John Ratzenberger is a featured article, which means it has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Disney Wiki community. If you see a way this page can be updated or improved without compromising previous work, please feel free to contribute.
John Dezso Ratzenberger is an American actor, voice actor, director, producer, screenwriter, and entrepreneur, who is best known for his role as Cliff Clavin in the NBC sitcom Cheers. He reprised this role for Mickey's 60th Birthday and Disneyland's 35th Anniversary Celebration. He has also done voice work in every Pixar film to date until Onward, with at least one live-action performance in a Disney television film.
Ratzenberger was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Bertha Veronica (née Grochowski), and Dezso Alexander Ratzenberger, a WWII veteran who had been a combat engineer in the Philippines. His father was of Austrian and Hungarian descent, and his mother was of Polish ancestry. Ratzenberger attended St. Ann's School in Bridgeport and then Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut. In 1969, Ratzenberger worked at the Woodstock Festival as a heavy equipment operator and as part of the crew building the stage. John moved to London in 1971, where he began his acting, writing, and directing career.
Ratzenberger at the premiere of Toy Story 3 in June 2010.
Ratzenberger at the premiere of Planes in August 2013.
Ratzenberger at the premiere of Coco in November 2017.
Ratzenberger signing autographs at the premiere of Toy Story 4 in June 2019.
Ratzenberger at the premiere of Onward in February 2020.
Trivia[]
The running gag of Ratzenberger portraying at least one character in every Pixar movie is referenced during the end credits of Cars; when Mack watches the Cars-parodies of previous Pixar films, he thinks that whoever did the voices of Hamm, Yeti, and P.T. Flea (all in car form) were great actors, until he realized it was the same voice actor in all those films and asks, "What kind of a cut-rate production is this?"
P.T. Flea from A Bug's Life is Ratzenberger's personal favorite character of his Pixar roles.
When Toy Story 3 was initially being made by Circle 7 Animation, Ratzenberger refused to voice Hamm unless Pixar produced the film.
While Soul is the first Pixar movie in which Ratzenberger doesn't have a voice role, his likeness does appear in the film. He also does not have a voice role in Luca, Turning Red, Lightyear, or Elemental, though this may be because he and Pixar likely decided to retire that tradition. However, it was announced that he would return to voice Fritz in Inside Out 2, and is likely to reprise his role as Hamm for Toy Story 5.