Characters
Ren Höek is a hot-tempered, "asthma-hound" Chihuahua. Kricfalusi originally voiced Ren, styled as a demented Peter Lorre. When Nickelodeon fired Kricfalusi, Billy West, already the voice of Stimpy, took the role using a combination of Burl Ives, Kirk Douglas and a slight "south of the border accent" for the rest of the Nickelodeon run.
Stimpson "Stimpy" J. Cat is a three-year-old dim-witted and happy-go-lucky cat. West voiced Stimpy for the Spümcø and Games Animation episodes, basing the voice on an "amped-up" Larry Fine.
The show features a host of supporting characters; some only appear in a single episode, while others are recurring characters, who occasionally appear in different roles. Ren and Stimpy play various roles themselves, from outer-space explorers to Old West horse thieves to nature-show hosts. While the characters are sometimes set in the present day, the show's crew tended to avoid "contemporary" jokes that reference current events. Some of the supporting characters factor directly into the storyline, while others make brief cameos. Other characters, such as Mr. Horse, are exclusively cameo-based, appearing in many episodes in scenes that have little bearing on the plot, as a running gag. Some notable artists and performers who voiced incidental characters on the show are Frank Zappa, Randy Quaid, Gilbert Gottfried, Rosie O'Donnell, Dom DeLuise, Phil Hartman, Mark Hamill, Frank Gorshin and Tommy Davidson.
Read more about this topic: The Ren & Stimpy Show
Famous quotes containing the word characters:
“The first glance at History convinces us that the actions of men proceed from their needs, their passions, their characters and talents; and impresses us with the belief that such needs, passions and interests are the sole spring of actions.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“The business of a novelist is, in my opinion, to create characters first and foremost, and then to set them in the snarl of the human currents of his time, so that there results an accurate permanent record of a phase of human history.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“I cannot be much pleased without an appearance of truth; at least of possibility—I wish the history to be natural though the sentiments are refined; and the characters to be probable, though their behaviour is excelling.”
—Frances Burney (1752–1840)