Sometimes This Blog Will Just Be Pinto Colvig, If It's Even That.

 I feel I should have known who Pinto Colvig was before this week. He had arguably one of the most influential voices in comedy. Like Mel Blanc, he is probably best known for the cartoon characters he voiced, but while Blanc was a well respected character comedian with a regular showcase on The Jack Benny Show (basically the Seinfeld of its day, only more so because it came first) Colvig had to slum it as unrecognisable nightmare fuel in terrible circus-based shorts for Capitol Records.

 In creating the role of the Wendigo-mouthed "Bozo", Colvig certainly proved influential enough in the world of horror (a Wendigo by the way is a flesh-eating, First Nations xenomorph notable for chewing its own lips off with hunger), but that's not why I feel he should be better known. He was also the voice of Grumpy the dwarf, and Sleepy, and Bluto from Popeye, and Pluto from Mickey Mouse, but most importantly, surely, he was the original voice of Goofy. That's a voice with big ripples. You can hear it in Dan Castellaneta's Homer Simpson, Spike Milligan by his own admission straight up stole the voice for Eccles, it is the dopey voice (although of course Dopey didn't have a voice), and his nervous "gollum" debuted years before the publication of The Hobbit (it's surely a nervous swallow that gives Smeagol his nickname, rather than Andy Serkis' odd cough). So I'd love to tell you more about Colvig. Unfortunately I can't get beyond the first ten seconds of this video (so you should feel under no obligation to, either):