Louie Provenza

Louie Provenza
Name	Louie Provenza
Spouse(s)	Liz Provenza (Ex-wife #1) Heather Provenza (Ex-wife #2 & 4) Sharon Provenza (Ex-wife #3) Patrice Perry/Provenza (Current)
Family	Three unnamed sons Two unnamed step-daughters Six unnamed grandkids
Career Information
Affiliation	Los Angeles Police Department
Rank	File:Lieutenant.png Lieutenant
Series Information
First appearance	The Closer (Pilot)

“

I don't run!

”

Lieutenant Louie Provenza is the second-in-command of the Major Crimes Division of the LAPD on The Closer and Major Crimes.

Character Information

Provenza is a long-tenured member of the LAPD with nearly 40 years served. He was selected to join the newly created Priority Homicide Division (later Major Crimes Division) after his history in the Robbery-Homicide Division first serving under, then, Captain Russell Taylor. He is married to Patrice but has several divorces in his past and pays alimony to all his ex-wives (one of whom he married and divorced twice). He has children as well as grandchildren, as well as stepchildren and at least one step-grandchild, though only his future step-granddaughter has been seen and he implies that he was not an involved parent. His closest friend is Andy Flynn. Being the oldest member of both the Priority Homicide Division and the Major Crimes Division, he is often threatened with being forced to retire, though he has sworn to die on his post; as part of the divorce settlement with his first wife, he is to share his pension with her when he retires and he doesn't want to give her the satisfaction. This agreement is void if she remarries, which she is planning to do. Though he often comes off as cynical or even lazy at times, he has a great deal of experience and sometimes notices small case-breaking details.

In episode "Turn Down", he and Flynn were on a drive-along with Buzz Watson on his first day as a reserve officer.

Provenza has developed a close relationship, often resembling that of an uncle or grandfather, with former murder witness Rusty Beck. He advises and looks out for the young man, even behind his back at times when he feels it to necessary. In return, Rusty sees him as someone he can turn to when he needs advice and doesn't want Sharon to know. Provenza has only been shown to betray Rusty's confidence once when got worried about why Rusty was asking about his mother's recent arrest history and checked up on his jail visit with her. What he discovered alarmed him so much he informed the rest of the squad and Sharon out of concern for the young man. He also reviews video of Rusty's visits with his biological mother, and directs Raydor to the moment at which she suggests he get her money by prostituting himself again. Most notably, when Rusty admitted he was gay to the squad, Provenza's reaction was the one he was most worried about besides Sharon's. Like everyone else, Provenza showed no surprise (though everyone tried to pretend they were). Rusty still pulls him aside to make sure Provenza is personally okay with the revelation. Provenza, who has been shown to be politically incorrect in the past, informs Rusty that he honestly doesn't care that he's gay, just as long as he's not flamboyant. He lets him know that being gay is the one thing he can't give him advice on however and leaves it at that. When he moves to live with Patrice, he hires Rusty and his friend TJ to move his stuff into storage and lie to Patrice for him that they are actually giving them away to charity. Rusty's boyfriend Gus is included in the guests at Provenza and Patrice's wedding, the only person there outside of the Major Crimes squad.

When Captain Sharon Raydor first joined the division, Provenza had a rocky relationship with her at first due to her time in FID and him wanting command of Major Crimes himself. His dislike for her only increased when she started making deals with criminals rather than sending them to trial. It nearly causes him to retire, but she manages to reach something of an understanding with him and he changes his mind. Following this, while he still doesn't like her, he at least supports her and respects her while Sharon defers to his expertise much of the time, causing them to develop a good working relationship. In one notable instance, Provenza stands up for Sharon to Rusty when the young man makes her cry with his accusations of her not caring and wanting to get rid of him, saying that he doesn't like Sharon, but even he knows how much she cares about him. Provenza is shown to be disgusted with the young man's actions and his words cause Rusty to realize just how big of a mistake he made. Over time, Provenza's relationship with Sharon gets better to the point that he occasionally calls her "Sharon" instead of "Captain" and he supports her when she needs help. He is currently very happy with his position in the team, with him even having command of the division when they are out of the office without Sharon, and he has fully accepted her as his boss and their working relationship is excellent.

In season 5 of Major Crimes, he is surprised by Patrice when she tells him that they received a wedding invitation from Liz, Provenza's first ex-wife. Although he is happy that Liz is getting remarried, he is not happy that Patrice started pushing him to retire as now he wouldn't have to share his pension with Liz. He is quick to change the subject every time Patrice brings it up but eventually they come to a mutual understanding that Louie could stay at the LAPD as long as he wants, but he would be the last cop she would ever marry.

Relationships

• Lauren - Lauren works at a high end department store and is much younger than Provenza. They fall in love in early Season 5 of The Closer.

Patrice Perry/Provenza

• Patrice Perry - A woman he meets during an investigation in season 3 of Major Crimes. The two have an ongoing relationship and Patrice seems to care for and match wits with him like almost no one can. In season 4, they move in together, though Provenza pays Rusty and his friend TJ to put all of his stuff in storage, just in case the relationship does not work out. Provenza ends up being pleased with the setup Patrice did for their new place even without his input. In "The Jumping Off Point", Provenza plans a big dinner to propose to Patrice only to have Andy accidentally ruin the surprise for him. He then begins avoiding Patrice until she confronts him about it, telling him she wasn't sure whether or not to take Andy seriously and set things up for them to have dinner that night together and made sure it would be somewhere perfect, if the dinner turned out to be "memorable" for them. At the end of "Hindsight, Part 5", Louie and Patrice are married in a small ceremony by Mayor Ramon Quintero (Played by guest star and current Mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti.)

Wives

Provenza is currently married to Patrice whom he married at the end of "Hindsight, Part 5". He also has four ex-wives. During reconstructions undertaken by the squad, Provenza names each doll after one of his ex-wives. A notable example was seen in the episode "Out of Focus" where he throws them off a balcony in order to see how a victim committed apparent suicide.

He notes that his first wife Liz always used to correct his grammar ("Out of Focus"). He reveals to Pope that he is adamant not to retire and would rather die on his post, due to a divorce settlement he had with her first wife in which he would share his pension with her and is reluctant to do so because he doesn't want to give her the satisfaction ("Dial M for Provenza"). Assistant Chief Pope sympathizes with him since he made a similar arrangement with his own first wife. Due to Liz getting remarried, Provenza is no longer required to give up half of his pension with her.

Provenza's second wife was Heather. She was also his fourth wife since he married her again.

His third wife was named Sharon and he notes that she was the one that always had to be right ("Out of Focus").

Officer-involved shootings

• Wade Weller ("Return to Sender Part 2")

Trivia

• Provenza's first name wasn't revealed until Season 5 of The Closer when it was mentioned by his former partner, George Andrews. Before that, he was always referred to as simply "Provenza" or "Lieutenant". In "The Last Word", he mentions that even his grandchildren call him "Lieutenant". In "Frozen Assets", Rusty learns his first name is Louie and Provenza tells him that "unless you outrank me or I divorced you, my name is Lieutenant."
• Whenever the PHD or MCD does reconstructions with dummies, Provenza names each doll after one of his ex-wives.
• Provenza has been sent to sensitivity training at least once.
• Provenza hates it when people sit or put things on his desk.
• He is the last person of his police academy class to still be on active duty.
• He sometimes gets jokes about his age such as in "Frozen Assets" when he brings up his first job to Rusty Beck and Andy Flynn asks him if it was as a cabin boy on the Mayflower or as a dishwasher at the Last Supper.
• Provenza tells Rusty that "snitching on people's how I started my career" when discussing possible job applications with him. He doesn't elaborate further than that though.
• In "Frozen Assets", Provenza writes Rusty a letter of recommendation for working in retail security based on his work in the operation to catch Wade Weller. Dick Tracy steals the letter after Rusty changes his mind about taking that sort of job and uses Provenza's letter which he hadn't put Rusty's name on yet to get a security job of his own.
• In "Final Cut" of Major Crimes, he buys the Major Crimes squad room a new high-tech printer after their old one breaks but makes everyone pay for using it. Following his buying of the printer, the squad members can occasionally be seen putting money in a jar after using his printer. In one episode, Assistant Chief Taylor uses it himself (though he doesn't pay for it citing his rank) saying its the best printer in the LAPD.

Lieutenant Provenza in his uniform.

• When in uniform, Provenza wears seven service stripes on his uniform. Each stripe represents five years of service in the LAPD meaning he has served for 35-39 years.
• In "There's No Place Like Home", Provenza's refusal to get glasses nearly causes him to be reassigned to desk duty as he's unable to shoot a good target without them anymore and can't qualify with his weapon. Near the end of the episode, he's stunned by the effect of a suspect's glasses and later uses them to qualify on the range, getting a perfect target. Following this, he gets glasses which he can be occasionally seen wearing, though he doesn't seem to need them at all times. Most notably, he wore them when he shot Wade Weller, allowing him to shoot him in the head, despite the distance he was at and the fact that Wade was using a hostage as a shield.
• In "The Jumping Off Point", Provenza plans another engagement despite the failures of his many marriages and is angry when Andy ruins the surprise, telling Andy that when he plans to propose to someone, he intends to do it himself, not have Andy do it for him,
• In "Risk Assessment", a suspect was arrested for using a victim's credit card but it simply turns out he found the card and was trying to buy his children a Christmas gift as he didn't have any money for it. After hearing the man's story, Provenza has Tao buy the man the gift he wanted for his children with Provenza's own credit card.
• While Provenza isn't shown outwardly to be as emotionally invested in the Alice Herrera case as Flynn, he admits that the outcome of them not being able to identify Alice bothers even him greatly despite not showing it.
• When two children are found murdered in "Flight Risk", Provenza is noticeably upset, telling Buzz to make sure to get everything on tape and to start to search for other clues so they can make sure the jury can see everything as they do, presumably to make the case stronger against the children's killer.
• When Flynn is sent to the hospital in "Taking the Fall", Provenza is shown to have medical Power of Attorney for him. He aids Flynn in filling out medical forms, but does it in such a way that Flynn jokes about needing a will. Rusty even comments at one point that he believes Sharon left him to make sure Provenza didn't go too far. One of the forms Provenza fills out is a DNR and upon seeing it, Patrice asks if someone is trying to kill Flynn who tells her Provenza did it.
• At his wedding to Patrice in "Hindsight, Part 5", Provenza was so excited he answered a question with "I do" before the ceremony even started.