Overview (4)

Born March 12, 1946 in Denver, Colorado, USA Birth Name Franklin Wendell Welker Nickname Dr. Frankenwelker Height 5' 8" (1.73 m)

Mini Bio (1)

Frank Welker was born in Colorado. He followed his dream to California, and started a voice acting career which has spanned over five decades and hundreds of credits. Frank has worked with fellow voice actors Casey Kasem, Nicole Jaffe, Don Messick, Heather North, and Indira/Stefanianna Christopherson on Hanna-Barbera's iconic Scooby Doo, wo bist du? (1969), voicing Fred Jones, among other Scooby credits over the years. He worked with Kurt Russell in the 1970's, and with Peter Cullen in the 21st century adaptations of the Transformers series, both Michael Bay's live action movies as well as in animation. Frank enjoys life in the acting world and always leaves the audience captivated with his impressive set of voices.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: Athanatos173

Trade Mark (4)

Often works in animated productions as the "voice" of various animal characters.



Often provides a deep raspy ominous voice for his characters, most notably Doctor Claw



The voice of Fred Jones. He has performed as the character over 200 times.





The voice of Megatron, the nefarious leader of the Decepticons on Transformers (1984).

Trivia (22)

Referred to in Hollywood as a voice god.





Has provided voices for eight of the original 14 Decepticons on Transformers (1984) animated series: Megatron, Soundwave, Skywarp, Laserbeak, Rumble, Frenzy, Ravage and Buzzsaw. He voiced two of the original Autobots as well: Trailbreaker and Mirage, as well as one of the Dinobots (Sludge) that also appeared in the first season.



Has done every voicing of Fred Jones for all of the Scooby-Doo animated series with the sole exception of A Pup Named Scooby-Doo (1988). Even in parodies and cameos on different television series, he has always done this voice.



Has done voices for both the Star Trek movie series and Star Trek: Raumschiff Voyager (1995).



He also did the animal voice effects including Dumbo in Falsches Spiel mit Roger Rabbit (1988).



In Tiny Toon Abenteuer (1990), he voiced Furrball, Gogo Dodo, Calamity Coyote, Little Beeper, Byron Basset, Uncle Stinky Pig, Henry Bear and Ralph the Guard who later appeared in Animaniacs (1993), where Frank not only voiced Ralph, but also voiced Thaddeus Plotz, Buttons, Runt, Flavio Hippo and Chicken Boo.

His broad spectrum of character voices, noises and other vocal effects that have appeared over the last 40 years in motion pictures, have vaulted him to number one on the "All Time Top 100 Stars at the Box office" list. The revenue of films he has participated in have generated over 12 billion dollars worldwide. His work in over 90 films has put him ahead of Eddie Murphy, Harrison Ford, Tom Hanks and Samuel L. Jackson.





Although he never met with the producers or the director Michael Bay , Bay felt his Welker's G1 Megatron voice did not fit the film and Bay's new interpretation. Ironically, he recreated the G1 voice for Transformers: The Game (2007) based on the movie, and was once again reunited with his old nemesis Optimus Prime played by Peter Cullen



His "Doctor Claw" voice came about as a result of him trying to do an impression of singer-songwriter Barry White



Having been the voice of Spock's screams, he is one of three Star Trek cast members who has also provided a voice for Star Wars. The others include George Takei and Simon Pegg



Based the voice of the Cave of Wonders in Aladdin (1992) on Sir Sean Connery

Attended Santa Monica City College where he majored in Theatrical Arts.



Born on exactly the same date as Liza Minnelli.



Personal Quotes (19)

I've been doing voices as long as I can remember. When I was little, I could pick up on sounds and then I discovered you could distort what you hear and make people laugh or disrupt a class.



I was voted by my high-school senior class as most likely to recede.



I like looking at the characters. Seeing them always brings up some voice or attitude. I am much more visual, and that works so much better than having someone tell me what the character is all about.



I have worked alone and with a cast and enjoy the process both ways. There is more back-and-forth with a full cast, and you can feed off the other actors' performance.



Normally, I play dads, good guys and little animals.



I have this peculiar ability to be able to anticipate mouth movements on screen and fill them with words or sound.



One thing that seems to surprise the studios is finding out later my willingness to audition. Under the right circumstances, I actually enjoy it very much.



[his views on education in children's programming] Education has its place on television but kids, like adults should have entertainment. Children should go to school all week, get their lessons from their parents, watch PBS and Big Bird and learn how to add and then turn over and watch Fall-Apart Rabbit's head fall off.



[his views on cartoon violence] I'm not sure that children's television is where we stop violence in America. I think gratuitous violence in any form is unnecessary. But when characters smack each other with pillow and powder puffs, I'm just not really convinced that that is harmful. But I make noises - I'm not a psychologist.



[on Transformers] I think for me, Megatron, for obvious reasons, is my favorite, followed closely by Soundwave.



Early in my life, I probably abused my voice more than I should have. It is an instrument. You need to take care of yourself. If you have a session the next day, go to bed early, do vocal warm-ups on the way to the studio, that's just about all you can do.





When you have a cast, you kind of play off each other. You can build ... almost like a play, because obviously you read it as a play, so you have this nice interaction. When we did the Transformers series, standing next to Peter Cullen was always a benefit because you really get into it. You're going hand-to-hand, but physically, you get the feeling of that person being there.

[on Scooby-Doo] In our business to have a show that goes 50 years, let alone to be part of that in the entertainment business, is kind of unheard of. So I feel lucky.





If you get any of the Transformers films on the Blu-ray version, which I just did; I finished my house and made a little theater in there with all my sound equipment. When you use the Blu-ray, Peter Cullen will actually take the dust off your wall and the paint begins to crack. That's the kind of voice this guy has. The color and the sound, oh my gosh.

On the Scooby gang: The audience sees what they want with the characters, and that's always good. You want your audience being involved! But I think the simple formula and the clean characters tends to resonate the most. I think we on the creative side tend to want to get a little rambunctious and make sure we keep their interest by doing new things and changing this or that. But as long as the group is basically the same, each generation can relate to it.



About Fred Jones in the Scooby-Doo series: Fred was the only one who had a license, so I drove the Mystery Machine, right? As long as nobody took the van away from me, that gave me four-wheel power.





I'm kind of a comedian goofball, so it was a little bit hard being restricted, but I was just happy to be a part of the gang. And, of course, being the leader! Joseph Barbera would tell me that Fred's the leader of the gang, and I would say, 'I guess you're right.'"



Joseph Barbera said that Fred Jones (in Scooby-Doo) was the all-American hero type and that I should just do my own voice. I was like, 'I never saw myself as the hero type, but OK!'"