David Ogden Stiers, prolific voice actor and star of television’s M*A*S*H, died Saturday after a battle with bladder cancer. He was 75.
Videos by ComicBook.com
The actor, whose career spanned nearly 50 years, is being mourned on social media, most prominently by generations who remember Stiers for his voice acting roles in well-known Disney works Beauty and the Beast, Pocahontas, and Lilo & Stitch.
Stiers also voiced the unseen Narrator in several of Disney’s animated Winnie the Pooh productions between 2004 and 2006, including the straight-to-video Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo and Pooh’s Heffalump Halloween Movie. That’s just a small sampling of his work, however.
Cogsworth and the Narrator (Beauty and the Beast)
Stiers’ relationship with Disney animation began with 1991’s acclaimed Beauty and the Beast, where he lent his booming voice to both the unseen Narrator as well as servant-turned-enchanted clock Cogsworth, the Beast’s stuffy and cantankerous majordomo.
Arguably Stiers’ most famous Disney role, the actor lent his voice to the character until 2007, voicing Cogsworth in animated television series House of Mouse and direct-to-video Mickey’s Magical Christmas: Snowed in at the House of Mouse and video games Beauty and the Beast: Magical Ballroom and Kingdom Hearts II.
Stiers also starred as Cogsworth in three straight-to-video Beauty and the Beast sequels between 1997 and 1999, reprising the role in The Enchanted Christmas, Belle’s Magical World, and Belle’s Tales of Friendship.
Governor Ratcliffe and Wiggins (Pocahontas)
Stiers took on double roles again in 1995’s Pocahontas, voicing both the villainous Governor Ratcliffe and his cowardly and clumsy manservant Wiggins.
He would return as the greedy and pompous Ratcliffe in its straight-to-video sequel, Pocahontas 2: Journey to a New World, and again in the interactive Walt Disney World attraction Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom.
The Archdeacon (The Hunchback of Notre Dame)
Stiers’ fifth Disney voice role came in his third animated Disney feature, 1996’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
There he played the wise and righteous Archdeacon, clergyman of Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral. In the earliest moments of the movie, the Archdeacon stops villainous Minister of Justice Claude Frollo (Tony Jay) from dropping a deformed child down a well — a child who would grow to become the bellringer known only as Quasimodo.
Fenton Q. Harcourt (Atlantis: The Lost Empire)
Stiers took on his third animated theatrical Disney production with 2001’s little-talked-about Atlantis: The Lost Empire.
The steampunk-inspired film, starring Back to the Future‘s Michael J. Fox, was inspired in part by Jules Verne’s A Journey to the Center of the Earth and adopted Hellboy creator Mike Mignola’s unique style for its animated characters.
Stiers’ minor role saw him voicing Fenton Q. Harcourt, the serious and skeptical museum boss of Milo Thatch (Fox).
Mr. Jolly (Teacher’s Pet)
Stiers took on a different kind of role as cowardly and agoraphobic cat Mr. Jolly in Disney animated series Teacher’s Pet and its big screen sequel, Teacher’s Pet: The Movie.
The plump tabby cat, who spoke both with a lisp and in a Shakespearean manner, was best friends with mean-spirited pet bird Pretty Boy (voice of Jerry Stiller).
Teacher’s Pet: The Movie in 2004 would mark Stiers’ final big screen animated Disney performance.
Dr. Jumba Jookiba (Lilo & Stitch)
Stiers next voiced mad scientist alien and self-proclaimed evil genius Jumba Jookiba, the eccentric inventor responsible for creating the illegal genetic experiment that would come to be named “Stitch” in 2002’s Lilo & Stitch.
After making his debut in the theatrical Lilo & Stitch, Stiers voiced the character for nearly a decade, voicing Jumba in multiple video games as well as direct-to-video sequels Stitch! The Movie and Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch as well as TV movie Leroy & Stitch.
Stiers voiced Jumba in both seasons of fan-favorite Disney Channel cartoon Lilo & Stitch: The Series, voicing him for a final time in PlayStation Portable game Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep in 2010.
That game also saw Stiers voice tongue-tied dwarf leader Doc of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs fame for the first and only time.
Nicky Flippers
Stiers next voiced debonair private detective frog Nicky Flippers in Blue Yonder Films and Kanbar Entertainment’s Hoodwinked!, a 2005 computer-animated comedy that put a whodunit spin on the Little Red Riding Hood fairy tale.
Stiers voiced the lanky and suave frog a second time in its big screen sequel, Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil.
Penguin, Solovar, and Dr. Odium (DC Comics)
Stiers loaned his familiar voice talents to several animated television shows based on DC Comics properties, including Justice League and Justice League Unlimited‘s Solovar, talking gorilla and Chief of Security for Gorilla City, and Static Shock‘s villainous Doctor Odium, who threatened to unleash an army of dangerous nannies on the world.
He also voiced famous Batman villain the Penguin direct-to-video animated film Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman, and appeared as J’onn J’onnz, the Martian Manhunter, in the 1997 live-action television movie Justice League of America.
