Jim Cummings
Jim Cummings is widely considered to be a successor to the late Mel Blanc. He speaks in a deep, gravelly voice for most roles, but can do many variations of it. His skills as a mimic have earned him scores of opportunities at Walt Disney Productions, in particular. At Disney, Cummings not only replaced the ailing Sterling Holloway as the voice of Winnie-the-Pooh, but later took over as the voice of Tigger when well-known ventriloquist and voice actor Paul Winchell retired, and also voiced Crud. Cummings was hired to sing the song "Be Prepared"in the film THE LION KING, He was also Ed the Hyena. He also sang for another non-singing actor Christopher Lloyd for the song, "In the Dark of the Night" in the animated film, Anastasia. He also played the star of the series Darkwing Duck
Cummings is the only original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles voice actor to return for the 2007 movie. His first three TMNT appearances were Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Turtles in Time. The 2007 movie was Cummings' sixth computer-animated movie appearance. His first five computer-animated movie appearances included Antz, The Nuttiest Nutcracker, Shrek, Jimmy Neutron Boy Genius, and Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas; and his latest animated movie appearances are Bee Movie, Bionicle: The Legend Reborn, and The Princess and the Frog.
In the course of two decades, Cummings' career as a voice actor has taken him from bit parts to leading roles in major series at various studios, including Nickelodeon, Warner Bros, Hanna-Barbera, DreamWorks, and 20th Century Fox studios. His most memorable roles, however, have been at Walt Disney Studios. There, he provided voices for a variety of television series, including leading roles in Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears, (taking over the character of Zummi Gummi after Paul Winchell's departure from the role), DuckTales (1987), Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers,[1] Darkwing Duck, Goof Troop, Bonkers (voicing both Bonkers and Lucky), Gargoyles, and House of Mouse, and movies such as Hercules, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Pocahontas and the Disney special edition of Alice in Wonderland (as the Cheshire Cat singing "I'm Odd"). Cummings also voiced the non-speaking roles of Ed the laughing hyena in 1994's The Lion King and Duncan the horse for one episode of The Simpsons.
Other notable roles include "Mr. Bumpy" in the cult Claymation show Bump in the Night, Dr. Robotnik on Sonic the Hedgehog (in both the dramatic, action-oriented SatAM adaptation and in the unaired pilot of the wacky, Looney Tunes-esque syndicated series), Mayor Manx on Swat Kats, Psy-Crow and Bob the Killer Goldfish on Earthworm Jim and Taz the Tazmanian Devil on Taz-Mania and a number of other projects.
In addition to Taz and Pooh, Cummings has over the years become the official voice for a number of legendary cartoon characters, including Tigger, Pete, Humphrey the Bear, Dick Dastardly, the Slag Brothers, Big Gruesome, Private Meekly, Clyde, and Morocco Mole. He also did some voices on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1987 such as Leatherhead the mutant alligator and some additional characters. He also did the voice of Don Karnage in Disney's Tale Spin. Cummings has also provided voices for video games, television commercials, and movie trailers, and is the current official announcer for Kids' WB!, as well as the official spokesperson for the current Cheez-It commercials. Recently, he returned to his role as Taz on Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas.
In the world of video games, Cummings has done the voice of Minsc of Baldur's Gate/Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn and Drizzt Do'Urden in the first Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance game. He is also prominently displayed in the credits of Kingdom Hearts as Pooh, Tigger, and Pete. Cummings provided the voices for "Bad Mr. Frosty", "Hougan", and "Sumo Santa" in Clay Fighter 63 1/3. He also voices "Sarge" and the other soldiers in the Army Men games. In Ys Book I and II for the Turbografx -16 CD system, he is credited as voicing "Dalles", and he provided voices for minor characters in Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers. He played several characters in the little-known Toonstruck. He also provided three of four of the voices of the main antagonist of Fallout, The Master. He also provides the voice of the Terror Mask in the 2010 Splatterhouse remake for the Xbox 360 and Play Station 3 He will also replace Tony Jay as Judge Frollo in Kingdom Hearts 3D.
In addition, Cummings narrates the current Epcot fireworks show at Walt Disney World, IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth. his Cummings has a notable cameo in Comic Book The Movie as an inebriated party-goer. This is one of very few live-action appearances. The movie stars many other voice actors, including Tom Kenny, Maurice LaMarche, Billy West and Mark Hamill.
Cummings even did make some vocal performances using his voice at normal pitch for some younger looking characters like Witterquick from Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light: Knights of the Magical Light and Buddy Boar from Taz-Mania.
Tropes associated with Jim Cummings include
- Large Ham: MINSC. And believe it or not, that's not the only hams Cummings got.
- Man of a Thousand Voices: Dear GOD. The man is capable of a crazy amount of different voices: ranging from high pitched heroic voices, guttural growly voices, very convincing Cajun accents (And has done several different sounding Cajun accents), spot-on impressions of actors like Sterling Holloway and Jeremy Irons, low-pitched smooth villainous voices, and has an overall mean ear for accents.
- Talking to Himself: He's Pooh and Tigger in the Winnie The Pooh franchise, and voices like five characters in Darkwing Duck And that's just on a normal basis. Not to mention that when he takes over singing for Scar in "Be Prepared," on of the hyenas he's singing to is Ed, also voiced by him.
- ↑ voicing Fat Cat, Professor Nimnul, and was the second voice for Monterey Jack, replacing Peter Cullen, even though Cummings voiced Monty in the pilot movie, "To The Rescue"