Alan Oppenheimer (He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, The NeverEnding Story)

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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slash Jim Cummings Podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Do it now? How you doing out there?

Speaker 1 (00:27):
It's me Tigger, I am.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Doc Wayne Duck.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
It's me Bunkers Deep Bobcat.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
All right, y'all?

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Is it great? Your favorite firefly you desire?

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Hold old knock Gud.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
My name is Jim Cummings and welcome to tuned In.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Welcome back, everybody to another episode of Tuned In with
Jim Cummings. I'm producer Chris join as always by the
legend of himself, mister Jim Cummings. How are you doing today, sir?

Speaker 1 (00:51):
We are back in the salad again, having a great
day with my old pal Allen.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Life is good today.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
You guys are in for a treat absolutely.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
Today's guest is none other than Alan Oppenheimer, legendary actor,
voice actor, stage actor, many many more.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
Pleasure for star, the star of anything that there is
to be a star of. You are, we're We're well now, No,
I think that goes forever.

Speaker 2 (01:18):
I think thank you. Once you make your mark, you
it's a mark. I used to have a good table
in a restaurant.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Oh yeah, now was it Chasins. It was.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
I'll tell you what happened. Wonderful Kate Mandalini there on
Wilshire and Dohini. We were on our way next Academy
to see a movie and we dropped in. I had
no reservation. There's already ten people were against the wall
waiting for the table. So we look in and the
steward says, yes. I said Robert Redford. She said, right
this way and took me to a table at the

(01:52):
back of the food. I said, you never looked up.
She said. I loved your answer.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
Yeah, that's good. And so you had dinner with Robert Redford.
Obviously he was he didn't show, he didn't show.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
I was Robert. I know, I know, Yes, you were.
You see the similarity, don't you? Yes? And and and
you were also.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
In in Sunset Boulevard.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Well that was a job. I was three years in that. Yeah, yeah, that.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Was cecil B. That's that's way up there too. Yeah,
it's not Robert Redford, but it's cecil B to Mill.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
Not bad, not bad at all. In the studio, Yeah, yeah,
I got a great gig that was.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Yeah, I would imagine, I remember, I remember. I think
we probably just met doing one of our crazy animation gigs.
And next thing I know, boom, there you were.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
On the on the on the they were.

Speaker 1 (02:50):
They had like five commercials in a row for that show.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
You guys did kick some butt. I didn't do any
commercials show.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
Yes you did. No, no you didn't. But they had
kids in the show.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Yeah. Yeah, you mean they didn't pay you.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
I'm shocked. Except no, we're not. We're not shocked at all.
Oh man, you've had a I think you it's safe
to say you've had a storied career.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
I think so. I mean stage and ten years in
repertory theater and out here and every sitcom in the
sixties and seventies week after week, and movies and voiceovers
and all of that stuff. You know, it's been wonderful. Yes,

(03:37):
the only thing I never did was porn. Oh well, well,
well I auditioned, but I missed it by that much.
Oh hey, good night everybody there they go, Yeah, old folks,
I'm here all week.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
I just say, oh my gosh, yeah, that is crazy.

Speaker 3 (03:54):
I was listening to an interview that you had done.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
What's that?

Speaker 3 (03:57):
I was listening to another interview that you had done,
and you said something that really struck me. And I
didn't expect to be as shocked as I was, But
you said you were a part of the AFRA union
because there was no TV yet.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
I joined when I was fourteen years old.

Speaker 3 (04:11):
Yeah, and that really I never thought about the union
before TV. That's wild.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
My card has only four numbers, one zero, two five,
and most of those people who already dead. Wow, no kidding.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, And that was the amount of people that were
in the union, members of the U, of the Radio Union,
the radio un that's true.

Speaker 2 (04:32):
Remember radio.

Speaker 1 (04:33):
You had to take away the tea and it's AFRA,
that's right.

Speaker 2 (04:36):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (04:37):
And that's where you got your first.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
AFRO forty years fourteen years old on New Year's Day,
an extra on the FBI and Piece of War, an
extra because my mother had lunch with Bill Paley's secretary.
Oh wow, and my mother said, oh, my son's trying
to be so they hired me as an extra in radio.

(05:04):
In radio, I kept the stub twenty five dollars I
was paid.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
Really, that sounds like it would have been pretty decent money.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Then, yeah, sure, it's like, oh it's like two thousand. Wow,
well I just did that quickly.

Speaker 1 (05:22):
Sure anybody buying that?

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Okay? Good? Yeah, maybe two hundred and fifty.

Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yeah, yeah, that sounds about right. That actually does sound
about right.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:30):
Man, oh man, well inflation and now here you are
speaking of being inflated. Here we are, here, we are today,
we're inflating everything in sight.

Speaker 2 (05:40):
It's great to have.

Speaker 1 (05:41):
You, man, it's really great, Thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:44):
We've worked together on a few things here and there.
And honestly, I was because you know, half the people
that I know are from animation, most of the people
that I know, and you are one of those guys
that's been on screen on the big screen, on the
little screen, on the no screen, and you're on a

(06:05):
small screen today. There, let's see. And uh And I'm
just glad to have you. But I mean, you've truly done.
Do you dance too, because that'll really kill me. I
was fired, but fired, Oh see, I told him.

Speaker 2 (06:20):
I said, I am not fred as Stair. They said,
we noticed replaced. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:27):
Yeah, and he's he rests rested easily that day, I
would imagine.

Speaker 2 (06:31):
Yeah. But I love musicals. I did eighteen musicals in
the summertime, summer stock musicals. Oh it wasn't one summer.
I hope he stretched it out three summers, six of summer. Yeah.
Oh I love that.

Speaker 3 (06:44):
Wow. Six plays of summer is no easy feet Yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:46):
Wow, that's a lot of memorizing. I could One time.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
I was one of my first summer stock jobs and
the play was Summer and Smoked Tennesseee Williams and the
lead got sick. I learned that part overnight. I was
a very I could do that. Is that why I
can't remember a goddamn line? But I did. I remembered
I did that part overnight.

Speaker 1 (07:14):
Jeez. Wow, that's it's amazing. Yeah, that's that's a kind
of amazing. Yeah, especially if you had more than say.

Speaker 2 (07:23):
Three lines. Yeah, you probably did, so that that hurts
to you. Even think about somewhere that I first had
a visitation from a dead person who came into my bedroom.
That's a fascinating thing I was in. I had a
room in this house, and about three in the morning

(07:45):
I woke up to see this little old lady in
a bobushka about five feet tall, walking towards my closet,
and I said, what do you want? And she learned
and backed out through the door and one step at
a time down and the doors in the neighborhood went crazy,
nice hitting. And then it happened the night of the
night and a third night. She was looking for where

(08:09):
she had lived. This was a new apartment building. They
had raised a house and built this, and she was
climbed back to where she was. Oh my god, yes, wow, yeah,
that was this outside of outside of Columbus. Was it
outside of the Columbus Ohio? Yeah, it might have been

(08:31):
that one.

Speaker 1 (08:32):
Well, I'm from Youngstown, and Ohio is pretty haunted.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:36):
Have you ever seen a ghost, Jim?

Speaker 2 (08:41):
No, but I saw a ufo? Yeah did you really? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (08:45):
Well, sure, I'm sure, sure, sure did well. I used
to be a deckhand on a riverboat out of New Orleans.
You will wear a deckhand on tugboats when I was
a kid. I was nineteen, and I did it because
it was it's Mark Twain's fault that I did it.
I read all those books and it sounded really good.
It sounded very romantic. Hook Finn Tom Sawyer on the

(09:06):
Mississippi River that I can't tell you how different it
is now hard to say.

Speaker 2 (09:12):
You know, there are no kids on rafts, forget it.

Speaker 1 (09:15):
But I was a dick hand on a riverboat and
it was about three in the morning, two in the morning,
and I'm sitting there in the gally and uh and
reading a Robert Heinlein book, a science fiction Time for
the Stars. I'm not kidding, and uh, And because I

(09:36):
was a big science fiction guy, still in and reading it,
reading it. All of a sudden, ning ning ning ing
ing ing ding ding ding ding ding dinging scared the crap.

Speaker 3 (09:43):
Out of me.

Speaker 1 (09:44):
There are there are certain rings like ding ding ding
means go out and tighten up the toe, ding ding
ding means go do something with the lights, ding ding
ding ding ding does something. But ding ding ding ding
ding ding ning ning ning means something's hitting the fans.
So I up there and I ran up, and the
guys looking, and there's a When you go through Louisiana,

(10:07):
you're on the inner coastal Canal, You're you're not in
the golf.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
You're in inland.

Speaker 1 (10:11):
You're surrounded by Louisiana and in West Louisiana, Eastern Texas,
lots of oil wells, lots of conning towers, lots you know,
things like that. And I looked up and I looked
up and there was like red lights over here, and
then there was like red blue, red blue, red blue,
red blue, red blue, red blue, and it was and

(10:32):
it was just kind of sitting there and it was different.
It wasn't a standard. I never saw one like that.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
And the guy goes, look at that. You see that.
It just moved.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
It moved, those lights moved and I said, no, it didn't.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
You moved.

Speaker 1 (10:48):
We're on a boat. You looked at it a couple
seconds ago, and you looked at it now. And then
and while I was explaining my theory as to why
he thought it moved, it went and I said it moved.
And I grabbed the spot like because they have these big,
nine mean big, just gigantic, like three garbage cans big.

(11:12):
And I turned on the light and it was cranking
and you have to do two. You have to do
one like this and one like that to get it
to go. And I was because I wanted to shine
it on that the thing, and it just went, not
a sound, not a sound. Oh, it took off, It
just went, It just left.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
It was not there anymore.

Speaker 1 (11:31):
And I went, okay, so that wasn't a plane and
that was I wish it was more interesting, but that
I think, Yeah, but it was.

Speaker 2 (11:45):
It's that's what happened.

Speaker 1 (11:47):
And it was in that time.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
I don't know the early stuff. There were tons of
Flag Saucer.

Speaker 1 (11:55):
Sightings, UFO sightings nineteen fifties, No, No, it was the
next time around.

Speaker 2 (12:00):
I think it was. It was the seventies, maybe every
Did we have him in the nineties. Maybe we've got
him now. Who knows a lot of Now we've got
drones that look like butterflies hovering outside your window. Yeah
that's true. Huh. Yeah, that seems private anymore. Jin be careful. Yeah,

(12:23):
so you're not a reputation buster. Yeah, I have a
reputation to live down to.

Speaker 3 (12:30):
So you talk about starting on the radio at fourteen
years old, and then where's it? Where's your career go
from there? Do you stay in radio? Do you start
doing plays as a ky?

Speaker 2 (12:38):
Yeah? I went to Carnegie Tech a drama student. Wow,
And in my junior year, I saw another actor looking
at the callboard and said to call Lionel Polton Katika.
I said, what is that? And he says, I do
radio shows with Katika. I said, well, would you ask
him if I can? I did three years every week
playing a different scientist, different dialog, different scientists. Then when

(13:02):
I was in the army, I wound up as a
disc jockey in Trieste and they had some of those recordings.
No kidding, yeah really it was called Adventures in Research,
Adventures in Research. Wow. And the one time I was
called upon to do a South African British you know,
I had never heard it, but in my mind I

(13:23):
put together. I knew it was the bores of Belgium
and the English, and in my imagination I created a
South African accent. Years later, the delegate actually in the
U n was that. I said, God, I nailed it.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
Then, really, wow, can you give us some because I'm
trying to place I'm trying.

Speaker 2 (13:45):
No no, no, no, no no no, we're all dead.
Oh I see, well there you have it.

Speaker 1 (13:52):
Good night everybody that was yeah, that's well, you've had
a crazy career.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
Oh yeah, my goodness. Fired several times too been fired.

Speaker 1 (14:02):
Oh yeah, I can't see. Well, you're so cantankerous. He's
such a You're such a bastage.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
What the heck? How so well? I auditioned for what
was it called the Jewish musical? Oh boy on the roof,
on the roof, it's got to be fair. Yeah. I
auditioned because I was doing Summer Stock and one of
the actors they said, you know, the auditioning, So I
called up, got the appointment. You know, so I killed

(14:28):
in New York.

Speaker 1 (14:29):
Who are you auditioning for tea or just general auditions?
Oh yeah, so no, not to you, No, no, I
was still only in my thirties.

Speaker 2 (14:40):
Oh okay, that wasn't worth. So I came on stage
and it's just a dark theater, the light here and
a piano and introduced myself. Oh yes, miss Dropham, and
I used to have you here if you'll just give
your music to them, I said, oh, I'm going to
do it. A cappella said, oh all right, so this

(15:01):
is what happened. I just finished doing Gypsy, so I
knew one number, Oh, and I did. It's funny. You're
a stranger who's come here, come from another town. Funny.
I'm a stranger myself here small old, isn't it? Thank you?
I said, there there. Oh god, that's the funniest audition

(15:25):
I ever had. We wait a minute, there's more. No,
there isn't no, there isn't.

Speaker 1 (15:33):
Take that with you, Oh manell these stories I love? Yeah, yeah,
well you must not have had that very moten you
few times A few times. Yeah, nothing worth mentioning except
for that one. I can come close, but I really
can't top that one.

Speaker 2 (15:50):
That's not bad. That's not bad.

Speaker 1 (15:52):
Oh god, well yeah, it's it's good when you're only
dissed by the best.

Speaker 2 (15:57):
You know.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
I have a story that I tell where Robin Williams
pretty much gave me the finger, and.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
So I got that going for me. That's a big plus.
That's a big bluz.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
I know.

Speaker 2 (16:09):
I saw him in his debut at the Comedy Store.
Oh you're kidding, you know, And there was a heckler
in the audience. He took him apart and the guy
didn't even know it. He just cut and skewered. The
audience was laughing. He didn't he was a couple. He
didn't even realize he was being sliced up. Oh man,

(16:33):
old Robin Williams was brilliant. Yeah he was scary.

Speaker 1 (16:37):
Yeah, yeah, he's he's I always say he's singular. There,
there's him, and then there's everybody else. Well, I said
about Richard Pryor to the two of them.

Speaker 2 (16:49):
I did a movie with him. He's spectacular. I was
a real estate guy. It's one word title. I was
on a plane and they were showing it and I
said to my wife, Oh God, I am so such
a ham in this movie. But I can't walk out.
We're thirty thousand feet Okay. So when the movie was over,

(17:13):
I said, geez, you know, I was pretty good in that.
I wasn't I didn't ham it up too much. Pretty good.
But my sister lives at eighty third in Madison, and
she's a painter. She spends a lot of time in
the museum. And this is the beginning of Robin's career.
And he came down the steps to much applause, and
he stood there and did twenty minutes improv for the

(17:35):
people in the street there. Wow, no kidding, Yeah, wow, brilliant.
That's like a super power brilliant. Yeah that how do you?
How do you do that? That's what we don't. Yeah,
I don't. He do he do? We don't.

Speaker 1 (17:53):
I could read for twenty minutes, you know, but much less.

Speaker 2 (17:58):
That's yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:59):
Well, you know, there's a few of us out there,
a few of them out there. Yeah, and uh and
he and I put him in Richard Pryor. It's kind
of like Richard Pryor Robin Williams, and then you're kind
of looking for everybody else, you know, Steve Martin's way
up there, of course. But did you have any idols
that you not necessarily comediens?

Speaker 2 (18:21):
But I worked with George C. Scott. Oh, and I
stole his voice for a cartoon too, No kidding, Transformers Warpath.
Oh really really yeah, that's right. Don't give me a
goddamn lip. How boy? Oh Man Warpath perfect. Yeah, but
I stole from him. I'd love that man and he
got on so famously. Yeah. I did the Hindenburg with him,

(18:43):
the movie.

Speaker 1 (18:46):
Wow, How well did it? How did it go over
with the movie like the Hinden Burton?

Speaker 2 (18:51):
No, I'm just kidd of it. Blew up? It did blow. Yeah.
They had to all set for the main shot of
all the blowing up, twelve cameras and something happened, and
it started prematurely and Robert weissid roll the roll and rolling.
You only got one shot here, and everybody ran for
their cameras and they got it all. Oh, the actual

(19:13):
the blowing up scene, yes, oh it started ahead of
time by an accident, and you got one take on that.

Speaker 1 (19:20):
Yeah, I would think, yeah, yeah, yeah, can we can
we wait till the lighting's a little bit No, that's
that's pretty scary. Well, as long as you weren't standing
underneath it.

Speaker 2 (19:31):
Okay, good, that's But I did another movie, Good Little
Big Man, and I played the Harry lieutenant and this
is Custer's charge and I'm riding with you know whatever
twenty other Custer's been and my foot came out of
the stirrup stirrup, and I wrapped my leg around the horse.

(19:51):
Now he's heading for the camera, and thank god there
was an extra stuntman got next to me and pushed
me this way. I would have ruined Dutch. Oh my god.
And this is a little big man. Yeah, okay, yeah,
so it was Dustin. Yeah he was good. So I

(20:11):
die by an arrow in the back, you know. Oh,
so they had that all walked up, had a piece
of ball. So something under my shirt and he fires
the arrow. It was a real arrow he had set
for the intensity. And I died, oh wait, bals woods
pretty thin. Pretty well, I'll tell you what happened. Oh.

(20:31):
The director was a pen wasn't unhappy. He said, we
have to do that again, and he quietly said to
the special effects turn it up a notch. Now the
arrow went through the ball. So and I went, ah,
thank you, that was really good. Alan.

Speaker 1 (20:48):
It was if you were in pain, that's right, what happened?

Speaker 2 (20:52):
Thank you? I mean, did you well? I had another wonderful,
wonderful anecdote in that MOVIEA yeah, I played the Harry
lieutenant with Custer, who was Mulligan, Uh, Bob Dick Mulligan.
They were brothers. One was the director. And oh anyway,
he was playing Custer and there's a scene where I say,

(21:16):
we can't go down there because they know when they kills.
He said, well, I do anything to do is ego Custer,
And he said something I was supposed to go just
like he reads me out, you know. Cut, Okay, thank you.
Now Mulligan comes up to me. He says, what the

(21:38):
hell's the matter with you? I said, what can't you
get this goddamn thing right? And I went, thank you. Cut.
He told them all Roland without telling me because he
didn't want me to act.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
Oh so he wanted you to act like you were shot,
like he wanted to.

Speaker 2 (21:58):
Know, not shot, but probably insulted as you know. Oh yeah,
yeah yeah. So so Mulligan says to me, what's the
matter with you? Thank you? That that's right? And I
just went cut, thank you, thank you. Ben oh Man,
I said, Wellams, I guess there's more than one way
to get your shot. Yeah, I apologize, but it worked well.

(22:19):
But oh man, a man, whatever the director's tricks, you know. Wow, yeah,
those are the stories I love about this business. Yeah,
I would think, well you must have so many great
human interest stories.

Speaker 1 (22:32):
Yeah, yeah, who speaking of human interest, who is the
biggest pain in the ass? Are they too numerous to mention?
And are they still around? And will you be sued
if you answered this question?

Speaker 2 (22:45):
You can? Should you get any? And they're both dead?
So you should I tell you.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
Okay, well there you go, But that's what I But
you're a hell of a an off color story on this.

Speaker 2 (23:00):
Yeah, probably depends on the Okay, Well I was I
was at a convention and this agent or representative, so
he gave this dinner and he invited me although I
wasn't a client. And after dinner he gets me to
stand in there and he says, let me ask you
something now, and did you have a work with anybody
that was really difficult and difficult? I said, yeah, I said,

(23:26):
I said, I've worked with some guys who screwed me
over so bad I had to take the morning after pill.
He looked, she's still using that line. Yeah, oh god,
that's painful. Yeah, okay, that's pretty good. That's not bad.

Speaker 1 (23:44):
And I promise I'll give you credit occasionally when I
used I think Jeff gives me credit.

Speaker 2 (23:51):
Okay, all right, that's pretty good. Oh god, I was
screwed so many times I had to take the morning
after bill. Oh there's got to be a morning man,
oh man. Okay, yeah, So where are we? Oh? Yeah,
go ahead? Oh no, no, I insist you go ahead,
you lead.

Speaker 3 (24:10):
But let's let's bring it around to your voice acting
career when you first started. I mean that, yeah, I mean,
of course, you've played the voice of so many iconic characters,
you know, mighty iconic.

Speaker 2 (24:22):
Yeah, skeletor falkeletor Falcore. That movie is a never ending story.
Uh huh. He hired me for Falcre and I wound
up doing four voices on it.

Speaker 1 (24:32):
Oh I didn't know that. Yeah, I knew the puppy dragon.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
I do the dragon, you know. And uh, well we
we did that one take, one character. He said, thank you,
thanks very much. I said, kind of a playback. He
said sure, well, it just sure and I looked at
I said, I have to do it again. Oh, we
come back tomorrow, m And I did it the second time,

(24:59):
and that's the version that you see. Oh. The first
one was technically correct but without heart. And the second
time commute had a little bit. Oh okay, yeah yeah yeah.
And then I thank you. He says, could you do
the rock bier? I said, well, let me look at it.
I said, oh my god, yes I can. I love

(25:21):
that guy. Yeah you know, yeah, I know that that
was you. Yeah, and I said thank you. He said,
oh you think you could do good work. I said, okay,
thank you, thank you for me. Oh, this is one
more thing. Oh yeah, but because you do the narrator
at the end, so I'm the announcer at the end

(25:42):
and the last line is but that's another story. Oh
that's perfect. Yeah. Yeah, that was the hell of a movie.
Oh that was really I mean it was different than
I would say about fifty percent of the fans that
come up to me. That's the Yeah, and moved, so moved.
Some of them carry a dog that looks like Falcore.

Speaker 3 (26:06):
That's funny.

Speaker 2 (26:06):
Someone can make souvenirs literally, yeah, give uppy dragon. You
don't what I'm talking about?

Speaker 1 (26:11):
It absolutely, boy, I sure do. Well, that's that's so cool. Well,
he's that's a very beloved character, isn't it. Oh yeah,
you know, it's it's it's in it's in the books,
you know. And I've worked with, uh, your your co
star tray you. Oh yeah, Noah Noah was his name.

(26:32):
And he's a character, does he ever? Yes, he is ever,
that little boy is now, Yes, yes he is. But yeah,
I've seen him at a few different conventions.

Speaker 2 (26:44):
And he's he has his fun yeah, tattoos and rings. Yes, yes,
he's really charming. Yeah. He's a good guy and a
lovely wife and they it's a good couple. Yeah yeah
yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:58):
Oh man, So what is your favorite thing that occupies
you nowadays?

Speaker 2 (27:04):
The retirement retirement.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
Yeah yeah, yeah, Well technically I'm retired, but it doesn't
feel like it. No.

Speaker 2 (27:12):
I mean, the only thing we do. I do is
the conventions. I don't record anymore.

Speaker 3 (27:16):
Yeah, okay, how do you like to spend your time?

Speaker 2 (27:19):
Though, foolishly, I spend a lot of time. If the
Dodgers are on, I watch that, If the Rams are on,
I watch that. I am a sports nut. I played
a lot of paddle tennis until I got to be

(27:39):
about ninety and I could no longer spin around and
I had to stop. And then I had a car
crash a broken hip. So I'm a viewer now, not
a dude. You're just showing off now, Yeah, but I
love that. But I did take up karum billiards. You

(28:00):
know what that is? Three cushion billiards with no pockets,
three balls, red, yellow, and white. And the object is
that your ball the object Your ball has to hit
at least three cushions before it hits the second ball.

(28:20):
Oh my god. So it's a combination of geometry and
speed and english on the ball. It's highly technical and
I am hooked. I am hooked.

Speaker 3 (28:32):
Oh was it on a rectangular table?

Speaker 2 (28:35):
No? A regular table, but no pockets.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
But no pockets.

Speaker 2 (28:39):
Oh, it's wonderful, wonderful, sounds fun. If you go on YouTube,
I'm going to and put in CARAM C I R
O M, and you watch some of these guys by
you How did he do that? You know, the last
shot I made about two years ago, I did a
sixth cushion shot. Six. I had figured it out, you know,

(29:00):
I couldn't believe I did the damn thing. So that's
my key to fame to me. Six cushions. Wow, it's
six cushions ball, cushions.

Speaker 1 (29:14):
Ball.

Speaker 2 (29:16):
Dang. Okay, Yeah, that thing hard. Then you got to
really like, No, it's not hard. It's follow through, follow
through the same as any sport. It isn't the speed,
it's it's the follow through. Yeah, I'm going to check
that out. Oh it's wonderful, very satisfying. Yeah. Yeah, well

(29:36):
I love stuff like that. That's that's pretty cool. I've
never even heard of it. Now I have to. Now
I feel like I'm going to be addicted. It's big.
It's big in Korea, and it's big in Spanish countries
as a matter of fact, where I played well, all
the old timers, the Mexicans and all great players been
playing their whole lives and you stand there and watching

(29:58):
all the shots they make you oh hmmm, kitching.

Speaker 1 (30:04):
and more. You'll feel the difference, So go ahead and
join the tuned In family today at patreon dot com

(30:25):
slash Jim Cummings podcast.

Speaker 2 (30:28):
Do it now.

Speaker 3 (30:29):
You were telling me before we started recording that you
kind of fell into voice acting by mistake, that it
was a well a not a true goal.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
No. I was just a stage actor, you know, who
came out here and suddenly I'm being cast in commercials.
And I went to my agent, Herb Tannon at the time,
and I said, listen, I'm going to wear out my
welcome and go see me on day after day and
they won't hire me. I'd like to do some voiceovers
Lenny Winerom, Joni Gerber, those people. Oh boy, yeah sure.

(31:02):
And we were all with Herb Tannem at the time.
He said, well, yeah, you know, he said, just try me.
He said, well, I'll have you come in and read
a local spot. See how it goes. I booked it. Wow.
Years later he told me, he said, let me tell
you a little story about that audition you did. I said, yeah.
He said, you did it very well. But the slate

(31:23):
when you said this is allan Oppenheimer when you left,
I killed that and put in this is allen Off.
If i'd heard that, they never want to listen to
the commercial. Oh jeez, because you were, Oh you were.
Oh it was so pontifical. Oh yes, yeah, you and
the pope. That's good. We're all mistaken for show that

(31:45):
you didn't know that. Wait who the Pope? I was
in second place last week? No kidding, way, way a second.
I'll tell you a little choke, my favorite joke, favorite joke. Okay,
you got time, don't you? All right? Let's I think
we're okay. So Fellaw goes.

Speaker 3 (32:03):
He has a barber.

Speaker 2 (32:04):
He goes to his Italian barber and he's talking to
him and he says, how are you? It's is on fine,
I'm going on a trip. Oh where do you go?
I'm going to Italy? Why you go to an old
place like Italy. Well, I think, how you go? Alatania?
Ali Ittalia? You lucky that plane don't crash. Go what
are you going to do when you get there? Well,

(32:24):
I'm gonna go to Rome for Rome, oh dirty oldest city.
You don't want to go there? Why? And then I'm
going to go to the coliseum and the Vatican. You
go to the Vatican, you're in the crowd of thirty
thousand people. Why, Well, I want to see the Pope.
The pope little guy in the doorway up there, and
you can't even see him. Have a good trip. I'll
see you when you get their back. So when he

(32:46):
comes back and he says, how was your trip? Is wonderful? Alatalia,
You're lucky it didn't crash. It was a gorgeous plane.
And Rome, Oh, it's a fascinating place. And I went
to the Vatican. Oh yeah, you the guy in the crowd.
How'd that go? Well? The Pope spotted me and he
asked to tea me in the garden to talk with me.

(33:07):
You talk to the Pope? Yes, what do you say?
He said, where do you get that lousy haircut? Is
that a true story? How about that?

Speaker 1 (33:24):
That's not bad.

Speaker 2 (33:25):
Oh yeah, me too. Yeah, where do you get that?
Where do you get that?

Speaker 1 (33:33):
I was having Chicko Mark Mark's uh flashbacks there for
a minute, chick out Chico, Chicko, Chicko, he was the Yeah,
he was the the Italian, right, yes, Mark's brother.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
Yeah, go ahead, tell me the story. Yeah, yeah, well
I don't have one. Oh, Chicko would, but I don't.
I don't, man.

Speaker 1 (33:55):
You know, I was going through your you know, because
I do my little cards here, and it occurs to
me that there isn't a I mean, it would be
probably easier to come up with sitcoms, classic sitcoms that
you weren't on, because you were on every bloody one
of them was. I mean, I'm looking at this and

(34:17):
I mean and things like West Mama's Family, The Bionic Woman,
She's a man saint elsewhere.

Speaker 2 (34:25):
I Happy Days. That's that's that's like I came in late.

Speaker 1 (34:32):
Yeah, but that these are like Mount Rushmore, that's.

Speaker 2 (34:34):
Right, shows six million dollar man, Yeah, six million dollar man. Yeah.
I've had all my parts replaced too.

Speaker 1 (34:43):
Oh yeah yeah yeah, And I'm sure they were even
more expensive. But you were on Hogan's Heroes for cool.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
That was my first. Really, I did about four of those.
They wrote one for me. Finally, where I was an
American flyer was now in the concentration camp, prisoner of war,
but he was. I had my wig on at the time. Ah.
And he comes in and says, hello, chaps, how are
you playing the hero? Youro movies? Did you have a

(35:14):
real asshole? Huh? You had a scarf? I'm sure, yes,
I know, and the mirror there, and I stopped and
talked to myself, Hello, chaps, how are you? Oh man?

Speaker 1 (35:27):
Those are those are some classics? I was, I was
your favorite Nazi. I did three Nazis, which is amazing. Yes,
Jewish guys make the best Nazis for good reason.

Speaker 2 (35:41):
Yeah, yeah, they've got reason to be pissed. Take that.
Yeah there, I was cast in that. I said to
my wife, I don't want to a naziason not funny.
She said, it's a comedy, dear, Nobody takes it seriously,
do it?

Speaker 1 (35:56):
And she was right over Yeah, yeah as usual, right,
oh absolutely, Oh that's good stuff.

Speaker 2 (36:04):
We man, oh man, but I mean that and the
Bionic Woman and Happy Days. I think you were Mouth's dad,
Ralph Mouth. Yeah, the name it's I knew Bosley. We
were at the Arena stage together before he ever was
cast as Fiorello, and he went up to New York

(36:24):
and he did Fiorello. And I saw him later on
and he said to me, how long are you going
to be at arena stage. I said, you are very lucky.
I said, you happened to look like LaGuardia. He said, well,
come on up here and we'll do the Adelaide Stevenson story.

(36:45):
And for those of you who I actually know who
that is, So how about that? Huh? He ran for
president twice? Yes, yeah, it was only twice. I thought
it was like, well, maybe it was more, Maybe it
was more. He was a Democrat, and I think he
ran against Reagan to time. Oh wow, I don't know
for president. Yeah, no, I don't think so it was.

Speaker 1 (37:06):
I think it was gone way before Reagan was Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
he was gone. Did you know Dutch, because you know,
nobody contemporary Michael Bell our old pal. He he would
sit there and talk, Yeah, Dutch, I know Dutch.

Speaker 2 (37:25):
You know.

Speaker 1 (37:25):
And Reagan was in the White House at the time,
and he just loved calling him Dutch because he knew him.

Speaker 2 (37:31):
So I thought for a chance you were. You were
in that very.

Speaker 1 (37:34):
Small, very elite club. No, good night, everybody. Well, okay,
I'll we get that.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
Out of Jesus.

Speaker 3 (37:45):
Who were people that you looked up to? I heard
you say that Jack Benny was one of your heroes,
that he was.

Speaker 2 (37:51):
One of By accident, we were doing an arena stage.
We were doing an on we play and Nick Coster rehearsal.
Nick me to the floor and my line is get
your foot off of me, and I did. I said,
get your foot off of me? And I stopped. I said,
where have I heard that voice? And that's how I

(38:11):
realized I was doing Jack Benny. Yeah, well, well, yeah,
he was my hero. My thirty ninth birthday, my wife
and a woman who was John William's wife at the time,
decided to give me a thirty ninth birthday party. And

(38:31):
so she called up Joan Benny and said, how I
was such adored her dad. So she sent over a picture. Now,
other people at the party gave me one hundred and
forty four one hundred and forty four boxes of jello
oh and a violin bow. Oh my yeah, that kind

(38:52):
of perfect. And I have a Jack Benny's script original
No kidding. Yeah, they gave me that too. Wow, that's
price talk. Yeah, give me a price for time. Anyway,
I adored radio, you know, Kenny del Mary and all
those guys, Kenny Delmark, Oh, Southern Southern Senator Claghorn, Yeah,

(39:16):
Senator Claghorn. Yeah, Kenny Bellemare. Who was the announcer on
the show huh on the Jack Benny Show. Oh okay.

Speaker 1 (39:25):
All I can remember is the Jack Betty Program.

Speaker 2 (39:28):
Who was that guy, the big boy? It might have
been Kenny Delmore. Oh, that's what I meant to say. No,
I don't think it was that.

Speaker 1 (39:36):
I thought he was the one that had that sort
of voice that you always knew it was the Jack
Betty Program because I could barely remember it, you know,
sitting with my dad watching because my dad.

Speaker 2 (39:47):
Used to watch it all the time. We all Sunday night.
Everybody stared at that box. Yeah. I was so young.
I thought the Philharmonic they were little mice in there
playing instruments. Yeah, well, I.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
Remember, I remember Zoro was like my back in the
day those everything was black and white.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
The whole world was black and white back then, that's right. Yeah,
oh my god. Yeah. Well, by the way, if you
watch old black and white movies on Turner Classic or whatever,
you see real camera work and real lighting and real blocking,
not single single singles. Yeah, god, the magnificent work. Yeah,

(40:28):
I love black and white movies. I think it works.

Speaker 1 (40:31):
I think it's Yeah, it's I mean, Maltie Falcon.

Speaker 3 (40:35):
You know you can really feel I feel like when
you watch those old black and white movies, I feel
like you can really feel the theater aspect of it.
Like it's way more of like almost watching a play
than it is watching a movie.

Speaker 2 (40:48):
That's right.

Speaker 3 (40:48):
How things have changed so much, you know, and the.

Speaker 2 (40:50):
Blocking of the actors and the lighting, the reflections and shadows.

Speaker 3 (40:54):
And you didn't have as many like extreme close ups.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
And you know that's that's why they do that. It's cheap.
You only have to light one person. Yeah, yeah, you
don't have to light for five or six people. Cut, cut, cut.
Then you don't get the reactions, immediate reactions, Yeah, you
just get lines.

Speaker 3 (41:15):
I had a bit of the movie Magic destroyed for me.
I was working on I was working on a TV show,
a CW show called The One Hundred Years Ago, and
I remember they needed an insert shot of this character
talking or picking up a walkie talkie out of the sand,
and she had already been wrapped for the day. You know,

(41:36):
she was already offset.

Speaker 1 (41:37):
You know.

Speaker 3 (41:38):
They're like, well, we need this shot for this day.
And so they got like one of the hairdressers and
she had like a similar skin tone, and they use
that as her picking up the radio. And I was like, oh,
that just ruined it for me, Like you don't even
need the actor on set, like, oh yeah, just get
some random lady. It's just you know, nobody will know.
It's a one second little you know, insert shot. And

(42:00):
I was like, oh, okay, yeah, well I guess it
makes sense, but.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
Yeah, showbiz. Well I didn't give up showbiz. That's right.

Speaker 3 (42:10):
You've said that when you play I mean, I think
it's fair to describe you as a character actor. Yes, yes,
And you've said that when you play all these characters
that you are them, like you really feel like you
become these characters do become. And I think, Jim, I
think you feel that same way too when you portray
a character.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
To an extent. Yeah yeah, yeah, I don't. I don't.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
I you you I'm sure have it much better because
you're much more talented and on camera, whereas I'll just
be stuck in my in my little cartoon head for
a couple hours afterwards, and you know, like dark wing
Duck would pop up.

Speaker 2 (42:47):
A little bit here and there.

Speaker 1 (42:48):
What the hell is that supposed to me? You know,
I mean what, I'm sorry, what were you talking about?
You know, you know, you you get in there and
it stay in the headspace.

Speaker 2 (42:56):
I just become very quickly, yeah, du yeah, I have
no there's no Oppenheimer. It just is whatever it is. Yeah,
that's how Skeletor came about. You know. They just showed me.
That just showed me the could look at Cuss. It
was at him. Yeah, they didn't have a cell yet,

(43:21):
and I saw the bony head, so I became nasal
and then it became an extension of that.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
You know.

Speaker 2 (43:31):
But at the beginning he was not a comedic character.
And then the one show in the beginning I put
in and lou Scheimer said, keep that in, and they
began to use him as a comedic character. M that's
why he's singular.

Speaker 1 (43:47):
And yeah, well, bad guys who have a little and
I've noticed this. I've got a couple of them myself.
If you could give a little bit of humor to
a bad guy. He's still a bad guy, but you
get a bonus. It's like a kickstart are Yeah. Yeah,

(44:08):
My guy Don Carnage from Tailspin started off.

Speaker 2 (44:13):
And he was just evil.

Speaker 1 (44:14):
He was a pirate and he just wanted to kill everybody.
And then I made him slightly goofy and they really
glombed onto that. Then they started writing for it.

Speaker 2 (44:23):
Yeah, so it's cool, that's right.

Speaker 1 (44:25):
You know, instincts are the best stinks. I always say
what you were saying. Instincts are the best stinks.

Speaker 2 (44:32):
Yeah. Yeah, you couldn't do it. You don't know. Yeah.
I was doing a fifteen minute show called mac and
Meyer for Hire Joey Faye and Mickey Demes. Yes, the
two guys with the hats. You did it. You were
on one of those, No, almost all of them. Different characters,

(44:53):
different characters, and one character I went, I add lib
oovi groovy. Mickey says, that's your that's your. Do you
use that in every show? If it made no sense,
I would say, oh, that's oovy groovy, and it became
my slogan, you know, Macima.

Speaker 1 (45:09):
I used to see that every day.

Speaker 2 (45:11):
Shit man. Yes, in the sixties, yes, I'd.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Come home from school and and and uh Macima they
had they had the local one of the local channel
twenty seven, Channel twenty one, Youngstown, Ohio. Come home from
school four to thirty show time.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
It was Tarzan. You'd watch Tarzan and mac and Meyer
were the guys. They did the interstitials. They were there
and and it was and who were the two guys
Mickey Demes and Joey Faye.

Speaker 1 (45:42):
Nckey Thames and Joey Fay And they were kind of
I used to think of them as a low rent Laurel.

Speaker 2 (45:48):
And Hardy Well because Mickey certainly they were. It felt
that way. Yeah, okay, good, Yeah? And he was which
one was he? Oh? I don't remember which one? Okay,
was he Hardy or I have no idea at this
point in time, but I know that Mickey told me
a story about Joey. They were walking up Broadway or something,

(46:09):
you know, and a friend of his, she says, listen, Joey,
I just came. They're looking for the Joey Faye type here.
So he goes up there and he says it's secretary like.
She says, yes, I said, I understand, you're looking for
the Joey Faye type. She said, we are He said,
I'm Joey Fay. She says, you're all wrong for it.

(46:33):
That's probably true. It was true.

Speaker 1 (46:36):
I mean that sounds like a showbiz you know story. Yeah,
but that's oh yeah, Now we're looking for a type,
not him, you're him?

Speaker 2 (46:48):
Goodbye. No, that's wrong. Oh that's painful. You're not get
that arrow out of the neck. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
Oh man, I wanted to ask you. You've been around
Hollywood and in Hollywood for so long, you must have seen, well,
undoubtedly seen so many changes. What do you think has
been like the biggest shift in entertainment business in your
lifetime that you've witnessed.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Oh? Wow, Wow, it's just so different. I mean, the
writing is different. It's just that's for sure. It's yeah,
it's writing is pretty bad most of the time. Yeah. Yeah.
And leading men all look alike, leading women all look alike.

(47:30):
They're cookie cutters. They don't have something singular about them,
like Hepburn or anybody like that. Oh, they're looking for
the whatever. I don't.

Speaker 1 (47:40):
We're fresh out of arrow Flynn's, aren't we.

Speaker 2 (47:44):
Yeah that's the idea. Yeah, and and but and the
writing I met on the sting to do the sting,
and I read for the the train conductor who puts
the game together.

Speaker 3 (47:59):
You know.

Speaker 2 (48:00):
Hm. I was all wrung for the part anyway. But
when it was over, I handed the script back and
I said, this is perfect. Don't change a word, and
they thought, oh, he's sucking up. You know. It was
the perfect piece of writing. And they did not change
a word. Oh wow, yeah, well they listened to you.

(48:21):
What a piece of work that is. Yeah. I thought
it was pretty good. Don't do Don't do Don' and wasn't.
It had no idea what the physicalization was, or the
music or anything, but the story and the dialogue was
just perfect. And when I complimented him and you took it,
you know, sucking up. He's not going to get the

(48:44):
part anyway, but oh that. And there's been a few
scripts like that, and they just stand I was doing
a hey man. Mess of the Universe went to one
hundred and twenty four episodes, and there was one episode.
Who wrote this? And lou told me and I sought
him out. Simon last name created Neil no Cartoon. Oh.

(49:15):
He was one of the creators with Matt Groening of
Oh yeah, it was a perfect piece of holcom for
he man, and I sought him out and I have
his signs script. Oh that's great when you read, when
you see writing like that, you got Cavell appreciated. Yeah,

(49:37):
it's so rare. Yeah, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 (49:40):
Yeah, oh man, Yeah, especially nowadays, everything's splat and run.

Speaker 2 (49:44):
You know, you asked me the animation is terrible today. Yeah,
it's just I know what it is.

Speaker 1 (49:54):
Yeah, well I think you know, not because I was there,
but I think the Disney Afternoon Eyes got it right.
You know, all the different shows, uh you know, Tailspin,
Dark Wing, Duck and goof Troop and on and on.
I think they they were. Everybody gave a damn. Everybody cared,
The animators carred, the writers certainly cared absolutely, and the

(50:17):
casting directors did and because they hired me, so that
showed they cared. And uh, you know, but but yeah,
I you know, and you want to avoid statements like,
well they don't make them like they used to.

Speaker 2 (50:32):
But they don't they so you kind of have to
acknowledge when do you want this? We wanted it yesterday? Yeah. Yeah,
fast is better than good. Yes, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
I had a guy tell me I had it, and
I used to work from all the time. I won't
say his name, but I said, yeah, but I could.
I gotta do it better.

Speaker 2 (50:53):
He goes, I'm not. Yeah, but it wasn't any good.
He goes, I'm not interested in good. I'm interested in done.

Speaker 1 (51:00):
I said, oh really, and he goes, okay, well, then
I guess we're done.

Speaker 2 (51:04):
I was doing a sitcom and I can't remember his name,
but thank god, because no, don't talk about him. But
he was in charge of production or whatever. And he
told the director, I don't want eight takes. I want
to take one or two. I don't want take eight.
Oh he said okay. The next day he said, all right,

(51:27):
let's get this shot slate. This is take eight, take nine.
All right, now, we got to now do one and two.
And he sent us upstairs and he says, I told
you you could do it in two takes. I thought
that was brilliant. Yea, what okay? Just brilliant? Yeah? Yeah,

(51:48):
oh that's funny. And it flew. What was this project?
Who knows? No, it don't doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter, oh man, And I thought, what a
great way to get around an idiot yeah, slate this
first one. Take eight, yeh, take eight, Take nine, Oh

(52:11):
now we got all right? Take one. Okay, and you
want me to tell you a horse story of the movie.
Oh okay, little big man. Right, I'm sitting on my horse.
There's the white mark the horse is supposed to go to,
and I'm sitting on a horse, he says. Penn says,

(52:32):
all right, let's have a rehearsal. Action. Horse doesn't move.
Third time I kicked the horse, he goes like this
to me. Oh jeez, I said out a wrangler. He says,
don't worry. He's been in show business longer than you have.
He'll know. Pen says, all right, oh hard, let's let's

(52:56):
have a take. Now. The horse went like this. As
soon as action, the horse went right to the mark.
I didn't have to do anything. You're kidding. This isn't good,
was this? Mister ed? This was real? Real Hollywood? Wow,
you're not And I was right, don't worry. He's show

(53:18):
business than you. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (53:21):
Wow, those show animals are crazy. I worked I worked
on a movie and it was like one of those
pet movies, you know, where like all the animals are
talking and stuff, and so I got to be around
like they had penguins and they had tortoises and cats
and dogs. Obviously, cats and dogs were like the main
it was called pop stars. And man, those those animals

(53:41):
are just so trained. But it's it's also kind of
like I was talking to one of the wranglers, you know,
and like they don't really get to be like a
normal dog. You know, they don't because they, like everything
in their life is like structured to like, you know,
put a paw up or like, you know, you see
the wranglers and they're they're holding a little like markers
for the dog's head to track, you know, and it's

(54:05):
so amazing. And but cats, cats work on their own schedule.
Cats like that. It can be the most trained cat
in the world. It can, you know, put a paw here,
it can do this and that. If they don't feel
like it, then literally the whole production shuts down and
they move on to something else.

Speaker 2 (54:20):
Cats are the same in civilian life. You'll know that. Yeah, yeah,
come here, Darren. Yeah, I'll get back to you. I'll
get back to you. Yeah. Yeah. The dogs like sure,
that's true. Yeah, God almighty, are you a pet guy? Dog?
Like are you a dog guy. Yeah, yeah, not a

(54:40):
turtle guy. Not a pandom guy. I am a pigeon guy.
Uh oh oh that's fine. I'm sorry had enough of
this stuff. I'm sorry. I should have turned this up.
Oh that's quite all right. Do you have to take it?
It's neary, it's it's my manager. We'll give him the

(55:05):
honorary blowgun. I can't talk to you now. Can't you tell?

Speaker 1 (55:10):
We're having a really this is big time show biz podcasting.

Speaker 2 (55:13):
Ye see. I told him I was going over there.
He's got some stuff I have to pick. So he
timed it, yeah, to make sure that he Where are
you coming? Where are you going? Yeah? What are you? Oh?
And you're on your way over to to you got
to a signing? No, I have to go. He brought
my suitcase with the pictures back. I got to get
the suitcase. I intend to work again, you know. Oh okay,

(55:36):
Well that's always good. That's always good. Yeah. You seem
to enjoy doing something in two weeks or something and
I know, yeah, oh you're doing Are you doing that? Yeah?
Inst you recognize me then too? Probably? Yeah? Yeah yeah
wait let me finish.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
No, your line is long. Yeah, well we do Okay,
what's your favorite character?

Speaker 2 (56:00):
Boy? Uh?

Speaker 1 (56:01):
Well, I actually get asked that a few a lot,
But it's Poo and Tigger. They're in their own category,
you know, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger.

Speaker 2 (56:11):
Yeah, the van their depoo v in their depoo.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
Poo and Tigger are in their own category. And then
dark Wing Duck, the terror.

Speaker 2 (56:23):
That flaps in the night. Who hear it? Who?

Speaker 1 (56:27):
Well that is I am the terror that flaps in
the night, the wicked skirts that pets such hern nightmares.
I have dark Wing.

Speaker 2 (56:35):
And then you say Duck. Yeah, I played a pigeon
ones at the actor's studio. Oh huh at the actor's studio. Well,
I was working with the priorites. I wanted to learn
from the beginning, you know, oh wonder good one. So
there was a pigeon. I said, let me do that.

(56:55):
Frank Walker was busy that day. Yeah, so I did that.
What give up, show biz? I'm walking on a limbo sill.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
Are you on that commercial on TV now? Because what
are the pigeons selling? They're selling car insurance or some
damn thing or another. There's a couple of squirrel pigeons
are big.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
Yeah, I can't understand them what they're saying. Yeah, well
you don't speak my years in, but you don't have
to get violent, Okay. He he's he's pissed. Man.

Speaker 3 (57:37):
You were good friends with Paul Winschall, If I'm not mistaken,
I was.

Speaker 2 (57:40):
I loved him. Yeah, he was brilliant. You know he's
an inventor too. You knew that. Yes, that's what I
always artificial.

Speaker 3 (57:47):
Heart, the artificial heart, that's right.

Speaker 2 (57:50):
Knucklehead smith, tigger and the artificial heart. Paul Winchell was wonderful.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
Oh yeah, did he ever tell you about his He
was also going to cure hunger. I don't know if
you uh huh, yeah, cure what hunger over? In Well,
it was in the eighties in Biafra, where the folks
were starving to death by the millions. He reasoned that
these little mud mud puppies that live in the literally

(58:20):
in the mud on the Mississippi River, only.

Speaker 2 (58:22):
In America, only in like two or three states, and
they're hideous there.

Speaker 1 (58:27):
You look at him and the last thing you think
is boy, I bet that's good eating. No, but they're
nutritious and they're full of you know good I mean
it's food. You grill him up, and he decided he
was going to go over to Africa and develop and
just make little farms. And like I say, you can

(58:48):
spray a few yards worth of mud and throw them
in there and they propagate, they flourish, And so he
was on his way over there to do that, the
good ship Hope. And that's how I became Tigger back
in the day because he was gone and they said, well,
you know, the gym was not terrible, so I was

(59:13):
tigger Light and that's isn't that. So yeah, when Paul
would be in Africa, I would step up and do
Tigger was the very first iteration of the winny to
pooh so wonderful.

Speaker 2 (59:26):
Yeah, it's a lot of fun. Did you know Ron Finberg?
I he I had just gotten into the business.

Speaker 1 (59:34):
So yes, the answer is yes, but not well, just
he was leaving, I was showing up.

Speaker 2 (59:41):
But we were on tour together when arrived here. It
was with the Evil a Galion, Sylvia Sidney and Lee
or Dana and we did three plays in rep and
I played in the Greek Tragedy. I don't remember which
one it was anyway, and Ron was my army of two. Okay,

(01:00:05):
so one particular night standing the wings waiting to go on,
and le Galleon starts said, oh, she is singing it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:14):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (01:00:15):
And I turned around and said, we're in deep trouble tonight. Oh.
And I came out and said my first line, and
the guy in the odence went shit. Oh we froze
good and wooden chairs popped up, and Leora said let's
go wrong yeah, and le Galleon and I just looked

(01:00:36):
at each other wait for him to exit, and we started.
But I said to her, we're in trouble tonight. Yes,
And I came out and said my line just as
pompously as I could. Shit critic, Yeah, I want to say,
wait a minut, I'm going with you, oh man, that's what.

Speaker 1 (01:01:00):
Yeah, that's painful that it was hysterically funny to yeah,
uh huh.

Speaker 2 (01:01:06):
At the time it was really Yeah. We could hardly
keep from laughing. That's good. Yeah. Well you gotta roll
with the punches, right, I really I stood rolling afterwards,
the one who say, wait a minute, going with you? Man?
Oh man? Well, we like to we like oh sorry, yes,
what I was gonna say.

Speaker 1 (01:01:27):
We I think we almost worked together on the Smurfs
at one point, dangerously close you were. It was one
of those you were leaving and I was coming in
and it was like.

Speaker 2 (01:01:37):
What character would Uh?

Speaker 1 (01:01:39):
Well, I was pinch hit for Gargamel on a show.

Speaker 2 (01:01:43):
Oh oh Paul, Oh who yeah? Do you do his voice? No?
Very badly? Smurfs? Oh little did too, you know? And
that was he still got it?

Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
He still got it. Yes, I'm still annoying. Sister Mary
Agnes is somewhere going.

Speaker 2 (01:02:03):
Oh this kid, you know, well I would. I was
doing Vanity smurf. Well, it was my best imitation of
Jack Penny as Vanity. But then he became kind of
light in the Loafers, so they had another name for me.
Oh okay, okay, don't say it. Oh well, this is radio.

(01:02:25):
Don't say it's right radio.

Speaker 1 (01:02:30):
and more. You'll feel the difference, so go ahead and
join the tuned In family today at Patreon dot com

(01:02:51):
slash Jim Cummings podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:02:54):
Do it now.

Speaker 1 (01:02:55):
Oh, speaking of radio, we've got it. We've got a
little something that we like to do.

Speaker 3 (01:03:00):
Yeah, we like to do a little voice swap game.
So it's a it's a trade off of characters. So
Jim will say a line has Winnie the Pooh, and
then you'll repeat that line as say Mighty Mouse, and
then we'll do vice versa. How does that sound to you.

Speaker 2 (01:03:14):
I'll give it a shot, all right. My voice is
not what it used to be. I'm an old person.
We'll give it a shot. Same here. But here, I'll
make it easy on you because I'm very familiar with
Mighty Mouse, very familiar with my mouse. So Winnie the Pooh,
Here I come to save the day. Oh, my goodness,

(01:03:40):
here I come to save the day. Was that Edith Bunker?
Who was that Edith Bunker? Oh that's right, isn't it? Yes, Ochie,
it's it really did sound like her. That was pretty good.
I don't know where the hell that's funny. I've never

(01:04:03):
thought of that. Yeah, that's how I came up with
Jack Benny. When Nick Costor put his foot on me
and I said, get your foot off of me. Totally
an accident, you know, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
I would think, okay, So now it's your turn. You
have to lay one on me and one of your characters.
Famous skeletor line or you know whatever.

Speaker 3 (01:04:24):
Yeah, how about skeletor if people would like to see
skeletor what's a line that skeletor says.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
You?

Speaker 2 (01:04:32):
Foolish fool? I could write a book about what you
don't know?

Speaker 3 (01:04:38):
How about shredders?

Speaker 1 (01:04:39):
Since it's alrighty, he said laughingly, you could write a
book about the crap that you don't know.

Speaker 2 (01:04:51):
Get those turtles, you royal boob, get out of my sight. Okay,
thank you very much for being here so much. Thank you, sir.
This is so great. I mean it's painless. Oh good, good, Well,

(01:05:13):
that's good. That's good to hear you heard it here first.
Thank you, Thank you so much.

Speaker 3 (01:05:18):
Po.

Speaker 2 (01:05:18):
I had no idea that what you did? You know? Yeah,
I don't need to see you around. But I don't
know what you do, whether you move furniture or whatever.
I do I do? I do you get paid well
for that too? Don't? Yes? Absolutely? Why do you have
a piano? Keep it to yourself? No, I'll move your footstool?

(01:05:39):
How's that?

Speaker 1 (01:05:40):
What?

Speaker 2 (01:05:40):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
No, not a stool. No, forget the stool part. It's
the footsto never mind.

Speaker 3 (01:05:47):
All right, well, I'll sign us off here.

Speaker 2 (01:05:49):
Let's get out of here. Just get ahold of this
flute and move it over there. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:05:54):
We hope you enjoyed that episode. If you did, be
sure to like and subscribe. This was another episode of
Two Do with Jim. I'm producer Chris Jim Cummings, and
thank you so much for joining us, mister Allen Oppenheimer.
Thank you great pleasure. And if you like this content
so much that you want to see more of it,
check us out on Patreon. There's bonus content, there's a
whole bunch of other good stuff. We're about to record

(01:06:15):
a private episode for Patreon right now. Actually, and if
you want some merchandise, you can go to Jim Coming's
closet on Shopify. Please be sure to leave a like
and subscribe. It helps us, it helps you finds videos
that are very similar to this, if not the same channel.
And as always, thank you for watching. We'll see you
in the next one.

Speaker 2 (01:06:34):
Thank you, sir. A thing you've got going here, thank you.
Oh thanks

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