Henry Albert Azaria (born April 25, 1964) is an American actor, voice actor, producer, and comedian. He voices Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Moe Szyslak, Chief Wiggum, Comic Book Guy, Jonathan Frink, Snake Jailbird and numerous other characters on The Simpsons. He voices the most characters on the show.

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Azaria is most famous for his voice work on The Simpsons. He joined the show at age 22, having previously performed only one voice over as an animated dog in the Fox pilot Hollywood Dog. The first voice he performed was that of the town bartender Moe, redubbing Christopher Collins who had voiced the character in the original track. Having known him from the failed pilot, casting director Bonita Pietila called Azaria and asked to audition for the voice of Moe. At the time he was doing a play, in which he performed the role of a drug dealer, basing his voice on Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon. He used that voice in the audition and was told by Matt Groening and Sam Simon to make it more gravelly, with it becoming the voice of Moe. Groening and Simon thought it was perfect and took Azaria over to the Fox recording studio. Before he had even seen a script, he recorded several lines of dialogue as Moe for the episode "Some Enchanted Evening."[1][2][3] Azaria didn't expect to hear from the show again but they continued to call him back, first to perform the voice of Chief Wiggum, and then Apu, until eventually during the second season he was doing numerous voices. At that point, he was given a contract and made a permanent member of the cast and has remained ever since. He has won three Primetime Emmy Awards for his work on the show in the category "Outstanding Voice-Over Performance". He also played Phoebe's Boyfriend, David on the show Friends, along with many other T.V characters.

Azaria also voices Carl, Comic Book Guy, Lou, Dr. Nick, Snake, Professor Frink, Sea Captain, Wiseguy, Superintendent Chalmers, Cletus, Kirk Van Houten, and others.

Many of his character's voices were loosely based on other people:

In early 2020, Azaria announced that he was stepping away from the Apu character, primarily because of the stereotypes and bias it perpetuated.[7]

Other work

Azaria has had an incredibly active career outside The Simpsons during his time on the show. He has had starring or recurring guest roles on the TV shows Herman's Head, Mad About You, Friends, Huff from 2004 to 2006 as the lead character Dr. Craig "Huff" Huffstodt, and as Venom/Eddie Brock in Spider-Man, as well as winning an Emmy for playing Mitch Albom in the miniseries Tuesdays with Morrie. He has appeared in numerous movies such as Quiz Show (1994), Heat (1995), The Birdcage (1996), Anastasia (1997), Godzilla (1998) along with Simpsons co-stars Nancy Cartwright and Harry Shearer, Mystery Men (1999), America's Sweethearts (2001), Along Came Polly (2004), Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (2010) and Gargamel in the 2011 film The Smurfs and its sequel The Smurfs 2. He has also had one of the roles in "Run Fat Boy Run". More recently in 2014, Hank has joined the cast of Ray Donovan an American television crime drama series playing James Cochran, head of the L.A. division of the FBI.

Credits

Also Starring (1989-1991)

Starring

Hank Azaria's Characters

See also