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Doug Heffernan
Doug
Comedian/Actor Kevin James as Doug
Vital statistics
Born: (1965-02-09) February 9, 1965 (age 59)
Occupation/
Career:
Delivery driver at IPS Packaging
Shift Supervisor at IPS Packaging (Former)
Family and Personal
Spouse(s): Carrie Heffernan (née Spooner)
Related to: Stephanie Heffernan (sister)
Joe Heffernan (father)

Janet Heffernan (mother)
Danny Heffernan (cousin)
Aunt Sheila (aunt)
Arthur Spooner (father in-law)
Sara Spooner (sister in-law)
Ming-Mei Heffernan (adopted daughter)
Bobby Heffernan (biological son)

Character information
Appeared on: The King of Queens
Episodes appeared in: All 207 in series, Seasons 1-9
Character played by: Kevin James
Tyler Hendrickson (young)

Douglas "Doug" Steven Heffernan (played by Kevin James) is one of the main characters on The King of Queens. He is a delivery driver for IPS Packaging, and he is married to Carrie Heffernan. He lives in Queens, New York with his wife Carrie and her father, Arthur Spooner. Doug was born in Montreal and is of American-Canadian descent (revealed in Dog Shelter ) and usually hangs around with his friends, Deacon, Spence, and Danny at Cooper's

About Doug

Doug is a disptatched deliery driver at IPS. Some of his more negative personality traits would be laziness, slacker demeanor, greediness, childish behavior and desire to do as little work as possible around the house but he is mostly easy-going and caring, especially while trying to get people to like him. Doug remains very movie-cultured, remembering a line from an 80's movie and taking it as his own as to woo Carrie. It's also revealed that he thinks the greatest movie of all time is Risky Business. He is also incredibly cowardly, and more than willing to avoid any sort of confrontation whether it be a physical one or an argument with Carrie.

The only time Doug puts any work in anything or does a romantic gesture for Carrie is normally for a personal advantage.  Such was when he forget to pick her up at a nail salon, leaving her out in the pouring rain. To make it up to her, the two go on a luxury spa weekend but this was more to collect "husband points" so she would allow him and his friends to go on a weekend at Vegas.

Doug's father owned a small hardware store in Queens, and his mother was a homemaker. References in a number of episodes indicate that the Heffernan home was a Catholic one, although Doug seems to have strayed from this after moving out. He lived with his parents until 27, before he moved into Richie's apartment. It also appears that Doug's father Joe had wanted Doug to assume control over the hardware store when he came of age, but Doug showed little interest in this venture.

He was a chubby child and was even sent to "fat camp" by his parents. Doug's weight battle was frequently a subject of contention between himself and his wife, with Carrie encouraging him to eat healthier but Doug steadfast in his enjoyment of fried foods and snacks. In fact, Carrie's domineering personality over the more easygoing Doug was another frequent subject matter, with Doug often secretly defying her demands (over clothing and type of cologne, for example).

Doug is an avid sports fan, supporting the New York Mets, New York Jets, New York Knicks, and the New York Islanders. Doug, in fact, would propose to Carrie at a Jets game. One year for Christmas, when he was given a Miami Dolphins Christmas ornament, Doug openly didn't like it because both the Jets and Dolphins played in the AFC East. (Despite the Jets–Patriots rivalry becoming more intense during the show's run than the Dolphins–Jets rivalry, it was never mentioned on the show; however, the Monday Night Miracle did take place during the show's third season.) Doug's love for the Mets is reflective of James in real life; he named his daughter Shea Joelle after the then-home of the Mets, Shea Stadium.[1]

Doug attended St. Gregory's High School in Queens, where he befriended Spence Olchin; he also went to school with his cousin Danny. Doug played high school football as a St. Gregory's Commodore, and was a star player and starting fullback. He was All-County in football during his junior and senior years. Frequent references to this era show that Doug was very popular in school, and it is because of this that he thinks of high school as the best years of his life. Unlike other popular jocks who usually bully outsiders and geeks, Doug was never like that in high school and the main reason why he was liked. In the episode "Hi, School", Doug says to Carrie during an argument: "Oh I see what's going on; you're mad because I rocked in high school, and you didn't." Carrie was the mean girl and rebellious teenager in high school and Doug was the slacker and sometimes outsider who wanted to be liked in high school. After graduation he went on to junior college (Nassau Community College, located on Long Island), but dropped out after eight days, without any clear plan. He tried out for the Nassau County Rebels, a semi-professional football team, but ultimately quit, because of politics.

He later acquired a job as a bouncer at a bar. Around this time his friend Richie Iannucci, a firefighter for the FDNY, introduced him to his future wife, Carrie Spooner. While dating Carrie, Doug inadvertently landed his final, and longest-standing, job as a truck driver for the fictional International Parcel Service (IPS).

Doug's weight is normally a running joke in the series, described as a compulsive eater specifically by Carrie who uses it to insult him whenever they fight. He himself is aware of being overweight however he has no desire of changing this and the brief occasions he does manage to lose some it normally has little effect. He normally goes to manipulative lengths to make sure his eating routines stay unaffected. An example was when he was forced on a diet by Carrie but realized when she went drinking with her colleague at work she was more laid-back and allowed him to eat whatever he liked so he made sure she kept to this and even bought his own mini-bar to make sure she stayed drunk.

Doug has a complicated relationship with his father-in-law, Arthur. Although he does grant him a house and home, he sees him as more of a personal annoyance than a person and goes to extreme lengths to get him out of his basement which are all, needless to say, fruitless.

It's also revealed that Doug's slow-wittiness was due to his greed. After saving a chicken from a butcher, he becomes attached to it and decides to become a vegetarian. After which he becomes much more intelligent and sophisticated but also quite stuffy and arrogant. He also had the focus to read an eleven-thousand page book, a task that Carrie was unable to do. He quickly reverted back to his average intelligence when he gorged on fast food yet again.

Doug's trademark phrase is "Shutty!" as a means of telling people to "shut up".

References

  1. Archived copy. Archived from the original on 2009-06-05. Retrieved on 2010-06-30.

External links

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