Wayne Allwine

Wayne Anthony Allwine (February 7, 1947 – May 18, 2009) was an American voice actor, a sound effects editor and foley artist for Walt Disney Studios. He was born in Glendale, California. He was the voice of Mickey Mouse for 32 years, narrowly the longest to date, and was married to voice actress Russi Taylor.

Allwine was the voice of Mickey Mouse from 1977 until his death in 2009. He succeeded 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 Mickey Mouse Club television show (ABC-TV, 1955–59).

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 also voiced the old man on the street at the start of the movie and the two weasels in the Christmas future scene.

He also starred in films such as 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 (2006-2009) and Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He has provided Mickey's voice for nearly every entry in the popular Kingdom Hearts series of video games, which was done in collaboration with Japanese video game company Square Enix.

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.

Personal life
In 1991, Allwine married Russi Taylor, who began performing the voice of Minnie Mouse in 1986 until her death in 2019 just ten years after his passing. They were both named Disney Legends in 2008.

Death
Allwine died of hypertensive crisis caused by complications from acute diabetes on May 18, 2009 at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. He was 62 years old. In addition to his wife Russi Taylor, Allwine was also survived by his children from previous marriages: Erin, Peter, Christopher, and Joshua, and a grandson named Isaac. His prospective understudy, Bret Iwan, assumed the role of voicing Mickey Mouse. His final performance was was in the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episode "The Golden Boo-Boo" (which premiered posthumously on September 28, 2012) and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, the English-language version of the game which are dedicated to his memory, dying twelve days before the game's Japanese release, along with the Mickey Mouse Clubhousetelevision 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.

The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episode "Road Rally" was produced with Allwine as Mickey's voice(Allwine's name appears in the end credits) but was first aired after his death.