Kevin Conroy
Kevin Conroy recently passed away on November 10, 2022, at the age of 66. Kevin Conroy is an American actor who is best known for his voice acting. His most notable role is that of the voice of Batman. He had quickly become incredibly iconic within the DC fanbase and was the favorite mainstay voice of Batman in many different DC projects, voicing him for three decades.
Early Life and Education
Kevin Conroy was born on November 30, 1955, in Westbury, New York. He was born into an Irish-Catholic family and was the son of Thomas and Patricia Conroy. He had three older siblings including Trisha and Tom Conroy. When he was 11, Conroy moved to Westport, Connecticut. His father, Thomas Conroy, was an alcoholic, and due to this, drove Kevin Conroy’s mother away. His father tried to commit suicide when Kevin was in high school, and due to the chaotic and tumultuous home environment, Kevin decided to live with a family friend during his last year of high school.
Kevin moved to New York City in 1973 after earning a full scholarship to the prestigious Julliard School’s drama division. Kevin’s Father was not supportive of Conroy’s dream of becoming an actor and thought it was” completely insane.” While at Julliard, Conroy was in a group with both Robin Williams and Kelsey Grammar, and they were all studying under the actor John Houseman. Kevin was roommates with Robin Williams and said that sometimes you would wake up in the middle of the night and hear voices coming from his bedroom. Conroy said it was “like the whole family was in there, but it was just Robin.” Conroy was also a heavy drinker and drug abuser from 17 to 21 until he decided he was going to go all in with his acting career and stopped all drinking and drug use. In 1978, Conroy graduated from Julliard and started touring with Houseman’s acting group known as the “The Acting Company”.
The Start of a Career
In 1979, he starred in Ira Levin’s Deathtrap, the longest running comedy thriller on Broadway which had only 5 characters and one set throughout its two acts. Conroy and his costar Brian Bedford struggled to get along and had an on-stage brawl at the opening night of Deathtrap at the Kennedy Center. While they were genuinely mad at each other on stage, the fight worked so well in the scene that the audience absolutely loved it.
Kevin Conroy’s experience as an actor is rooted in on-stage theatre performances. After he played the recurring character Jerry Grove in the television series Another World, Conroy moved out to California to pursue further television work, and it is there that he became associated with the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego. Conroy then performed in a few of their productions such as Hamlet, Lolita, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Eastern Standard. Performing in these plays would occupy the next 5 years of his life, until 1985 when Conroy returned to television in the made for TV movie Covenant. He then played the gay lawyer Bart Fallmont on Dynasty from 1985 to 1986. He also had recurring roles on Ohara and Tour of Duty in 1987. He starred in several TV movies and shows until 1992 when he got his big break.
Becoming the Voice of Batman
In 1992 Kevin Conroy auditioned for the voice of Batman, in the upcoming animated series Batman: The Animated Series (BTAS). Conroy was recommended to the show’s producers by a friend and auditioned for a role that over 500 actors had already auditioned for. To make matters worse, Conroy knew nothing about the character. After the producers briefly explained the concept of the character to Conroy, he read for the part and was hired on the spot. When reading, Conroy immediately separated the voices between Batman and Bruce Wayne. According to Conroy this is because he “decided that the Bruce Wayne persona, the public persona, is the performance, and the Batman character is who he is when he is most natural. When he’s putting on the cape, he is becoming himself.” This idea has since been reflected many times in comics like Batman: Ego or even in Christian Bale’s performance in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy. Conroy based his dual voice performance on Leslie Howard in 1934’s Scarlet Pimpernel.
BTAS is typically held in high regards by the DC Fanbase, and Conroy had a major impact on that perception. Due to this, he went on to continue voicing Batman in different projects throughout the DC Animated Universe. The actor has a tally of “nearly 60 different productions, including 15 films, 15 animated series that spanned almost 400 episodes, and two dozen video games, according to DC Comics.” This means he portrayed the character longer than any other actor in live-action and animation. He also redubbed Christian Bale’s Batman lines in an animated trailer for The Dark Knight Rises in 2012. Kevin Conroy had a very notable performance as Batman in the Batman: Arkham video game series. He has had one live action performance as Batman in the Crisis on Infinite Earths Crossover within the “Arrowverse” TV Universe. On December 8, 2022, during the Game Awards Ceremony, it was confirmed that Kevin Conroy reprised his role as Batman one final time in the upcoming video game Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.
Kevin has also often worked with Mark Hamill who voices the Joker in many of the same projects opposite Conroy and has spoken highly of him. During an interview, Hamill said that “When they offer me roles now, I say, ‘Is Kevin doing it?’ … I don’t even have to read the script, if Kevin’s doing it, I’ll do it.”
Personal Life
After the attacks of September 11, 2001, Kevin Conroy volunteered to aid with relief efforts by cooking for police officers and firefighters. At behest of a cook Conroy called out from the Kitchen into the dining area with his Batman voice, reciting his most iconic line from BTAS, “I am vengeance! I am the night! I am Batman!” The emergency personnel applauded this, many of them having been fans of BTAS in the 90’s. Conroy said he was humbled and deeply flattered by their reaction.
In 2016, Conroy publicly revealed that he was gay, something he tried to keep concealed throughout most of his career. He authored a story called Finding Batman as part of DC Comic’s 2022 pride anthology, which was a story that recounted his life and experience as a gay man and received critical acclaim upon release. Kevin said that he had faced some discrimination when potential collaborators and employers found out about his homosexuality. Conroy said that on multiple occasions he had been removed from consideration for acting jobs due to his sexual orientation. Most fans didn’t care that he was gay, and Conroy continued to make many appearances at different conventions such as Comicon throughout his career, sometimes appearing with co-star Mark Hamill. Kevin Conroy was married to Vaughn C Williams until the time of his death.
Death
Kevin Conroy unfortunately died on November 10, 2022. He was 66 when he died from intestinal cancer at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. He had never publicly disclosed that he was ill, and his death was announced by a press release from Warner Bros.
His death quickly became international news, and many have paid tribute to him on different media outlets. People who paid tribute to him included Mark Hamill, Steve Blum, Michael Rosenbaum, Tara Strong, Tim Daly, Andrea Romano, Paul Dini, James Gunn, Susan Eisenberg, George Takei, Lynda Carter and Dana Delany. DC Comics also released a separate statement and gave free online access to Finding Batman to honor his memory.
Kevin Conroy may be gone, but he is certainly not forgotten.
“Kevin Conroy” by Wikipedia is licensed under CC BY 4.0
“BATMAN! KEVIN CONROY talks Anxiety, Traumatic Childhood, and Robin Williams” by Michael Rosenbaum is licensed under CC BY 4.0
“Bio – Kevin Conroy” by Esquire is licensed under CC BY 4.0
