Last December, voice actor Tom Kane, suffered a stroke. A recent update from his daughter on his Facebook page has announced that he will be retiring from voice acting.
What’s Happening:
- Last December, Voice of Yoda in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, and so many other Star Wars and Marvel characters, as well as the voice of the Walt Disney World Monorail since 2012, Tom Kane, suffered a stroke. At the time, many fans feared that this would possibly leave him unable to do voiceover work.
- Recently, Kane’s daughter updated his Facebook page and announced that his father will no longer be able to perform, elaborating on his condition.
- The post reads: “Because of this stroke my dad has been forced into early retirement. The damage to his speech center is just too severe. He cannot read well nor get out the words he wants, which is sort of required for voice acting. He has what’s called Apraxia which means he has difficulty moving smoothly from one sound, syllable, or word to another. Groping movements like with his jaw, lips or tongue to make the correct movement for speech sounds are impaired. Essentially he knows exactly what he wants to say, he knows exactly what’s going on, but the words are trapped in his head, and when they do come out, it’s usually too slurred to understand. He has a handful of words he says perfectly, but just a handful. He relies on all forms of non verbal communication now. Thank god he’s an actor and great at charades! I have SO much more to say about this like how many people miss having conversations with him, especially his children and wife. How [expletive deleted] is it that in a split second one of the most talented voice actors ever lost his voice and career? I’ll stop here or else I’ll cry and I’ve already done that like a thousand times this year…Thank you all for reading this, please take good care of yourselves.”
- With a wide expanse of work, surely you’ve heard the voice work of Tom Kane. It may have been on any number of Star Wars animated series where he provided the voice of Yoda and Admiral Ackbar among others, or Marvel series or video games where he provided the voice of Odin, Thor’s father, even in the closed Marvel experiences at Disneyland Park’s Innoventions. You may have even heard him narrate your journey aboard the Walt Disney World Monorail if you visited after 2012.