Larry Kenney

Larry Kenney (b. August 5, 1947, Pekin, Illinois) is an American radio personality and voice actor.

In 1963, Kenney began his radio career at the age of 15 as a disc jockey at WIRL in Peoria. After WIRL, he worked at WOWO, Ft. Wayne, Indiana; WKYC (AM, now WTAM), Cleveland (1970–1973); WYNY, New York City; WJJD (now WYLL), Chicago; and WKHK (now WLTW), New York City until 1972.

Kenney was part of the regular cast on the Imus in the Morning radio show from 1973 to 2007, where he recorded impersonations of dozens of characters, including General George Patton, Andy Rooney and Ross Perot. Also in 1973, Kenney joined 1050 WHN (now WEPN), a country music station in New York City. He originally announced the afternoon drive-time, before taking over the prestigious morning drive-time in 1974. He stayed at WHN until the fall of 1979. His show was a hit, not only for the music, but also for his comical characters who "joined" him while performing his deejay duties. He was the host of the New York edition of the television show Bowling for Dollars on WOR-TV (now WWOR-TV) from 1976 to 1979.

He is also known for his voice work as Lion-O on the 1980s Rankin-Bass cartoon ThunderCats, as well as Karate Kat, a martial arts blackbelt cat featured as part of The Comic Strip. He was also the voice of Bluegrass in SilverHawks. In recent years, he has reprised this role for humorous ThunderCats references on the animated series Family Guy.

Warner Bros announced that a new Thundercats Animated series is in the works, and due to come out in 2011 on Cartoon Network. Larry will return to the series but will be voicing Claudus Lion-O's Father.

Currently, he is also the announcer for VH1's Best Week Ever, along with the introductions for Westwood One's radio coverage of Monday Night Football and various other commercial work. He was the announcer for "102.7 The Beat" in the video game Grand Theft Auto IV and has provided the voices for breakfast cereal commercial characters including Count Chocula and Sonny the Cuckoo Bird.

Family
He and his wife Carol Ann Jacobs Kenney have three children: daughters Kerri and Ashley, and son Tanner. Kerri Kenney-Silver, the eldest, is an actress, best known for her work on the series Reno 911! and The State. Ashley is a musician who has been in such bands as "Came to Destroy", "The Donahue Family" and "A Tribute To The Source". Tanner did a voice in the video game Grand Theft Auto IV.

Interviews

 * Larry Kenney e-mail interview (2000) on Thundercatslair.com
 * Larry Kenney interview (2002) on Matt Blank website
 * Larry Kenney audio interview with Nick Mills (2008) on Thundercatslair.com
 * Larry Kenney interview (c. 2008) with Rob Shan Lone on insomniacmania.com &mdash; transcript
 * "ThunderCat Has His Tongue" (2009) with Don E. Smith Jr. on Cosmic Booknews

Larry Kenney