Eric Bauza, the Emmy winning voice actor who carried Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and most of the Looney Tunes lineup for a new generation, died suddenly on Sunday. He was 46.
His family announced the news in a statement posted to his official Instagram account Sunday night, saying he “has passed away suddenly” and that more details would come. No cause of death has been given.
If you watched a cartoon in the last 15 years, you heard him. Bauza voiced Bugs, Daffy, Porky Pig, Tweety, Marvin the Martian, Elmer Fudd and Foghorn Leghorn across “Looney Tunes Cartoons” and “Bugs Bunny Builders,” played Puss in Boots and Baby Fozzie in the Muppet Babies reboot, and won three Children’s and Family Emmy Awards along the way. This year he voiced Wile E. Coyote in “Coyote vs. Acme,” the Looney Tunes movie Warner Bros. tried to shelve before fans forced it into theaters.
He talked about the weight of the job the same way every time: the characters were bigger than any one voice, and his job was to hand them to the next kid the way Mel Blanc handed them to him.
“It is an honor, truly, truly an honor.”
Eric Bauza, on voicing the Looney Tunes characters
Bauza was born in Scarborough, Ontario, and started in animation as a designer before the voice work took over completely. By Sunday night his name was trending across the country, with fellow voice actors and fans posting clips of his Bugs and Daffy all night. He is survived by his wife, Jessica, and their son.
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