- "We were barely making ends meet as it was..."
— Mr. Bucket on being fired
William Bucket[citation needed] appeared in Roald Dahl's novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He is the father of Charlie Bucket and husband of Helen Bucket.
In the 1971 film, he is said to be already deceased. In the 2005 film, he is alive like the book. He was played by Noah Taylor.
In the book, he is the son of Grandpa Joe and Grandma Josephine. The 1971 film changed this so Mrs. Bucket is their child instead. In the 2005 film, Grandpa George is now Mr. Bucket's father as he can be heard addressing him as Pops.
Background[]
Him and his wife live in a small wooden house which is cold in the winter from drafts. They both sleep on a mattress on the floor.
As a factory worker
He is the only one in the family who has a job. William worked at the local toothpaste factory screwing on caps. The job was menial, repetitive and insanity-inducing, as it grew boring after the first few minutes, let alone several hours. He worked for many hours, the pay was terrible, and very occasionally there were unexpected surprises. He gathered defective toothpaste caps and brought them home for Charlie which he made into a miniature factory with Willy Wonka present.
However, due to rise in cavities resulting in a rise in toothpaste sales, the company made enough revenue for the factory to modernize their factory by adding a machine putting caps on the toothpaste tubes, thus making him redundant and leaving him unemployed. The situation becomes dire as the family begins to starve, and his family becomes concerned when Charlie begins to have a skeleton-like frame. Mr. Bucket is only able to earn some pennies by shovelling snow.
Film[]
In the end William ends up in the factory supplying food and gains a better job as the man fixing and maintaining the machine that replaced his previous job. His pay then increased tremendously supplying the good food for the family in the end.
Trivia[]
- He works at a toothpaste factory which produces Smilex toothpaste. "Smylex" is also the name of the poisonous gas concocted by The Joker in Batman (1989), also directed by Tim Burton.
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