Niles Crane (born 1957) is a fictional character on the American sitcom Frasier, a spin-off of the television show Cheers. He was portrayed by David Hyde Pierce. Niles is the younger brother of Frasier Crane (played by Kelsey Grammer).
Pierce was hired because Frasier producers saw his headshot and commented on how much he looked like a young Grammer. Unlike Frasier, part of whose background comes from Cheers, Niles's background is established over the course of Frasier.
Pierce has said that his character was originally explained to him as "what Frasier would be if he had never gone to Boston and never been exposed to the people at Cheers."
It has been suggested that "the difference between the brothers is that Frasier knows they're being pretentious; Niles honestly doesn't".
Background
Niles was born in Seattle, Washington, in 1957, to Hester Crane, a psychiatrist, and Martin Crane, a police officer. Like his older brother Frasier, Niles was named for one of his mother's lab rats. Also like Frasier, Niles was an unusually sensitive child and a frequent target for bullies. As a result, he was quite close to his older brother, and at the same time fiercely competitive with him. Like Frasier, Niles prefers fine arts, music, and intellectual pursuits to physical activities like sports. He is also an established philanthropist.
After attending the private Bryce Academy with Frasier, Niles's success in school led to matriculation at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, as an undergraduate, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and studied for a year at the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England as a graduate student. According to the Season 2 episode "The Club", at some point during his young adulthood when Richard Nixon was campaigning for president, he was arrested for "mooning" Nixon, which according to Niles was a result of him being "young and firm and in love with an anarchist".
Niles describes his profession as "the saving grace of my life", and is greatly respected professionally. He specializes in marriage and family therapy. (While substituting for his brother on the radio Niles says, "While Frasier is a Freudian, I am a Jungian. So there'll be no blaming mother today!") Niles is an authority on clinical psychosis, has had his research published in several psychiatric journals, serves on the board of the American Psychiatric Association, and four of his patients have been elected to political office.
Niles often compares his own career to that of his brother, and early in Frasier's career as a talk show host makes frequent jokes about the "fast-food approach to psychiatry" that Frasier practices through his radio show. Niles sometimes admits, however, that he envies how his "big shot radio host" brother is well-known, Frasier's face appears on "the side of buses", and he helps many "people who need it", while no one appreciates his own work.
Personality
Niles, like Frasier, is haughty, snobby and fussy, has gourmet tastes, and was described by an interviewer at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer as obsessive-compulsive. He frequently wears double breasted suits and Trafalgar limited-edition suspenders. Although Frasier also plays the piano, when they make music together Niles plays while Frasier sings. He is an admirer of the fine arts including opera, theatre, and classical music, drinks fine wine, and enjoys French cuisine which he himself cooks, and frequently obsesses about knowing the right people and climbing the social ladder. At Cafe Nervosa, the coffee house he frequents with Frasier and other friends and family members, Niles's usual is a latte with a "whisper" of cinnamon, and occasionally chocolate shavings or nutmeg. According to Daphne, he would "eat a worm if [she] gave it a French name," while Frasier at one point says, "I'm a teamster compared to you!"