Romani people in fiction

• 1596: A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare – Which includes the lines "Sees Helen's beauty in the brow of Egypt" ("Egyptian" was used to refer to the Romani people of England). Here, Theseus is imagining the face of a lover can make the dark-skinned gypsy look like Helen of Troy, a great beauty.[11][12]
• 1600: As You Like It a pastoral comedy by Shakespeare – He uses the word "ducdame" (Act II, Sc. 5), possibly a corruption or mishearing of the old Anglo-Romani word dukka me or (I foretell or I tell fortunes).[13][14]
• 1603: Othello by Shakespeare – Desdemona's handkerchief a gift to Othello's mother is a gift from an "Egyptian charmer" who can almost read the thoughts of people.[15]
• 1611: The Tempest by Shakespeare – Caliban, the only human inhabitant of the mythical island, is thought to be named after the word Kaliban meaning "black" or "with blackness" in Anglo-Romani.[16] As the first Romani immigrants arrived in England a century before Shakespeare wrote The Tempest, it is thought he may have been influenced by their exotic looks.[14][15]
• 1613: Miguel de Cervantes' novel La Gitanilla
• 1631: Ben Jonson's play Bartholomew Fair. A comedy set in London's Bartholomew Fair where a band of Romani entertain a crowd.
• 18th century: William Wordsworth's Vagrant Muse. A young homeless woman is welcomed by a band of Gypsies who take her in and offer her charity and companionship.
• 1722: Daniel Defoe's Moll Flanders. Moll's earliest memory is of wandering "among a group of people they call Gypsies or Egyptians" in England.

• Georges Bizet's 1875 opera Carmen.
• The Cirque du Soleil traveling show Varekai takes its name from the Romani language and the characters represented on stage are loosely based on the nomadic way of life associated with the Romani people.
• Warhammer Fantasy includes an ethnic group of humans, the Strigany, who are often referred to as gypsies. They conflate the Romani with Romanians: the Strigany are from the same geographical area as Romania, and negative stereotypes about the Romani people are justified against the Strigany, who are persecuted for vampire worship and sometimes actually enabling the Undead.
• The Curse of Strahd supplement for Dungeons & Dragons includes a fantasy version of the Romani, the Vistani. Early printings portrayed the Vistani in a stereotyped light.[17]
• The video for the English synth-pop duo Erasure song "Love to Hate You" features a group of dancing women, wearing Romani dress.

• In the Batman series of comics, the character Richard Grayson (a.k.a. Robin and Nightwing) is shown to be of at least 1/4 Romani descent.
• DC Comics character Cynthia Reynolds, styles herself after the stereotypical depictions of gypsies and adopts Gypsy (comics) as her superhero identity. Her costume would be updated several times in later years to something less stereotype and her heritage retconned as being Romani.
• Marvel Comics superheroes and twins Wanda Maximoff (Scarlet Witch) and Pietro Maximoff (Quicksilver) have had several origin stories over the decades. In 1979, the twins were revealed to have been raised by Romani couple Django and Marya Maximoff, as part of their tribe. Their biological mother was established to be a Romani woman named Magda.[18] In 1982, the twins biological father was revealed to be the Jewish mutant Magneto.[19] In 2014, Marvel Comics retconned the twins origin. Their biological parents were no longer Magda and Magneto. In 2016, the twins were revealed to be the children of Natalya Maximoff (an earlier Scarlet Witch), a Romani woman and sister of Django Maximoff.[20] Pietro has a daughter named Luna Maximoff, together with Crystal (a member of the Inhumans).[21] Wanda once had twin sons, named William and Thomas, with the android superhero Vision.[22] William and Thomas were eventually erased from existence,[23] but were reincarnated as Young Avengers members Billy Kaplan (Wiccan) and Tommy Shepherd (Speed).[24]
• Canonical origin of the supervillain Doctor Doom of the Romani people, and was driven to his nominally villainous actions as a response to the persecution of his family. As dictator of the fictional nation of Latveria, Doom has taken a special interest in the welfare of Gypsies, as that is his heritage, and often that race is first to be taken care of in a manner similar to Saddam Hussein showering his Tikriti tribe with benefits.
• Meggan of the Marvel comics superhero team Excalibur was born to a band of Romanies in England. She was expelled when they saw that she was a shapeshifter, and believed her to be a demon.
• Margali Szardos, the foster-mother of Nightcrawler (comics) of the Marvel comics superhero teams Excalibur and X-Men, is a French Romani sorceress.
• In the web comic The Science Table Comic, Alex, one of the recurring characters, is a gypsy and is adorned in what is stated by another character as his "Traditional native garbs."
• Katerina Donlan of Gunnerkrigg Court is referred to as "gypsy" by another character. Tom Sidell, the comic's author, confirmed she is half-Roma, her mother belonging to the gitano ethnical group.
• Tora Olafsdotter (the DC Comics superherone known as "Ice") was originally presented as a princess of an isolated tribe of magic-wielding Norsemen. In the series Justice League: Generation Lost, that origin is revealed to have been a lie. It is revealed that Tora was born Romani, with her grandfather being the leader of a clan of Romani criminals. When Tora began manifesting her cryokinetic powers, her parents feared that her grandfather would try using her for crime, and fled from the clan. Tora had made up her previous origin story, upon becoming a superhero, to make herself more acceptable to the world (stating that heroes come from better stock than her).[25][26]

• In the anime Blood +, it is implied that the character Haji is Roma. However, he was bought from his caravan at a young age and does not identify as such thereafter.
• In the anime Cowboy Bebop, the character Faye Valentine claims to be one of the Romani people, though this is later dispelled through her own personal flashbacks.
• In the anime Kaze to Ki no Uta, Serge Battour is the orphaned son of a viscount and a beautiful Roma woman.
• In the Code Geass OVA spinoff, Akito the Exiled, the main cast of characters encounter a group of elderly Romani.
• The Fullmetal Alchemist movie, Conqueror of Shamballa, features Romani women in Pre-Nazi Germany.

• The videogame Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King features Romani characters Kalderasha, named after the Kalderash, and his daughter Valentina.
• In the videogame Psychonauts and it's sequel, Psychonauts 2, The main character, Razputin Aquato, and his family are Romani.
• In Assassin's Creed: Revelations, courtesan NPCs are replaced by Romanies which act as moving hiding spots and can be used to distract guards.
• The Crimson Skies character Nathan Zachary has claimed Romani heritage.
• The four protagonists of Mother Russia Bleeds are all referred to as Romani (their background is vague, but they were apparently raised in an impoverished roma camp somewhere in Russia).
• The videogame Bohemian Killing features a Romani protagonist guilty of murder, who has to try and convince the jury he didn't do it.

• In the television series Car 54, Where Are You episode "The Gypsy Curse" (aired November 12, 1961), Maureen Stapleton plays a Romani matriarch telling fortunes from a storefront in Toody and Muldoon's precinct. Stereotypical jokes abound. She lifts a guy's wallet, the father is a layabout, the children don't go to school, they pack up and move to another storefront in short order, etc.
• The Dennis the Menace episode "Dennis in Gypsyland" (aired November 4, 1962), featured a group of Romanies who visited Dennis's town, were accused of theft, and almost inveigled police Officer Murphy into marrying one of their women, to whom he had offered bread at dinner.
• In The Andy Griffith Show, episode 182 in the sixth season is titled "The Gypsies" (aired February 21, 1966). A family of Romanies (one of whom is played by Jamie Farr) places a curse on the town of Mayberry.
• The Canterville Ghost (1974) Television dramatization - Based on the (1887) short story by Oscar Wilde. An English gypsy group are suspected of kidnapping a girl but are innocent and join in the search.
• In Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock (1983-1987), the sentient anthropomorphic Trash Heap refers to herself as a 'gypsy Trash Heap' when she performs her only act of magic. The character "The Old Gypsy Woman" appears in several episodes.
• In the MacGyver episode "Thief of Budapest" (aired May 18, 1990), MacGyver helps a Romani family escape from the KGB.[27]
• In the television film Young Indiana Jones: Travels with Father (aired June 16, 1996), a 10-year-old Indiana Jones visits Russia in 1909, with his family, and runs away with Leo Tolstoy. On their journey, the duo hitches a ride with a traveling Romani tribe, and spend the night in their camp. During the night, Imperial Cossack troops (that the government uses to rid themselves of undesirable ethnic groups) attacks the camp and kills many of the Romani people there. Indiana and Tolstoy barely make it away alive. They seeks refuge at a church, only to almost be cast out by a priest, who mistake them for Romani.
• 1997 Greek television series Whispers of the Heart (Greek: Ψίθυροι Καρδιάς) was about a rich architect who falls in love with a young beautiful gypsy girl. It aired in 1997 and it is one of the most popular, Greek television series.
• On the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003), Romanies in 19th Century Romania place a curse on the vampire Angelus to punish him for the murder of a teenage Romani girl, by restoring his human soul (and by extension, his conscience) and forcing him to feel guilt for his crimes. Angel was doomed to misery until he could enjoy a moment of pure happiness. It is later revealed that these Romanies were members of the Kalderash tribe and that the character Jenny Calendar, actually Janna of the Kalderash, is a member of the tribe.
• The Chilean telenovela Romané (2000) features the life of the Romani in the north of Chile.
• The Simpsons:
  • In "Simpson Tide" (aired March 29, 1998), Milhouse Van Houten comes to school with an earring. Principal Skinner tells Milhouse that earrings are specifically forbidden by the school's dress code. When Skinner notes that people of Romani heritage are excepted from this rule, Milhouse claims to be Romani, which Skinner asks him to prove. In a faux Transylvanian accent, Milhouse says: "I 'vant' to suck your blood!". Skinner corrects Milhouse: "That's a vampire. But, uh, they're also covered".
  • In "Treehouse of Horror XII" (aired November 6, 2001), the Simpson family visit a Romani fortune teller. After Homer destroys the fortune teller's business, she places a curse on him (causing Homer's loved ones to be transformed or killed). In retaliation, Homer sics a leprechaun on the fortune teller. To Homer's surprise, the leprechaun and the fortune teller fall in love. At the end of the story, Homer and Marge attend their wedding. Marge (whom the curse has left covered in hair from head to toe) remarks that "The best thing about a Gypsy wedding is I'm not the hairiest woman here".
  • In "The President Wore Pearls" (aired November 16, 2003), Lisa is elected student body president at Springfield Elementary. She declares an intent to take back the playground from the Romani people. The episode then cuts to a stereotypical Romani family, living on the Springfield Elementary playground. When two students are playing with a frisbee, a Romani man takes it mid-air and says "Is our frisbee now".
• The television series WB television series Charmed episode "The Eyes Have It" (aired October 20, 2002), depicted Romanies, referred to as "gypsies", as practicing a magical craft similar to those of modern-day witches. Much like the star witches in the series, Romanies possess supernatural powers and pass down family Books of Shadows.
• A 2002 episode of The Twilight Zone features a female Romani.
• In the HBO series Carnivàle (2003-2005), the characters of Sophie and her mother Apollonia are said to be Roma.
• In the House episode "Needle in a Haystack" (aired February 6, 2007), Dr. House and his team must treat a 16-year-old Romani boy with respiratory distress. The boy's parents (who are established as having made their son drop out of school, and work for them) are played up as being anti-science and hostile towards outsiders (to the extent that they can't touch people who aren't Romani). The Doctors have to lie and distract the parents, in order to be able to examine and treat the boy. Dr. Foreman is critical of the parents, whom he feels are wasting their son's potential, and offers to help him get a job at the hospital. The boy rejects the offer, because none of the Doctors treating him are married (convincing the boy that the same would happen to him, unless he goes home with his family).
• In the Heartbeat episode "Danse Macabre" (series 17, episode 16. Aired July 27, 2008), a group of Romani arrives in Aidensfield. When a 15-year-old girl named Natalie disappears from a house, the butler of the house speculates that she might have been taken by the Romani people. However, PC Joe Mason (Joe McFadden) dismisses that idea as something that only happens in fairytales. In an ironic twist, Natalie is revealed to be a Romani child (her father's among the newly arrived group), whom the butler had taken from her family years earlier.
• Lark Rise to Candleford, Series 2 Episode 1 (aired December 21, 2008) — A BBC costume drama. The village is haunted by the spirit of a young English Romany girl who drowned in the local lake.
• In the television show Criminal Minds, the fourth-season episode "Bloodlines" (aired January 21, 2009) depicts a family of Romani who kidnap little girls to marry their sons.
• Ashes to Ashes Series 2, Episode 2 (aired April 27, 2009) — A British television police drama series set in the 1980s. A police officer tries to clear her name when she is involved in the accidental death of an English Romanichal. She uncovers a premeditated plot to murder him. The episode does include some stereotypical elements as the plot unfolds; namely the plot device of an old Romani clairvoyant and friction between the police and the Romani camp. However these stereotypes are turned on their head as the local doctor who was obsessed with the victims wife is found guilty of poisoning and elements of police corruption. A supporting principal character is revealed to be part Romani.
• In the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Lost Traveller" (season 13, episode 9. Aired November 30, 2011), the detectives investigate a missing Romani boy.
• The character Willa Monday on the TV show The Finder (2012) is a Romani juvenile delinquent.
• The television series Hemlock Grove (2013-2015) features a family of Romani.
• The BBC television series Peaky Blinders (2013-present) revolves around protagonist Tommy Shelby and the Shelby crime family who are of Romani heritage. It also features the Romani Lee family which includes main character Esme Lee, who marries one of the Shelby brothers.
• The television series Legion (2017-2019) centers around protagonist and mutant David Haller (based on the Marvel Comics character), whom the show depicts as being half-Romani. David is the son of mutant Charles Xavier and his wife, Gabrielle (Stephanie Corneliussen), a Romani Holocaust survivor. Charles and Gabrielle met in a mental hospital, after World War II, where they were both patients. Gabrielle had been rescued from the camps, but had lost her entire family and the trauma of the Holocaust had left Gabrielle catatonic. With his telepathy, Charles managed to get her out of that state. The two became close (helping each other get better), fell in love, and left the hospital together. Afterwards, they got married and had their son David. Gabrielle is depicted as a loving wife and mother, who struggles with the trauma of the Holocaust, when Charles leaves her alone for a while, to seek out the mutant Amahl Farouk.[28][29] In the comics, Gabrielle was a Jewish Holocaust survivor.[30]
• On the television Series What We Do in the Shadows (2019-present) the character Nadja is a Romani Vampire.

Romani characters are frequently depicted in werewolf films, including Maleva the fortuneteller (Maria Ouspenskaya) in The Wolf Man and the Romani clan of female werewolves in Cry of the Werewolf.

• Gypsy (term)
• Antiziganism