Pete (O’ Brother Where art Thou?), part of the threesome also composed of Ulysses Ulysses(George Clooney) and Delmar Delmar(Time Blake Nelson), breaks out of jail with Ulysses and Delmar and sets off on a journey to retrieve $1.2 million which Ulysses claims to have stolen and buried before his incarceration. Pete leads the group to the house of his cousin, who removes their chains and feeds them before betraying them to the authorities in an attempt to collect the reward money for their capture. Pete, along with Delmar, is later baptized in the midst of a congregation on a riverbank. Pete sings backup on “Man of Constant Sorrow” and later stumbles upon a group of sirens. Hypnotized by their song, Pete and Co. submit to their spell. The women turn Pete in to the authorities in order to collect the reward money. Ulysses and Delmar wake to find Pete disappeared. Ulysses tries to reason through the situation while Delmar vehemently claims that Pete has been transformed into the toad found inside his abandoned clothes. Upon discovering Pete remains human, Ulysses and Delmar promptly break him out of jail. Pete then admits he revealed the location of the money. Ulysses counters by admitting there is no treasure. Enraged by this insight, Pete reveals that he only had two more weeks left on his sentence and attacks McGill. Despite this dispute, Pete remains with the group for the rest of the film.

Pete represents the common man and fills the gap between Ulysses, who represents knowledge and logical thought, and Delmar, who represents stupidity and unquestioning belief. As the common man, Pete is motivated by themes the audience can identify with; he desires freedom as well as financial security. Pete expresses a desire to move west and open a restaurant which represents his version of the American dream. Pete seems to place great significance in family and blood ties; he turns to his cousin for help upon escaping prison and curses his Hogwallop blood after revealing the location of the buried treasure to the authorities. Like most men, sex also motivates Pete. Upon hearing the sirens’ song, Pete makes no attempt to resist and rushes off to find the source of the seductive sound, which naturally leads the entire group right into the sirens’ hands. While Pete’s intellect is superior to Delmar’s he still cannot match wits with Ulysses and follows whatever plan Ulysses concocts for the group. Unlike Delmar however, Pete does express anger when Ulysses admits that the entire reason for their journey, the treasure, is a myth and the two come to blows. Pete’s anger indicates that while he is loyal to his friends, he still expects a return on his investment and is not satisfied with simply putting himself in harm’s way to help Ulysses. However, after his anger subsides Pete chooses to remain with the group and help Ulysses win back his wife showing that while Pete, like most men, is motivated by self preservation, he also has a strong loyalty to friends.

Pete is played by Coen Brothers stalwart John Turturro who also appeared in The Big Lebowski, Barton Fink, and Miller’s Crossing.