Henrietta Platchkey is the human biological mother of Hollyhock and the former mistress of Butterscotch Horseman. Her past occupation was as a maid for the Horseman Household. She is currently a nurse in Minneapolis.
Henrietta is mentioned numerous times throughout Season 4 by Beatrice Horseman.
Personality
From everything seen so far, Henrietta seems to be a very nice person. In Time's Arrow, even though her face is scribbled out, she speaks in a sweet, friendly manner and seems like a pleasant and innocent woman who is also somewhat nervous and introverted.
Although a very kind and sweet lady she appears to be naive and not so bright as a foil to Beatrice who is sharp and clever. She displayed the tendency to point out the most obvious, describing paintings as "T.V. without all the talking and music" and her love of books because "the words tell stories"- Beatrice finds this somewhat annoying as it does not make for very stimulating conversation.
Design:
As a maid she wore a blue button down collared dress with a white trim and white collar and two large pockets on the side and yellow buttons as her uniform and white tennis shoes and white socks. She seems to have had brown hair that was medium length and bangs going across her forehead. She looks like she had a tan skin tone, and she appears to have wide hips, a similar body type to that of her daughter.
Beatrice does not want to remember Henrietta as she is bitter about Butterscotch's affair. This is why Henrietta's face appears only as scribbles. Hence, at this current moment in time it is not known what her facial features are like, although according to the official lead artist Lisa Hanswalt, her face in concepts was designed to be "horse-like".
Background
In "Thoughts and Prayers", it is revealed Beatrice Horseman, BoJack's mother, has dementia. As a result, she does not recognize him as her son and instead recognizes and refers to him as "Henrietta"
In "Time's Arrow", which shows flashbacks to Beatrice's life from her point of view and which are affected by her dementia, we learn that Henrietta (whose face is scribbled out, most likely due to Beatrice's dementia affecting her memories) was a maid for the Horseman household circa the late 90s.
Butterscotch Horseman, the father of BoJack and the husband of Beatrice, had an affair with her, resulting in pregnancy. He tells Beatrice, who is angry about the affair, pleading her to help fix the situation. She talks to Henrietta, who wants to keep the baby, a female horse. Henrietta is then fired.
She cries saying Butterscotch was kind to her and said she reminded him of his mother, which is a very similar line he used on Beatrice when they first met. Henrietta explains she wants to go to nursing school but tuition keeps going up. Beatrice says she'll pay for her tuition under the condition tells her she Henrietta gives up the baby up for adoption. Henrietta objects to this at first. Beatrice tells her not to make the same mistake she did, giving up her life for the baby and letting Butterscotch poison her life. Henrietta finally agrees because she is frightened, young, and naive at the time and does not see any other alternative.
Beatrice is with Henrietta as she gives birth. After the baby is born, Henrietta pleads Beatrice to let her hold her, but Beatrice refuses and leaves with baby Hollyhock, saying she can't get attached and this is for her own good. Henrietta screams and sobs as her baby is taken away from her, implying that she did in fact want her child.
The baby was originally named "Girl Horse". She was eventually adopted by eight gay men and renamed Hollyhock.
Hollyhock, now 17, eventually finds out through her dads, who got the info from BoJack, that Henrietta is her biological mother, and in the last scene of Season 4 she is about to board a plane to go meet her for the first time.
Trivia
- In her early stages of Dementia Beatrice Horseman thinks her son BoJack is Herietta Platchkey their former maid.
- As an injoke, Henrietta has an actual, "official" Facebook account [1].
- Both Beatrice Horseman and Henrietta refuse abortions.
References
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