Norm Peterson

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

Norm enters the show as an accountant, though later becomes unemployed and eventually a housepainter. Norm was revealed to be an accomplished interior decorator and beer taster (capable of spotting a bad vat in a factory by drinking a single bottle). Ironically, even when unemployed, Norm is the bar's best customer. Numerous jokes are made about the enormousness of Norm's tab at Cheers (e.g., several large binders are shown as being just a portion of it).

Norm's best friend is postman and fellow barfly Cliff Clavin.

Norm's entrance into the bar is a running gag on Cheers, typically beginning with a welcome by the bar crowd followed by a joke from Norm. A typical entrance went:

Norm enters

Norm: Afternoon, everybody!

Customers: NORM!

Peter: And Peter! Yea!

Coach: How's life treating you Norm?

Norm: Like he caught me in bed with his wife.

This is referenced in The Simpsons episode "Flaming Moe's" where Barney Gumble walks into the newly successful and popular Moe's Tavern to be greeted with the friendly cry of "Barney!".

Norm has a wife named Vera who is often mentioned but never seen. When she is finally shown, her face is covered in a thrown pie. The only other time she is seen, viewers can see only her legs. Vera was played by George Wendt's real-life wife, Bernadette Birkett.

When not sipping beer at Cheers, Norm satisfies his hunger at an eatery called The Hungry Heifer, whose emblem is a young cow smacking her chops. The customers there greet him just the same as the Cheers patrons do. He knows the waitresses by name, and usually orders a meal called a Feeding Frenzy, a monstrous supply of corn and beef.

The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine character of Morn was inspired by and anagrammatically named after the Norm Peterson character. Morn was also a patron of Quark's, the bar/casino that served as one of the main sets on that show, though he was not nearly as prominent a character on DS9 as Norm was in Cheers, as he was never heard speaking by the home audience, despite being described as loquacious by the show's other characters.

George Wendt guest starred as Norm Peterson on St. Elsewhere, Cheers’ first spinoff The Tortellis, Wings, and The Simpsons. Years after Cheers ended, Wendt played Norm in a 2002 episode of its more successful spinoff Frasier. Norm was most recently seen in animated form, voiced by Wendt, on Family Guy in the 2007 episode "Road to Rupert".