Wayne Allwine

Wayne Anthony Allwine (February 7, 1947 – May 18, 2009) was an American voice actor, sound effects editor and foley artist for The Walt Disney Company. He is best remembered as the 3rd voice of Mickey Mouse for a period of 32 years, narrowly the longest to date, and was married to voice actress Russi Taylor.

Early life and career

Allwine was born in Glendale, California, on February 7, 1947. He is a graduate of John Burroughs High School.

In 1966, Allwine started work in the mailing room at the Disney studios, before working in the sound effects department under Jimmy MacDonald.

After auditioning for the role, Allwine became the voice of Mickey Mouse in 1977. He replaced Jimmy MacDonald, who in 1947 had taken over from Walt Disney himself, who had performed the role since 1928 as well as supplying Mickey's voice for animated portions of the original The Mickey Mouse Club television show (ABC-TV, 1955–1959).

Allwine's first appearance as Mickey was voicing the animated lead-ins for The New Mickey Mouse Club in 1977. His first appearance as Mickey for a theatrical release was in the 1983 featurette Mickey's Christmas Carol. In the same film, he voiced a Santa Claus on the street appealing for charity donations at the start of the movie, Moley (who appears with Ratty) "collecting for the poor", and one of the two weasel undertakers in the Christmas future scene.

In 1999 version Wayne Allwine as Mickey Mouse sings the Christmas song called “O Holy Night” composed by Adolphe Adam and Placide Clappeau featuring Eddie Carroll as Jiminy Cricket at the House of Mouse.

He also starred in films such as The Great Mouse Detective (1986), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), The Prince and the Pauper (1990) and Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers (2004), and the TV series Mickey Mouse Works (1999–2000), Disney's House of Mouse (2001–2003), and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (2006–2012). He has provided Mickey's voice in the popular Kingdom Hearts series of video games prior to Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep, which was done in collaboration with Japanese video game company Square Enix. Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, which was the last game that used his voice (mainly with Mickey as a playable character in Mission Mode), would leave a message in his memory as the game was released in North America several months after his death.

In addition to his voice work, Allwine had also been a sound effects editor on Disney films and TV shows including Splash (1984) and Three Men and a Baby (1987); as well as Innerspace (1987), Alien Nation (1988), and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier for other studios.

He played rhythm guitar and briefly toured with the band Davie Allan & the Arrows, including on the 1967 single "Cycle-Delic". He was also an accomplished Dixieland jazz drummer, occasionally sitting in with Firehouse Five Plus Two alumni George Probert's Monrovia Old Style Jazz Band.

Personal life and death

In 1991, he married Russi Taylor, who voiced Minnie Mouse from 1986 to 2019, and they were named Disney Legends in 2008; they remained married until his death in 2009. Allwine also has five children from previous marriages.

Allwine died of hypertensive crisis caused by complications from acute diabetes at the age of 62 on May 18, 2009, at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles. His prospective understudy, Bret Iwan, assumed the role of voicing Mickey Mouse. His final performance was in the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episode "The Golden Boo-Boo" (which premiered posthumously on September 28, 2012) and the English-language version of Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, which are dedicated to his memory, dying twelve days before the game's Japanese release, along with the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse television movie "Choo-Choo Express". In 2013, his voice was used in the English-language version of Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix, and in 2014, his voice was again used in the English-language version of Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix via archive audio from his previous work in Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II. He is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.