James Earl Jones (January 17, 1931-September 9, 2024) was an Academy Award-nominated and Tony Award-winning actor, known for his work on stage, in film, and on television since the 1960s. However, his greatest contribution to pop culture is supplying the deep, menacing voice of Darth Vader in the Star Wars films. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for The Great White Hope (1970), and Mufasa from the 1994 Disney film The Lion King.
On The Simpsons, he first guest starred in "Treehouse of Horror", where he was heard in all three segments, the only special guest voice to date who holds that distinction: as the moving man in "Bad Dream House", Serak the Preparer in "Hungry Are the Damned", and the narrator in "The Raven". He later voiced an alternate-universe Maggie in "Treehouse of Horror V" and the closing narrator in "Das Bus", explaining that the children were rescued by, "...oh, let's say Moe."
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In "'Round Springfield", when Bleeding Gums Murphy speaks to Lisa from a cloud, he is joined by Mufasa from The Lion King, Darth Vader, and a CNN announcer: all voice-over roles originally portrayed by James Earl Jones, but in this instance imitated by Harry Shearer instead of James Earl Jones.