Jenny Harper Jenny Harper (
Amber Tamblyn, main in Season 11, recurring in season 12) is the long-lost, illegitimate daughter of Charlie Harper. An aspiring actress, Jenny first appears in the premiere episode of season 11. Here, she comes to Malibu hoping to reconnect with her dad, though Walden and her uncle Alan tell her he is dead. It is later revealed that she is a lesbian. Some episodes of the eleventh season emphasize this to the point of
comedically portraying Jenny as a stereotypical lesbian who is uninterested in serious relationships and is content to have sex with any woman she meets, to the extent that she is able to seduce (or "recruit") straight women (at one point, Walden claims that he did not know that one of Jenny's one-night-stands, who is his friend, was a lesbian. Jenny responds "Neither did she until last week", insinuating that the woman was straight but Jenny made her lesbian), among them Walden's own mother. A brief
running gag is Walden and Alan trying to keep their dates from meeting Jenny for this reason. Later in the series, she abandons her promiscuous lifestyle and tries to find a steady lover. After warming up to her, Walden and Alan invite her to move in after she reveals she has nowhere to go. Though she exhibits many of Charlie's personality traits (particularly his
sarcasm, alcoholism, and womanizing), Jenny is considerably much nicer and down-to-earth than he was. Thus far, she has formed good relationships with her surviving relatives, Walden, Berta and Walden's friend Barry (
Clark Duke). She and Jake have never met thus far. But she does know he exists and would like to meet him. In "Welcome Home, Jake", she meets Barry for the first time, mistaking him for Jake. She happily gives him a hug only to be disgusted when she discovers the truth. She eventually takes a liking to Barry, and the two become the best of friends. Though it is apparent that Walden is attracted to her, he believes she has no drive or ambition. Fearing she may turn into "another Alan", he tries to be a positive role model for her. Jenny considers Walden the greatest father figure she has ever had. She had moved from her home in
New York City to find her dad in Malibu. She apparently has a poor relationship with her mother (like her father did), and the only reason she became an actress was "to piss her mother off," as she wanted her to become a doctor. In the twelfth season, Jenny uses her experience in the LGBT community to help Walden and Alan pose as a gay couple so that they can adopt Louis. She moves out of the beach house so Louis can stay in Jake's room. She makes a brief appearance in the final episode, where she receives a large check and an apology letter from Charlie, who survived his accident in Paris. She also appears to have gone back to her promiscuous ways, given that she is apparently having a threesome with two women and forgets they are in her bedroom. Despite being introduced as the new "half man" in the eleventh season, she was replaced in that capacity by another character, Louis, for the twelfth and final season. Tamblyn's billing was also demoted to below Conchata Ferrell's because the role was now recurring rather than regular.
Louis Schmidt Louis Schmidt (Edan Alexander, Season 12) is the child whom Walden and Alan foster. Louis and Alan bond almost instantly, whereas he and Walden initially do not. But they eventually find a common ground and form a strong father–son relationship. He also takes a liking to Berta and Evelyn as well. Louis' favorite snacks are Cheez-Its, cereal, and pancakes. He is officially adopted by Walden in the third-to-last episode. Notably, Louis is the only main character physically absent in the series finale, "
Of Course He's Dead". This absence is not explained, although a picture of him is shown.
Berta Berta (
Conchata Ferrell, recurring in Season 1, regular in Seasons 2–12) is the family housekeeper. She is 63 years old in the first season and about 74 and a half in the last. Although she may be viewed as sarcastic, rude, and sometimes outright disrespectful, Alan and Charlie treat her with enormous respect, partly out of fear. It is also clear that the household cannot function properly without her. Berta has tried her best not to allow the overwhelming stress of her job to get to her head: When the very tidy Alan moves in, she quits. Charlie is so upset that Alan had to personally beg her to return, promising that Alan would do his own cleaning. However, the facts that Jake's bedroom could be confused with a dump (including at various times dead fish in the closet, food left-overs in his toy box, and nasal mucus under the bed), his toilet seat is frequently sprayed with urine, and his underwear is filthy often leads to anger on her part. Her favorite line after a mini-disaster occurs in the house is, "I ain't cleaning that up." Her role on screen was increased during the Kutcher years of the show. Season 11 was the first time she appeared in every episode of a season. Berta has a sister named Daisy (
Camryn Manheim), with whom she does not get along. She also has three daughters and several granddaughters, whom she admits are "sleazy and easy" and sometimes brings along to work. A notable example is her teenage granddaughter Prudence (
Megan Fox). Berta has two ex-husbands: her first marriage lasted 15 years, and her second was a drunken Las Vegas escapade she refers to as "one hell of a weekend", which ended when she divorced him in Reno. She has served time in
prison and worked as a prison barber. She uses, and makes references to, drugs (legal and otherwise). It is hinted that she has enjoyed many a joint during work hours and can produce a perfect one given the opportunity. She takes anxiolytics (especially
Valium) in her coffee to reduce her violent tendencies. She was a
groupie with the
Grateful Dead and has implied that she had a lesbian experience during that time. It is hinted several times before Charlie's death that he has changed his will so she would inherit the beach house instead of Alan. However, that turns out to be untrue, although Berta is set to move out because the house has mortgages attached that Alan has no chance of paying. Berta often calls Alan "Zippy". She and Alan are portrayed as the only people saddened over Charlie's death. She considers him to be the best boss she ever had. After Walden buys the house, he asks her to remain there as a live-in housekeeper. She agrees, mainly because she is extremely attracted to Walden and would often make discreet advances at him. This living arrangement is short-lived when she finds out that Alan will be moving back in, only this becomes more likely when Walden sees Berta invite a piggish houseguest over. She never thought she could work for anyone besides Charlie, but admits to Walden that he is instead the greatest boss she ever had, making Charlie second-best. Berta hardly shows any signs of attraction to Walden after season 9. Despite her displeasure of Jake's presence in the house when he originally moved in, she is far more friendly and welcoming to Louis when he moves in because he is cute and his background is similar to hers. In 2014, Ferrell revealed that Berta was originally intended to be an ethnic minority, but producers liked the way Ferrell performed the role. She also revealed that Berta was intended to be only in a two-episode arc of the first season and was to leave due to Alan and his kid moving into the beach house, but producers extended the role and eventually made her a main cast member from season 2 onwards. In the final episode, Berta gets a large check from Charlie and seems to retire to Walden's beach house.
Evelyn Harper Evelyn Pepper (previously
Harper,
Gorsky,
Thomas,
King, and
Leopold;
Holland Taylor, regular in seasons 1–9, recurring in seasons 10–12) is Charlie and Alan's mother and Jake and Jenny's grandmother. In the first season, she is 58 years old. Out of vanity, she changes the year of her birth as she ages. She expresses a superficial fondness for her sons and grandson. But she rarely lives up to her self-perceived notion of being a devoted and misunderstood
matriarch. Her sons and grandson generally return the favor and go out of their way to avoid interacting with her on most occasions. Her wide-ranging sex life is a recurring gag throughout the series as she is attracted to both men and women. In addition to
Teddy, who is not actually "
Courtney's" father, Evelyn has been sexually involved with several parents of her sons' lovers and friends, including
Rose's father, Gloria's mother, Gloria's presumed father, Gloria's likely biological father (i.e., the boys' father, Frank Harper), Walden's mother (with whom Charlie's daughter Jenny had already had sex), and Lyndsey's mother. She also bedded Charlie's ex-girlfriend Jill (who had become Bill) and Walden. Evelyn has been divorced once and widowed five times, her sixth marriage being the shortest as he died an hour after saying their vows. The family frequently refers to her as "the devil" (or, as Charlie puts it, "unholy mother of us"). Charlie has her number on speed-dial in his cell phone as "
666". Once, she showed up at the door in a black cloak while carrying a scythe. When Alan asked who it was, Charlie responded "It's Death," to which Alan replied, "Hi, mom!" It has been implied on one occasion that she is
literally a witch who is dreaded and feared by other witches—one of Charlie's girls was a worshipper of the Devil and was scared away by Evelyn. Wealthy, with a luxurious house in
Beverly Hills, she sells
real estate in Beverly Hills and Malibu, having sold Charlie his house. Surprisingly, she is distraught over Charlie's death. However, at his funeral, she continuously mentions her intention to sell his house
while Alan is giving his eulogy. Her relationship with Alan improves somewhat after Charlie's death, because she acknowledges that he is not just her second-born son, he is now the only son she has left, as well. When Alan almost dies from a heart attack, she fears for his life, because not only does she not want to lose another child, her "good son" is already deceased. Two years after Charlie's death, she finally meets her long-lost granddaughter Jenny. Surprisingly, Evelyn embraces her newfound grandchild and temporarily forgets about Jake. She had previously expressed sadness by him going to the army and said she would have enjoyed a relationship with Jake, but "got to him" too late for proper bonding. She also makes Jenny heir to her estate, knowing if Alan had been the heir, he would've killed her for the inheritance. In the eleventh season, she marries for the seventh time, this time to her much older lover Marty Pepper. She rarely appeared during season 9, but was prominent in the last few episodes of the season. Despite still being credited and billed as a main character, Evelyn made only one appearance in the tenth season and several appearances in the eleventh. In the final season, she shows up at Alan and Walden's wedding. This is followed by her sleeping with "Michael Bolton" and Walden's mother Robin. She then has sex with a fake Santa Claus. In the last episode, she appears when Alan needs Charlie's death certificate and when she gets a threatening message from Charlie.
Judith Harper-Melnick Judith Harper-Melnick (
Marin Hinkle; regular in seasons 1–9, guest in seasons 10–12) is Alan's cheating, vindictive, cold-hearted, self-absorbed, and humorless first wife. She seems to despise Alan and takes all chances to humiliate him. She is the first woman Alan has slept with and a video shows her dancing with erotic abandon at their wedding. But their marriage was cold: according to her, the only time she was happy being sexual was when she was pregnant with Jake. In the pilot, she lies to him about realizing she is homosexual as an excuse to end the marriage. In a subsequent episode, he catches her picking up multiple men. She makes no secret of living luxuriously with Alan's
alimony, seeing she has not held a job since she divorced him. She later marries Dr. Herbert "Herb" Melnick (
Ryan Stiles), Jake's pediatrician, a union that brings joy to Alan because it means he no longer has to pay alimony. Judith also considers Charlie to be a bad role model for Jake. In season 6, she throws Herb out of the house and briefly reunites with Alan before reconciling with Herb. It is later revealed she is pregnant with a daughter, whom she eventually names Millie. Alan hopes he is the father. But Judith says she would kill him if he reveals that he slept with her. After she gives birth in the sixth-season finale, the child's parentage remains uncertain, because Judith was with both Herb and Alan around the time Millie was conceived. Jake and Berta describe Millie as looking nothing like Judith or Herb but more like a girl version of Alan, implying Alan is the probable biological father. Judith makes very few appearances in seasons 7 and 9, but is featured in almost every episode in season 8. Unlike her relationship with Charlie—who she considered to be a misogynistic bad example for Jake—Judith gets along with Walden just fine—mostly due to her initial interest in him. She is not seen after the season 9 finale until towards the end of season 10, being mentioned only briefly for most of the season. Judith's absence is finally explained in the episode "Run, Steven Staven! Run!" when Herb mentions that Judith moved out when he cheated on her with his receptionist (yet in season 11, she is shown to still be living there). However, in the 19th episode of season 10, she reappears after a long absence when Herb starts to go crazy. Walden and Alan call her to go to Herb's hotel room and take him back. She plays a major role in the season 11 episode "Cab Fare and a Bottle of Penicillin," when Alan shows up at her house just to talk about old times and they end up engaged after a night of drinking. However, in the end, Judith ends the engagement after Walden explains to her that Alan had proposed to Lindsey the same night he had proposed to her (however, he does not explain that she had not accepted Alan's proposal as she is now engaged to Larry). Angered by this, she kicks Alan in the groin. It is unknown if she and Herb have officially divorced or are just separated. In the final episode, Alan calls Judith thinking that Charlie is going to kill him. He tells her that she is his only true love. Having just received a generous check from their newly wealthy son Jake, she tells Alan she has another call and hangs up on him.
Rose Rose (
Melanie Lynskey; regular in seasons 1–2; recurring in seasons 3–6, 8–10 and 12; guest in seasons 7 and 11) is the Harpers' wealthy neighbor and Charlie's stalker. After his death, she finds new love and a stalker victim in Walden. The character has been described as a sociopath although she has a warm and friendly exterior. Although she is somewhat mentally unhinged and obsessed with Charlie, Rose expresses that she "has an undergraduate degree from
Princeton University (which she completed in two years) and a
master's degree in
behavioral psychology from
Stanford University." Throughout the series, Rose applies her knowledge of interpersonal communication in the various situations that arise. Her family is involved in banking and oil, making them (and implicitly her) extremely wealthy.
Martin Sheen, who is Charlie Sheen's real-life father, makes a guest-appearance on the show as Rose's equally-disturbed father, Harvey, who similarly obsessed over Evelyn after sleeping with her once. Rose's paternal grandparents were first cousins. Her grandmother attributes Rose's and Harvey's mental issues to this. Rose also has five ferrets, all named "Charlie," as had been revealed in Season 2's "The Salmon Under My Sweater." She was one of Charlie's one-night stands. She would not allow him to forget about her as he does all his other sexual conquests. Rose acknowledges that she is "boundary challenged", while Charlie and Alan refer to her as Charlie's stalker. In the pilot, she tells Alan that she sneaks into Charlie's room while he is asleep and tries on his underwear. Usually uninvited, she enters and exits Charlie's house by climbing onto the backyard deck, rather than using the front door. She is caught by Charlie and Alan on several occasions watching them while sleeping. While credited among the main cast in CBS press releases in season 3–4, she was listed as a recurring star in on-screen credits. After season 4, she leaves for London and appears on the show only rarely. She later returns to Malibu in season 5, though no longer living next door to Charlie and therefore, appearing less frequently. She claims she was sent away from England after "an incident at
Buckingham Palace". In Season 6, she becomes friends with Charlie's fiancée Chelsea and goes on a blind date with Alan. The two begin dating before Rose evinces the same jealousy and possessiveness toward Alan that she had applied toward Charlie, right down to gluing things to his genitals. Her only appearance in season 7 is in "Gumby with a Pokey" when Charlie begins to hallucinate (after taking medicinal marijuana). Women in his past interrogate why he mistreated them. Then, he goes out to the deck to discover Rose. Unlike the other women, Rose is really there. She makes multiple appearances in season 8, after staging her wedding, which makes Charlie realize he probably loves her. In the last episode of season 8, Charlie leaves for Paris with her. In season 9, Rose reveals that she and Charlie got engaged in Paris. It is implied she may have had something to do with Charlie's death after she returned to their Paris hotel to find him showering with another woman. She reappears again at the end of "What a Lovely Landing Strip" catching Walden's ex-wife Bridget spying on Walden and his new girlfriend. She then tells her that she can help her make Walden suffer. She makes a brief cameo through archive footage in a flashback montage in the episode "Oh Look! Al-Qaeda!". She returns in Season 10's "That's Not What They Call It in Amsterdam", now dating Walden, much to Alan's dismay. The relationship gets serious but is short lived when Walden reconciles with Zoey. However, Rose gets revenge by telling Zoey that she is pregnant with Walden's baby. Walden ends up without Zoey or Rose. Rose continues to stalk Walden as well as the Harpers, despite Charlie's death. Rose returns in "Advantage: Fat, Flying Baby" at the end, where it is discovered that Rose is Walden's girlfriend's new investor for her fashion line. In the series finale "Of Course He's Dead," it is revealed that Rose lied about Charlie's death. She married Charlie in Paris but soon caught him cheating with a French maid, a
mime and a goat. Upon returning with the captive Charlie to Los Angeles she keeps him as a love slave imprisoned in her basement. After four years Charlie escapes using a rope made from his trademark bowling shirts. He subsequently uses the royalties from his children's songs to compensate some of the people he wronged, while sending threats to Evelyn, Alan, and Walden. Rose reveals the truth to them before departing the Malibu house to escape whatever vengeance Charlie has planned for her.
Kandi Harper Kandi Harper (
April Bowlby; recurring in season 3, main in season 4, guest in seasons 10 and 12) is Alan's second ex-wife. She was credited among the main cast during the fourth season. Initially she is Charlie's gorgeous but dim-witted (though sexually and theatrically smart) girlfriend until Charlie breaks it off with her so he could date Mia. When Judith (who later becomes Kandi's confidante) initially tries to end Kandi's relationship with Alan, Kandi's mother Mandi (
Gail O'Grady), who also has a brief fling with Charlie during that time, makes sure the couple are dating again. During this time, Judith briefly dates Kandi's father Andi (
Kevin Sorbo). This leads to an interesting joke Jake tells his father about the possibility Kandi could be his stepmother, stepsister, and stepcousin all at once. Kandi and Alan have a superficial relationship based mostly on sex. But they eventually wed in
Las Vegas, where they also win half a million dollars. After only four months of marriage and spending nearly all of their winnings, Kandi kicks Alan out of their condominium. This is later revealed to be because Alan does not want to have another child with her. With Judith's help, Kandi acquires (and
seduces) Judith's lawyer from her divorce and, despite only being married to him four months, manages to claim alimony payments from Alan, making him all the poorer and dependent on Charlie. Kandi is soon offered a role as a forensics expert on a
CSI-type television series, entitled
Stiffs. At the same time, Alan sees that Jake is practically grown up and returns to Kandi to agree to have a baby with her. However, moments before they try to conceive, Kandi finally signs the divorce papers to ensure that Alan will not have any claim on her new-found television lucre, and disappears from Alan's life. In the tenth season, Kandi resurfaces as a television star and tries to win Alan back. But despite his temptations, Alan ultimately rejects her as he is in a relationship with Lyndsey McElroy. After a paparazzo acquires
altered photographs of them together, Kandi goes to explain the situation to Lyndsey, and for unknown reasons they end up having sex. In the final episode, Kandi has become a celebrity and is seen being mobbed by photographers. Fearing the wrath of a very-alive Charlie, Alan telephones her to tell her she is the love of his life. She is the only one of Alan's lovers to be genuinely touched by his words, indicating that she may have been the only woman to actually love Alan. Prior to playing Kandi, Bowlby had appeared as another character named Kimber.
Chelsea Melini Chelsea Christine Melini (
Jennifer Bini Taylor; recurring in season 6; regular in season 7, guest in seasons 9 and 12) is Charlie's girlfriend for most of season 6. She moves into his house by the season's end. Formerly a
one-night stand, Chelsea seems to be one of the few women out of Charlie's countless relationships who has induced him to try to make positive changes in his degenerate lifestyle. She becomes close friends with Alan, something Charlie enjoys because Alan could take her to museums and foreign films (activities that Charlie cannot stand). In the seventh season premiere, Charlie finally decides to let go of Mia and commit to Chelsea. However, as the season progresses, Chelsea unintentionally begins to bring out Charlie's evil side, as he starts treating Alan and Jake cruelly if they accidentally inconvenience her. Eventually they plan to marry. But Chelsea postpones the wedding after she becomes attracted to Alan's lawyer Brad and Charlie vomits on a baby. This results in a rift, during which Charlie vents his anger on Alan by forcing him to sleep on the couch so he can sleep in Alan's room. Charlie and Chelsea make several attempts to reconcile, most recently following her breakup with Brad. Chelsea tries to reunite with Charlie, but is thwarted due to her best friend Gail (
Tricia Helfer) sleeping with him. Jake later gives Chelsea a necklace that Charlie got her for her birthday and she goes outside to see him. But when she gets there, Charlie is in trouble with the police for rear ending a police car, with a suspended license. Jake is driving at the beginning of this episode. But when the police pursue them, Jake and Charlie switch seats, causing Charlie to lose his license. While being credited among the main cast as Jennifer Taylor during the seventh season, CBS press releases billed her as a recurring character. At Charlie's funeral, she announces that he gave her
chlamydia. She appears in the
finale with a huge check from Charlie and an apology letter for shooting her while they were dating. Bini Taylor previously appeared in the pilot episode as a woman in the grocery store aisle complimenting Charlie and Jake, and again in season 2 as Tina, one of the women Charlie apologizes to as he tries to find out who set up the 'Charlie Harper Sucks' website. == Recurring characters ==