Meet John Ratzenberger
During more than three decades of movie making and theatre, John Ratzenberger has enjoyed success as a screenwriter, director, producer and multi Emmy-nominated actor. He is also an accomplished entrepreneur and philanthropist. John’s career began in earnest in the early 1970s, when he formed the improvisational theatre duo “Sal’s Meat Market,” which performed to standing-room-only crowds throughout Europe for 634 straight performances. To help pay the bills, John also worked as a house framer, archery instructor and deck hand on a fishing boat. Learning a few trades allowed him to pursue his dream of acting. In 1982, John accepted a writing assignment for CBS in Los Angeles. On the day he was scheduled to return to London, he auditioned for a role on the upcoming Cheers. At the time of his audition, the character of the postman did not exist. As he walked out of the room, he turned and asked the creators “Do you have a bar know-it-all?” They didn’t know what that was, so John gave them five minutes of improv, demonstrating exactly what it meant with the perfect Boston accent. They loved what they saw and Cliff Clavin was born. In the history of television, only a handful of series have achieved the worldwide success of Cheers, on which John portrayed Cliff for the show’s entire 11-year run. To this day, thanks to daily syndication, Cliff continues as one of America’s most beloved characters. John is better known to a younger generation as the only actor to voice a character in every Pixar film including: the witty Hamm the piggy bank in Toy Story 1 (1995), Toy Story 2 (1999), Toy Story 3 (2010) and Toy Story 4 (2019); P.T. Flea, the circus ringmaster in Bug’s Life (1998); the lovable snow monster Yeti in Monsters, Inc.(2002) and Monsters University (2013); the ever-changing school of Moonfish in Finding Nemo (2003); the philosophical character The Underminer in The Incredibles (2004) and The Incredibles 2 (2018); a Mac-truck in Cars (2006), Cars 2 (2011) and Cars 3 (2017); Mustafa, the head waiter in Ratatouille (2007); as John, a human in WALL-E (2008), the construction worker in Up! (2009); Gordon the guard in Brave (2012); Harland in Planes (2013), Fritz in Inside Out (2015); Earl in The Good Dinosaur (2015); Bill the Crab in Finding Dory (2016); and Juan Ortodoncia in Coco (2017). Pixar artists always find a way to include John’s recognizable eyebrows and mustache. Pixar’s creators call John their “good luck charm.” John’s latest project is a partnership with actor and director Kevin Sorbo in the upcoming film East Texas Miracle – a...
What “American Made” Means to John Ratzenberger
This article was originally posted in HuffPost Business by Stacey Alcorn. Click here to read the full article. There’s a good chance you know him as Cliff Clavin, the know-it-all postman onCheers. Or maybe you know him from his hit show Made In America on the Travel Channel where he showcased the people behind the products made in the USA. He has worked on feature films like Superman and Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back, as well as independent films like The Woodcarver. He’s also the only actor to voice a role in every Pixar film with such beloved characters as Mack the Truck and Hamm the Piggy Bank. John Ratzenberger has been listed as the 6th most successful actor of all time in terms of box office receipts and there’s no slowing him down. In addition to an average of 5 speeches a month, regular visits with Congressional leaders on issues that affect American manufacturers and another Pixar film release this summer, he’ll be launching 1-2 minute syndicated vignettes called “It’s a Little Known Fact” on radio stations nationwide starting this month. Successful? No question. Self-made? You bet. He started his acting career while working part-time as a carpenter to pay the bills. Ambitious? Let’s just say that in between his acting, vocal talents, and screen writing, he is also an avid entrepreneur with his hands in several businesses. Ambitious is an understatement. Passionate? Without a doubt. And that’s what brings us to today and this article.John Ratzenberger loves acting, writing, and entrepreneurship. But his absolute passion is America. He’s a fascinating person to talk to, rich with knowledge of history and how things work. He could talk for hours about the infrastructure of America and how highways, tunnels, and cities were meticulously built during a time when the only manpower was true man power; the blood, sweat, and tears of laborers. Ratzenberger is an aficionado of learning, a connoisseur of understanding the mechanics of how things work, and an advocate for re-introducing trade, mechanics, shop, and carpentry skills back into schools so that we can truly marry human talent and skill to today’s innovative society in order to create a better America. He says that he hopes his legacy, when people fall upon his name one hundred years from now, is not that he was Cliff from Cheers, or Mack the Truck in a Pixar film, but that he was that guy who advocated for empowering individuals to leave America better than it was found. Here are John Ratzenberger’s four simple strategies for putting the most powerful brand in the world back into the hands...
