Eric Bauza, whose performances helped introduce Looney Tunes characters to a new generation, died suddenly of natural causes on Oct. 25. He was 46. Colleagues across the animation industry have paid tribute to his command of the voices made famous by Mel Blanc and to the warmth he brought to recording sessions, friendships and community projects.
Born in Scarborough, Toronto, Bauza began his career working as an animator, character designer and layout artist at Spümcø. His breakthrough in voice acting came as Stimpy in the studio’s Ren & Stimpy revival, Adult Party Cartoon. Although the series failed, his performance attracted attention within animation and helped establish the career that followed.
When Bauza auditioned to play Bugs Bunny in Looney Tunes Cartoons in 2018, producer Alex Kirwan immediately noticed something beyond an accurate impression. Bauza captured the characters’ frantic comic energy while drawing on detailed knowledge of their earlier appearances. Susan Rogers, a Warner Bros. Pictures Animation producer who worked with him on Daffy Season, said he spent about an hour each day watching Looney Tunes to study the performances.
Pete Browngardt first worked with Bauza on Cartoon Network’s Uncle Grandpa, casting him as Belly Bag. Their friendship developed over more than 150 episodes, with Bauza testing his Looney Tunes impressions between takes. When Browngardt later had an opportunity to work on Looney Tunes Cartoons, he already knew Bauza was the performer he wanted.
His interpretations changed with each project. Bugs became gentle and affectionate in the preschool series Bugs Bunny Builders, while Daffy emerged as a conspiracy theorist in Browngardt’s The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie. Bauza also performed Porky Pig in a rap battle for Space Jam: A New Legacy and gave Foghorn Leghorn a threatening villainous role in Coyote vs. Acme.
Bauza became a prominent advocate for releasing Coyote vs. Acme after Warner Bros. shelved it as a tax write-off. He promoted the campaign on social media and appealed for its release in Daffy’s voice at the 2024 Annie Awards. The film was subsequently sold to Ketchup Entertainment for a reported $50 million and has earned more than $100 million worldwide. Ketchup confirmed plans to submit it for animated feature consideration at the 2027 Oscars.
Tributes also emphasized Bauza’s generosity. Jack Quaid, Matthew Mercer and other colleagues recalled his kindness, while Kirwan described his willingness to help students and participate in smaller projects. With his fiancée, Caro Beurmann, Bauza co-founded Saturday Morning Cartoons United, a nonprofit vintage-cartoon screening series that raises money for the animation community, including members affected by the Los Angeles wildfires.
Audiences will hear more of his completed work in November. Daffy Season is scheduled to accompany The Cat in the Hat when it opens Nov. 6, and Warner Bros. will add a memorial card to the short’s Academy screeners. Bauza also voiced two characters for a Nov. 15 episode of The Simpsons, fulfilling a longstanding ambition. The future of Bye Bye Bunny: A Looney Tunes Musical, for which he recorded dialogue and musical numbers, remains uncertain.
Those who worked with him said his respect for earlier performers was central to his approach. Kirwan recalled that Bauza regularly acknowledged the actors who had voiced the characters before him. For Rogers, the loss extends well beyond finding another performer: “But there’s only one Eric Bauza.”
