Jeffrey Bergman (born July 10, 1960)[1][2] is an American voice actor who has provided the modern-day voices of various classic cartoon characters, most notably with Looney Tunes and Hanna-Barbera.
Bergman was born on July 10, 1960, to a Jewish family in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[2][3] Throughout his early life, he impersonated several celebrities and cartoon characters, his first impression being comic influence Ed Sullivan at the age of 6. At the age of 15, Bergman began doing impressions of various Looney Tunes characters.[2]
He studied theatre and communications at the University of Pittsburgh where he first did voice work after becoming involved with a student-run radio station and interning at the KQV and WDVE radio stations.[2][4] While there, he made his first demo reel and was profiled in a story on KDKA-TV's Evening Magazine. The story was picked up on similar TV news magazines shows and helped land him his representation with William Morris Agency following his graduation from Pitt in 1983.
During his time at university, Bergman attended an on-campus lecture by Mel Blanc, who was best known for voicing the Looney Tunes such as Bugs Bunny. Bergman later tracked Blanc down and met him at his Oakland hotel room in 1981, where Bergman imitated Blanc's characters for him, earning himself a 45-minute session. Bergman credits Blanc with helping him graduate two years later.[2][4]
Career
Bergman voiced the Pillsbury Doughboy from 1986 to 2014 following Paul Frees' death in 1986.[5] Bergman's work with Warner Bros. began in 1986, recording voices for The Bugs Bunny Show. After being rebuffed several times by Warner Bros. directors, he recorded a tape of himself as several of Blanc's characters, including Bugs Bunny. He took the tape to the production company and used a switch to toggle back and forth between his work and the original Mel Blanc recording. Then-Warner Bros. president Edward Bleier was unable to tell the difference between the voices,[6] and Bergman, at the age of 29, became the first performer to provide the voice of Bugs Bunny after Mel Blanc died on July 10, 1989 – Bergman's 29th birthday.[2]
Outside of the Looney Tunes, Bergman also voiced George Jetson and Mr. Spacely in Jetsons: The Movie (1990) when their previous voice actors George O'Hanlon and Mel Blanc both died during production;[6] he had been working at his local radio station in Pennsylvania when he received the call to travel to California and complete the dialogue. He also voiced George Jetson in the theme park attraction The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera. By the mid-1990s, Bergman decided to not continue voicing the Looney Tunes, due to reluctance about relocating to Los Angeles. At the time, he was living in Pittsburgh so Warner Bros. hired other voice actors such as Joe Alaskey (who was the first person to replace Blanc as the voice of Yosemite Sam in Who Framed Roger Rabbit in 1988), Greg Burson, Bob Bergen, Billy West and Blanc's son Noel Blanc.[8]
Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Bergman continued voicing various Hanna-Barbera characters, namely Fred Flintstone, in newer specials such as The Flintstones: On the Rocks following Henry Corden's retirement from the role in 2000, only understudying the voices of the Looney Tunes in times when Alaskey and West were not available. In 2003, he voiced Bugs in a sketch on the NBC comedy show Saturday Night Live. Eventually, after almost 20 years, and after sporadically appearing as the Looney Tunes characters for nearly two decades, he returned as the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Foghorn Leghorn, Sylvester the Cat, Pepé Le Pew and Tweety in 2011's The Looney Tunes Show.[4] He also returned for the 2015 series New Looney Tunes, voicing Bugs, Foghorn, Sylvester and Elmer Fudd, as well as other minor characters such as Michigan J. Frog. He also voices some characters in Looney Tunes Cartoons; Eric Bauza voices Bugs, Daffy, and Tweety for that series, with Bergman handling Foghorn, Sylvester and Elmer Fudd.
^Leigh Livingstone and Tim Iffland. "Jeff Bergman". Popcorn Podcast (Podcast). Archived from the original on July 24, 2022.
^The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown! Closing Credits
^Bergman, Jeff (Summer 2021). "Making A Good Impression". Pitt Magazine (Interview). Interviewed by Susan Wiedel. University of Pittsburgh. Archived from the original on June 29, 2021. The movie stars LeBron James, Zendaya, Don Cheadle—and Bergman, of course, who voices Bugs Bunny, Sylvester the Cat, Yosemite Sam, Yogi Bear and Fred Flintstone.
