Stevie Budd
| Stevie Budd | |
|---|---|
| Schitt's Creek character | |
| Portrayed by | Emily Hampshire |
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Stevie Budd is a fictional character in Schitt's Creek, portrayed by Emily Hampshire.[1] She performed "Maybe This Time" in the episode "Life Is a Cabaret".
Role
Stevie is one of the first people the Roses encounter upon their arrival at the Schitt's Creek Motel, which is owned by her aunt. Stevie is a disinterested, deadpan front desk clerk most often seen in the motel office on the motel's computer playing solitaire, reading or anything other than performing her normal job duties, and finds the entitled attitudes of the Roses distasteful, doing the very minimum of what is asked of her.
She runs afoul of Moira after the latter indirectly accuses her of stealing her diamond earrings, which Moira later learns that Johnny had hidden in one of his shoes. Upon hearing this, David catches up with Stevie and apologizes to her for his mother's accusations. Stevie's appreciation of this is short-lived after David reminds her of his two previous attempts to get her to bring a towel to him. They unexpectedly bond after David accuses her of being rude (though oblivious to the fact that he was the cause) and Stevie accepts it as a compliment. Over the course of the series, David and Stevie develop a deepening platonic relationship. Their friendship extends to David's family, who eventually come to accept her as one of their own.
After Stevie's aunt Maureen dies, she learns as her aunt's sole heir, that she has inherited the motel. Having had a taste for acting after a local theater production, Stevie longs for life outside of Schitt's Creek, but finds her sudden ownership of the motel overwhelming, as she tearfully confides to Johnny one day. Sensing opportunity, Johnny offers to come on as a partner to help her run it, which frees Stevie up to pursue her dreams, but eventually Stevie has a reality gut-check with herself and decides to return to the hotel, where Johnny joyfully welcomes her back. She begins to share Johnny's interest in developing the motel into a franchised operation with more locations to come, starting with renaming the motel as the very first Rosebud Motel. After Johnny announces that his family will set up corporate operations for the newly-formed Rosebud Motels in New York City, Stevie decides to stay behind and continue running the motel along with setting up new properties.
Stevie tries to hide her disappointment at the thought of David (and his new husband Patrick) to New York City, but tells David that Patrick had looked for a house for them that David had mentioned earlier that he had liked. David confronts Patrick, and Patrick admits that while the house was not on the market for sale, he later approached the owners and informed them that they if were ever interested in selling the house, to call him. They later did and offered Patrick first right of refusal so they could move to Florida. Touched by this gesture, and in a rare departure from his usual selfishness, David takes Stevie to see the house. She asks him why he wants to return to New York so badly, and he claims his friends are there. She reminds him that his New York friends whom he invited to his wedding ditched him to attend an electronic music festival in Europe, and asks him why he would ever want to return to a place that's done nothing but hurt him. In one of David's most vulnerable moments, he breaks down crying and tells Stevie that he wants those there to know that's he not a joke and that he's won. Crying, Stevie tells him that he's already won, and reminds him that Patrick's extremes to make him happy with the house are proof of that and as such, he has nothing more to prove. She also tells him that she doesn't want him to go. She later serves as Maid of Honor at David and Patrick's wedding.
Character
Design
Stevie is usually presented in a mid-90's 'grunge' look, wearing flannel shirts, canvas tennis shoes, and worn-looking jeans. Her mid-length dark hair is usually worn down. As the character further develops in later seasons, Stevie is often seen in more conventional business attire, but doesn't deviate much from her initial wardrobe. She lives in a modest studio apartment and drives a well-worn used Ford Focus station wagon.
Personality
Stevie, who presumably grew up in Schitt's Creek her whole life, is in her early thirties and has a laid-back, deadpan personality and lacks interest in pop culture, style or most trends embraced by her generation. She has a dry sense of humor often dripping with sarcasm.
She also has a high threshold of patience when dealing with others, especially where David is concerned. She interprets his diva-esque persona as a by-product of his privileged, entitled upbringing rather than deliberate meanness. She uses his episodes of socially awkward behavior to help remind him of the value of true friendship and warns him not to take advantage of it.
Stevie is not romantically attached at the long term level, but has a friends with benefits relationship with David in the first season.
