Paul Winchell, voice of Tigger, dies

Paul Winchell, voice of Tigger, dies
Los Angeles Times

Sunday, June 26, 2005

Paul Winchell, the voice of Tigger in Winnie the Pooh features for more than three decades and a versatile ventriloquist who became a fixture in early children's television along with his dummies Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff, has died. He was 82.

Mr. Winchell died early Friday in his sleep at his home in Moorpark, Calif., Burt Du Brow, a television producer and close family friend, said Saturday.

Although he was a legendary ventriloquist and built a career attracting legions on followers on that dwindling art, Mr. Winchell's most durable legacy might be his rich voice as Tigger and other animated characters on television and in motion pictures.

He became the lovable Tigger in 1968 for Disney's Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day, which earned an Academy Award for best animated short film. Mr. Winchell continued to voice A.A. Milne's imaginative little tiger on television and the big screen through Winnie the Pooh: Seasons of Giving in 1999. In recent years, Jim Cummings has voiced Tigger as well as Pooh.



snip



http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/nation/epaper/2005/06/26/a21a_winchell_0626.html

Thank you Mr. Winchell for a wonderful characterization.

L-

"...Mr. Winchell was also an inventor who held 30 patents, including one for an early artificial heart he built in 1963 and then donated to the University of Utah for research. Dr. Robert Jarvik and other University of Utah researchers later became well-known for the Jarvik-7 which was implanted into patients after 1982.

Among Winchell's other inventions were an early disposable razor, a flameless cigarette lighter, an invisible garter belt and an indicator to show when frozen food had gone bad after a power outage.

Very gifted individual...

L-

I want to see that invisible garter belt though.

That's very sad news.

screw the Pooh!

Paul Winchell devoted much of his time in the seventies and eighties to his inventions, which included an artificial heart

"The Winchell Mahoney Show" used to be on after school in Philadelphia where I lived.

George W. Bush, a k a Dick Cheney's Knucklehead Smiff, has simply surrounded himself with unscrupulous people such as Donald Rumsfeld and John Ashcroft. Rumsfeld looks worse than most of us when he is sweating and he seems to be doing a lot of that these days. John Ashcroft we may recall, was the incumbent Republican senator from Missouri who lost a bid for re-election to a dead man. That's how much his local countrypersons felt about him.
http://www.westmilfordnow.com/wmn-4-14.htm

I live near Milford, but I don't know where that is. Near Philly?

up near the NY/NJ border

Could it be that he's a love child of K. Smiff and the Mad Magazine guy?
Maybe one of them was a cross dresser...

Rest in Peace Paul. :-(

He's one of my kids' favorite voices, and favorite characters. We named a cat Tigger. So sad. A toast to an amazing life, Mr. Winchell.

I loved his evil, but almost heartwarmingly-pathetic, Smurficidal wizard.

I always take it hard when a voice over actor dies.

Of all the people in the Entertainment Industry, I have always held the VO people in the highest regard- much higher than the "A-List" stars who earn $20 million or more per film.

Historically, voice over actors* have had it as bad as writers in Hollywood. It was only in the last few years that many were even given proper credit for their characterizations. Most cartoon shows produced earlier than 2000 had all the actors in the entire season lumped into one giant credit at the end of the show. Unless one was very good at recognizing voices, it was impossible to figure out which actor did any particular voice in the episode (especially since the credits often featured people who were not even in the particular one that aired). To make matters worse, some actors who originated a role on television saw that part given to another actor with more name-recognition if the show was translated to the big screen.** Speaking of theatrical releases, how insulted would you be as an actor to see these "celebrity voices" get bigger credits on screen for minor roles when the people behind the voices of major characters get the same, tired old mass credit at the end of the movie just like any other episode on television?***

Most importantly, there is a world of difference between the acting done by voice over artists and their more-visible counterparts in live-action productions. All a voice over actor has to work with is his voice. He cannot rely on the audience to see any subtleties of facial expression or body language. If the actor in the recording booth cannot convey all the emotional range needed for a role strictly through voice, the actor fails. Too often big-budget animated movies fail critically (and financially) due to the simple fact that, in an effort to bring people to the movie based solely on the name-recognition factor, the producers hire "A-List" stars whose performances ultimately feel wooden and fake since these pretty-faced actors lack the incredible skill needed to act with voice alone.****

Evil Kumquat
___________________________________

*For the purposes of brevity, when you see the word "actor(s)", please read it as "actor(s) and actress(es)".

**When The Jetsons Movie was made, instead of getting Janet Waldo to reprise her role of Judy Jetson, the producers got "singer" Tiffany to do it instead, in a vain attempt to cash in on the last of that bubblegum princess's fading popularity.

***Don Johnson received top billing for 1987's G.I. Joe: The Movie for a character whose inclusion for the movie felt unnecessarily tacked-on.

****Titan: A.E. is an excellent example of how NOT to cast an animated film. Shrek, however, worked in spite of its casting- although Cameron Diaz's Fiona was still pretty poorly acted. In both movies, Fiona sounded like Cameron Diaz reading a script. One could almost imagine her sipping from her beer and belching into the mic to the irritation of the vocal director.

And, "S" is for "Sad." I love Tigger. This is sad news, indeed.

tiggers are made for bouncing. ttfn :(

I will never forget the night on "Laugh-In" where your "dummy" began to fall apart during the sketch. You were left holding a stick with a lower jaw attached to it and I rolled on the floor, gasping for breath!

Roy, The Martian Joy Boy, was a helluva bit, too. Fly free forever, Winch!

:loveya:

you'll not soon be forgotten. :cry:

later for you paul

You will not be forgotten, as more children become Tigger fans for generations to come. You were always my favorite and I'm glad I was able to pass my love of you onto my own children.

TTFN. :(

It was a silly TV puppet show, but it was all Paul Winchell and I followed his career ever since. He will sorely be missed.

Also, not sure if anyone else posted, he was instrumental in the development of the artificial heart.

Another great voice of our life and childhood as moved on. Peace and glory, Mr. Winchell.

I have some fond memories of Tigger. RIP.

TTFN

:(

I don't when exactly--it had undoubtedly been in print for many years when I checked it out of the school library and studied it assiduously for many weeks. I even learned a few of the tricks of the trade but never got to far. I was probably 10 or 11 years old at the time and that was many years ago.

May he rest in peace.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0934593/

RL