The Magic Behind the Voices
The Magic Behind the Voices: A Who's Who of Cartoon Voice Actors is a 367-page book by Tim Lawson and Alisa Persons, chronicling the artistic achievements and history of cartoon voice actors from the past and the present.
It was published by the University Press of Mississippi in December 2004.
Summary
Drawn from dozens of personal interviews, the book features various biographies, anecdotes, credit listings, and photographs pertaining to thirty-nine of the hidden artists of show business. The featured biographies span many animation studios and production companies, and discuss many details about well-known and distinguished voice actors, such as Beavis and Butt-Head and King of the Hill creator and lead voice artist Mike Judge, who got his start as an engineer for a weapons contractor); Bart Simpson's voice actress Nancy Cartwright, an Ohio native who became the star protégé of Daws Butler ; and Wayne Allwine and Russi Taylor, the real-life husband-and-wife duo who, at the time of this book's publication, were the current voice actors for Mickey and Minnie Mouse, respectively.List of voice actors discussed in this book
- Charlie Adler
- Dayton Allen
- Wayne Allwine
- Jackson Beck
- Mary Kay Bergman
- Mel Blanc
- Daws Butler
- Nancy Cartwright
- Adriana Caselotti
- Dan Castellaneta
- Art Clokey
- Townsend Coleman
- Wally Cox
- Jim Cummings
- E.G. Daily
- Nicole David
- June Foray
- Paul Frees
- Sterling Holloway
- Mike Judge
- Tom Kenny
- John Kricfalusi
- Maurice LaMarche
- Norma Macmillan
- Bob McFadden
- Jack Mercer
- Don Messick
- Rob Paulsen
- Mae Questel
- Alan Reed
- Chris Sarandon
- Bill Scott
- Kath Soucie
- Jean Vander Pyl
- Janet Waldo
- Frank Welker
- Billy West
- Paul Winchell
Background
In the earliest days of cartoons, voice actors were seldom credited for their work, and prior to 1990, voice actors' potential as real actors was overlooked even by the Screen Actors Guild, with Mel Blanc, the so-named "Man of 1,000 Voices", being the only voice actor known to the general public.Now, Oscar-winning celebrities clamor to guest star on animated television shows and features ; however, despite the crushing turnouts at signings for such television series as Animaniacs, The Simpsons, and SpongeBob SquarePants, most voice actors, even in 21st-century animation, continue to work in relative anonymity.