triple Bypass", where Marge rushes to the hospital after receiving a telephone call that Homer had suffered a heart attack at work. Patty and Selma (instead of going to the hospital and comforting Marge in her time of need) remain seated at the kitchen table, continuing their activity of cutting coupons, gasping in amazement at a five cent discount and behaving as though nothing was wrong. They later attempt to set up Marge with a (rather sleazy) friend as a replacement for Homer, regardless of the fact that Homer was still very much alive.

In "Mother Simpson", Homer fakes his death, and Patty and Selma show up holding a tombstone inscribed with "Homer J. Simpson. We are richer for having lost him." This gift as well as the fact that they been saving for this since Marge's wedding causes her to angrily throw them out.

Selma's favorite brand of cigarettes is identified as "Laramie Hi-Tars" while Patty's favorite brand of cigarettes is "Lady Laramie 100s." They share an apartment at the Spinster Arms apartment complex and work at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Usually sticklers for rules, they have on occasion acted unprofessionally in the course of their jobs, usually when Homer is involved. For example, in "The Otto Show," they allowed Otto to regain his driver's license during Otto's brief tenancy with the Simpson family due to their mutual dislike for Homer.

One other notable time was in "Homer vs. Patty & Selma" when Homer had to apply for a chauffeur’s license to become a chauffeur so he could pay off a debt he owed them, and they purposely failed him to show how much of a loser he was. On this occasion, however, Homer had the last laugh; saving their jobs by pretending their cigarettes were his when they were caught smoking on the job by their superior. Homer then forced them to wipe the debt clean to repay the favor, thus negating his need to earn a chauffeur's license and removing the power they had of Homer.

Like her twin sister Patty, Selma is an avid (and sometimes maniacal) fan of the 1980s TV series MacGyver. During Selma's marriage to Sideshow Bob, he insults MacGyver and she takes it very seriously and starts crying. Regardless of their orientation, they also seem to be erotically aroused by the show and the character, euphemistically needing a cigarette after each viewing of the show. In the episode "A Star Is Burns" guest-star Jay Sherman (from The Critic) tells Patty and Selma that MacGyver is gay; they respond by suspending him from the Simpson home gutter by his underwear. When Richard Dean Anderson tells them he hated playing MacGyver they kidnap him but eventually grow tired of him and get him to leave. Selma's favorite film actor was reportedly Troy McClure, to whom she was briefly married.

In the 2005 episode "There's Something About Marrying", Patty comes out of the closet as a lesbian, although hints of her sexual orientation have been dropped many times, such as in "Bart After Dark", when she is seen coming out of burlesque house La Maison Derriere, and "Principal Charming", in which she lacks romantic interest in Seymour Skinner despite his being very much in love with her. She is also seen saying "There goes the last lingering thread of my heterosexuality", when Homer runs past her, naked and screaming, in "Treehouse of Horror III", and hiding in a closet with Smithers on a parade float during a gay pride parade in "Jaws Wired Shut."

She also had one hint of being a transsexual, as evidenced by Otto asking in the episode "The Otto Show" "Are you always a chick? I mean, I don't want to offend you, but, you were born a man, weren't you? You can tell me, I'm open-minded."

Patty and Selma drive a 1973 or 1974 VW Thing

Future
In the future, Patty and Selma still live together and are apparently both still single, as hinted by Selma threatens to stuff Edna Krabappel's hat down her throat if she catches the bouquet at "Lisa's Wedding." It is presumed that they both die early, as they are both heavy smokers.

Relationships
Selma inherited her deceased aunt's iguana Jub-Jub (a name invented by Conan O'Brien) in "Selma's Choice."

In the episode "Goo Goo Gai Pan", a very menopausal Selma adopted a Chinese baby, Ling. During the adoption process, Selma pretended to be married to Homer, since the Chinese government only allows children to be adopted by successful couples.When the jig was up, Selma manages to keep the baby, as a Chinese dignitary (voiced by Lucy Liu) becomes sympathetic, as she too was raised by a single mother. Also in the episode The Way We Weren't it reveals that she kissed Homer when they were at camp purpusly to show that a kiss is nothing and while she enjoyed it Homer did not.All though she did not know it was Homer.

The Bouviers and the Simpsons
As children, Patty and Selma were apparently domineering towards Marge and ridiculed her ambition of becoming an astronaut, as well as assaulting her when she told them "no" which resulted in her having difficulty with telling anyone no. Their relationship seems to have improved over the years. As adults, the Bouvier twins have a friendly relationship with their sister and frequently visit the Simpsons. They seem relatively fond of their nieces and nephew, but seem to like them more when they were younger: "The older they get, the cuter they ain't." They have, on occasion, watched the kids when their parents were out of town. However, Bart and Lisa would rather not be around when their aunts visit. Their idea of bonding with Lisa includes tutoring her in the belief that men are pigs, using Homer as the prime example.

Their relationship with Homer remains one of mutual dislike (although Selma gradually grows to become more tolerant towards Homer and often experiences brief moments of kindness) which involves a continuous exchange of insults from day one. They unfavorably compare their brother-in-law to a caveman, suggesting him capable of trading Maggie for beer and a nudie magazine.In one episode,she or Selma said "Hello everybody except Homer"

Selma and Patty have occasionally expressed their common hope that Marge will eventually divorce Homer. They are often quick in pointing out his attempts at infidelity, and have unsuccessfully offered to help Marge find a replacement for Homer (although Selma eventually gave in and helped Marge find Homer after seeing how truly unhappy she was). In the episode "Three Gays of the Condo" the twins went so far as to have a billboard built trying to convince voters to have Homer kicked out of Springfield.

Their dislike towards Homer has even led to push Homer off a bridge in "Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind", although they half-heartedly claim they did this in order to get him to his surprise party, which was conveniently on a boat passing beneath the bridge at the time.

Selma once took the Simpson children on a disastrous trip to the Duff Gardens theme park (in the episode "Selma's Choice"). Unable to control the children, Bart manhandles several animatronic characters and Lisa goes on a psychedelic trip after drinking "water" from an It's a Small World - like boat ride (later swimming naked in the Fermentarium and exclaiming "I am the lizard queen!"). After that, however, Selma returned home with the children and asked Homer how he does it, referring to raising children. She mentioned children and they exchanged a hug, implying that Selma is slightly more capable of overcoming her dislike of Homer than Patty. She told Homer she just couldn't cut it today, and he comforted her. As noted above, Homer was also willing to help Selma adopt a baby, further highlighting their comparative tolerance of each other.

Homer also openly calls them ugly. One such incident is when Homer sees them working out and calls the sight nauseating. In Wedding for Disaster, he says that he was blindfolded and "two sobbing trolls" threw him on to the lawn. Homer also is known to show little care to what happens to [Patty] and [Selma], except if it happens to [Marge] her upset as is showing in [Treehouse of Horror XIV], when as the reaper killed [Patty} with no remorse, in [Homer vs. Patty and Selma], when [Patty] and [Selma] foiled Homer to get his license, he smoked their cigarettes to save them from getting fired, but only did it because [Marge] was upset.

Romantic liaisons
Despite being identical twins, Patty and Selma have had very different track records when it comes to finding dates. According to Marge, Patty chose a life of celibacy, while Selma had celibacy thrust upon her (a sly reference to Malvolio in Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night). This presumably explains her occasional attempts at romance. Her standards are extremely low, as evidenced by her comments on Mr. Burns: "Single, eh? Well, he passes the Selma Test."

In the February 20, 2005 episode, "There's Something About Marrying", Patty came out as a lesbian after Springfield legalized same-sex marriage. Marge was initially hurt that Patty had hidden her sexuality for years (though as Patty put it when Marge stated she "hadn't seen it coming", "you could see it from Space!"). However, before Patty's lesbian wedding, her partner Veronica is revealed to be a man who disguised his gender to get into the LPGA tour. Patty's sexuality was previously implied in an earlier episode when her voice emanated from an "in the closet" float at the Springfield Gay Pride Parade. Another hint occurred in "Treehouse of Horror III" where Patty sees Homer naked and remarks, "There goes the last lingering thread of my heterosexuality". However, Treehouse of Horror episodes are considered to be non-canon. In yet another episode, a snapshot of Patty exiting the infamous Springfield burlesque house (with only a small fraction of her face blacked out) was displayed during a town hall meeting. Selma does indeed indignantly exclaim, "Patty!" when the picture is shown. In the episode "Homer Simpson, This is Your Wife", which aired March 26, 2006, Patty wooed a tenured professor of Yale University away from her husband. Also, in "Rome-old and Juli-eh", it is hinted that Patty may be attracted to Edna Krabappel. In addition, in "Marge on the Lam," when Marge wanted to ask Patty to the ballet, Patty retorts, "Bah! Girls' stuff."

However, Patty did date Principal Skinner in the season 2 episode, "Principal Charming." She refused to marry him, claiming she was too devoted to Selma as a sister to leave her alone. However, she did consider Principal Skinner a gentleman and had seemed to take it hard that she could not marry him, ending their relationship with the words "Good night, sweet principal." (Homer, in that episode, had been looking for a man for Selma and after Patty found one, Selma was depressed enough to go out on a date with Barney).

Dangerous Behaviour
Patty and Selma can be quite dangerous to people who they are obsessed with or people they hate. In "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bangalore", they capture Richard Dean Anderson a.k.a. MacGyver, isolate him and tie him to a chair. They only let him go because they get bored of him. They also kidnap Homer in "Wedding for Disaster" to prevent him remarrying Marge. They let him go when they hear his vows and are forced to throw the two their wedding afterwards (as Bart and Lisa found out [with some help from a previous suspect; Sideshow Bob] and threatened to tell Marge that they kidnapped Homer in order to ruin the wedding if they didn't comply).

Creation
The direction Julie Kavner was given for Patty and Selma was to "drain all joy out of every line of dialogue." Patty and Selma are also major characters on the show and have been central characters in several episodes. although they weren't seen much in the 11th season and did not have any central roles. Episodes about Patty and Selma usually focus on Homer and Marge. They have been featured in 175 episodes.