Arthur "Artie" Abrams is a fictional character from the Fox musical comedy-drama series Glee portrayed as the "glue" of the glee club. The character is portrayed by actor Kevin McHale, and appeared in Glee since its pilot episode, first broadcast on May 19, 2009. Artie was developed by Glee creators Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan. He is a guitarist and paraplegic manual wheelchair user who is a member of the glee club at the fictional William McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio, where the show is set. Artie uses a wheelchair due to a spinal cord injury he sustained in a car crash at the age of eight. His storylines have seen him accept his disability, pine for the affections of fellow New Directions members, and dabble in film directing.
As Artie, McHale featured in many musical performances which were released as singles available for download. McHale joined Glee from a dance background, and found it challenging to adapt to using a wheelchair, but was able to utilize his dancing ability in episodes such as "Dream On", in which he dances in a shopping mall during a fantasy flash mob sequence. McHale stated that performing as Artie has made him more aware of the challenges that people with disabilities face, and was grateful to showcase how Artie can "still do everything everyone else can that matters".
Storylines Artie is introduced in "Pilot" as a guitar-playing member of the William McKinley High School glee club. He uses a wheelchair. He is constantly bullied by members of the school football team. He is also in the school's jazz ensemble, and it is later revealed that he is in the A.V. Club and a member of the Academic Decathlon team as well. During preparations for the Sectionals round of show choir competition, Principal Figgins (Iqbal Theba) decrees that there is no money in the school budget to hire a handicap-accessible bus to transport the glee club. The other students hold a fund-raising bake sale, but although they make enough money to hire a bus, Artie requests that they donate it to the school to pay for more wheelchair ramps in order to benefit future students. He goes on a date with club member Tina Cohen-Chang (Jenna Ushkowitz), who stutters, and explains that he was left paralyzed following a car crash when he was eight years old. The two share a kiss, but Artie is hurt when Tina confesses she has been faking her speech impediment since the sixth grade. He later forgives Tina, but makes sexist remarks about her fashion sense, demanding that she begin wearing skimpier clothes if she wants to be with him. Tina publicly confronts him for this behavior, and Artie apologizes; they kiss and become a couple.
When Tina learns that Artie's dream is to become a dancer, she asks him to perform in a tap dancing routine with her despite his paralysis, but their attempt fails miserably, and Artie asks Tina to leave. She later presents him with research on the progress of spinal cord injury treatments, raising Artie's hopes that he may soon be able to walk again, but guidance counselor Emma Pillsbury (Jayma Mays) reminds him that testing for these treatments will take many years. Artie comes to accept that he may never be a dancer, and tells Tina to choose another dance partner. Artie is dismayed when New Directions lose at Regionals, but thankful for having been a member of the glee club, admitting that Tina was his first kiss.
At the beginning of the second season, Artie asks Finn Hudson (Cory Monteith) to help him join the football team. He hopes to win back Tina, who has broken up with him to date Mike Chang (Harry Shum Jr.). The new football coach, Shannon Beiste (Dot-Marie Jones), believes that Finn is colluding against her by forcing her to reject a wheelchair-reliant student, and drops Finn from the team. After re-considering she accepts them both. Brittany Pierce (Heather Morris) pairs with Artie for the duets assignment and competition, and they start dating. Artie loses his virginity to Brittany, but before they compete Santana Lopez (Naya Rivera) tells him that Brittany only wanted him for his voice so she could win the competition. He is deeply upset that his first sexual experience was the consequence of such motivations, so he breaks up with Brittany and dissolves their partnership. Artie later realizes he wants her back, and with encouragement from Puck, they start a real relationship. Later, Artie confronts Brittany: he becomes upset that Brittany cannot recognize that she is cheating on him with Santana, and calls her stupid. Artie deeply regrets his words and tries to salvage their relationship, but she refuses.
At the beginning of the third season, Artie, now a junior, is asked to direct the school musical, West Side Story. Though assailed by self-doubt at the last minute, he is thanked by the cast, and he thanks them for trusting him. At the end of the school year, Artie and the others lead New Directions to victory at the Nationals competition. In the first episode of the fourth season, Artie chooses the new lead singer of New Directions, Blaine. Brittany runs for senior class president and picks Artie as her vice president, though they lose to Blaine and Sam. Finn returns to McKinley, and Artie visits him at work and asks him to help direct Grease, which Finn accepts. In the episode "Glee, Actually", after Artie injures himself on an icy ramp, he is angry and humiliated, and wishes he'd never had to be in a wheelchair. A subsequent dream, in which he imagines himself walking, but where New Directions failed to get off the ground without his presence, makes him realize his importance to the club. He began dating his underclassman and fellow glee club member Kitty Wilde (Becca Tobin) at the beginning of the fifth season, but broke up with her after he graduated in the mid season, right after the glee club was disbanded. He goes to a film school in New York.
In the final season, Artie, still at the film school, comes back to McKinley to help Rachel Berry (Lea Michele) recruit new members for the newly rebooted glee club. He occasionally returns to help the glee club during the season, and also attending Santana and Brittany's wedding. In "2009", the parallel episode to the "Pilot", it is revealed that he auditions for the glee club with the song "Pony", and that he (along with Tina) auditions because they were dared by their goth friends to do so. Artie is a successful film director as of the series finale, "Dreams Come True". His film, which stars Tina (who is also revealed to be his girlfriend), was accepted into Slamdance Film Festival in 2020. He returns to McKinley to attend a rededication to McKinley's auditorium to the late Finn Hudson and performs "I Lived" with former members of the New Directions for the final time and then takes a bow with the rest of the Glee cast.
Development
McHale auditioned for Glee coming from a boy-band background, having previously been a member of the quartet group NLT (Not Like Them) as one of two lead singers, with the song "Let It Be" by The Beatles. He found it challenging to adapt to using a wheelchair, having to overcome the instinctive urge to dance along or tap his foot during musical performances. He found it difficult to watch his colleagues dancing while he used a wheelchair, but still learned the same dance routines as the other cast members, and was able to stand in during rehearsals in the event of absences.
McHale performed in the 2010 Glee Live! In Concert! tour in character as Artie, remaining in a wheelchair during live performances. He used a wireless microphone headset instead of a regular wireless handheld microphone, as his hands were needed to control his wheelchair. He performed in a wheelchair when the Glee cast were invited to perform at the White House for the Obama family and guests in April 2010. McHale was able to utilize his dancing background in the episode "Dream On", in which Artie dances in a shopping mall during a fantasy flash mob sequence. He enjoyed the performance, but took time to pick up the choreography having spent so long working in a wheelchair. Although McHale prefers contact lenses, he auditioned for the part wearing glasses to enhance the "nerd" element of Artie's personality, and the thick glasses became a part of his costume.
McHale describes Artie as a "nerd" who loves the glee club whole–heartedly and uses it as a form of escapism. He believes that Artie has more confidence than he himself possesses, explaining: "I think he knows who he is and he doesn't care what anyone thinks." He enjoyed Artie's character development in the episode "Wheels," explaining that when he was cast in the role, he did not know Artie's background and thus made up his own backstory for him. He believed that Artie became paralyzed later in life, rather than being born that way, which is confirmed in "Wheels". Of the burgeoning romance between Artie and Tina, McHale opined: "I think Tina and Artie will be together. I think they will be a couple for a long time." He explained that from the beginning of the show's production, creator Ryan Murphy expressed the belief that Artie and Tina should be together, and so he and Jenna Ushkowitz deliberately sat close to one another during filming, assuming that it would eventually happen. McHale was shocked by Artie's reaction to Tina's faked stutter. He was initially unsure "why he was being so dramatic". He concluded however: "I really think Artie fell for Tina because they were set apart by their disabilities. They're already kind of outcasts being in glee, but within that group they shared a connection. So he based their whole relationship on that and when it went away, Artie didn't know what to do." McHale is close to his co–star Jenna Ushkowitz, and the two of them are in support of the relationship between their characters, referred to by the portmanteau "Artina", for Artie and Tina. McHale described Artie and Tina's relationship as being similar to the one between Cory (Ben Savage) and Topanga (Danielle Fishel) in the ABC comedy–drama Boy Meets World, and he believes they will always be together.
Artie, like a number of the students at McKinley High, is the "namesake" of one of Brad Falchuk's high school friends at Beaver Country Day School in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. The character was named for Arthur Stroyman, who helped Falchuk make horror films when they were teens. Stroyman was not much like Artie, however: he was an athlete who "never fully understood the artsy kids" in high school.
Musical performances As Artie, McHale features in many musical performances, which have been released as singles, available for download. In the episode "Wheels" he has his first solo performance on the show "Dancing With Myself". Murphy commented that the performance is Artie's chance to "break away from being misunderstood by everyone" and express himself, explaining that although Artie is usually "a very secure guy" who does not care about others' opinions of him, "Wheels" sees his friends take his disability for granted: "So this performance is all about him saying, 'Look, this is who I am, and this is who I want to be. McHale has stated that performing as Artie has made him more aware of the challenges that people with disabilities face: "It's a completely different side of life. More than ever, I realize how grateful I am to be able to get up between each take and walk around. I'm glad that I can represent that kind of life on television so millions of people see it every week. And the whole point of it is to show that Artie can still do everything everyone else can that matters."