LOS ANGELES, CA – APRIL 29: Voice Over actor Peter Cullen attends the 2016 Daytime Creative Arts Emmy Awards – Arrivals at Westin Bonaventure Hotel on April 29, 2016 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Leon Bennett/WireImage)
WireImage
Peter Cullen, the longtime voice actor of Autobot leader Optimus Prime in the Transformers animated series and live-action movies, has died.
Cullen’s agent, Kevin Motley, told TMZ that his client died at his home on Wednesday in Los Angeles. He was 85. Cullen’s cause of death was not given.
“Peter Cullen passed away peacefully, surrounded by his loving family – and held in the hearts of his many friends and countless fans worldwide,” Cullen’s family told TMZ in a statement. “His family asks that you honor his remarkable legacy by serving your communities and leading others with compassion, integrity, and loyalty and always remember ‘be strong enough to be gentle.’”
Optimus Prime(L), from the worldwide blockbuster film “Transformers: Age of Extinction” is unveiled at a handprint ceremony outside the TCL Chinese Theater in Hollywood, California on September 30, 2014 where the heroic leader of the Autobots was immortalized with the traditional ceremony for Hollywood stars, with Canadian voice actor Peter Cullen(R), the voice of Optimus Prime, dipping his hands into the cement. AFP PHOTO / Frederic J. BROWN (Photo credit should read FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images)
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Cullen first voiced Optimus Prime for the syndicated animated series The Transformers from 1984 to 1987, and also voiced the role for the 1986 animated feature Transformers: The Movie.
Apart from Cullen’s other Transformers animated project, the voice actor began a long run with director Michael Bay’s Transformers movie franchise, which began with the 2007 film starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox and Josh Duhamel. Cullen subsequently reprised the voice of Optimus Prime for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Transformers: Age of Extinction, Transformers: The Last Knight. He last voiced the character in live-action for the 2023 hit Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
Cullen also voiced such iconic animated characters as the stuffed donkey Eeyore in the series The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. In a 2023 interview with Collider, Cullen discussed his affinity for the sullen character when asked who his favorite character to voice was outside of Optimus Prime.
I loved the characters that were easiest to do, that didn’t require a lot of screaming and yelling, and stuff like that, because screaming and yelling, it’s hard work,” Cullen told Collider. “But my favorite, outside of Prime, was Eeyore. [Mimics Eeyore] “Thanks for noticing me. Not that anybody cares.”
In 2023, Cullen was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences at the 2nd Annual Children’s & Family Emmy Awards. Prior to that, Cullen was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program for his voice work as Optimus Prime in the series Transformers Prime.
Cullen also provided sounds for the title characters in the 1976 version of King Kong starring Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange, as well the title character in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 1987 blockbuster Predator.
Describing the clicking noise that he employed for the “voice” of the Predator, Cullen told Collider, “I’ve told this story many times, I’m sure some of you know it, but years ago on the beach in Massachusetts, at low tide, there was an upside-down horseshoe crab, and it was a hot day, and the bubbles were coming out of it, and its legs are like this [gestures], and all those bubbles are breaking, and they’re making that little [mimics Predator click]. So, I figured, “That’s stuck in my brain.”
Peter Cullen Had More Than 200 Voice Credits In Film, Television And Video Games
Born Peter Claven Cullen on July 28, 1941 in Montreal, Cullen’s first credited voice role was in a guest role in the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation series Shoestring Theatre in 1964.
Cullen’s big break in Hollywood came three years later, where he was hired as an announcer for the CBS variety series The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Cullen was an announcer on the series for 32 episodes from 1967 to 1968.
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