Mary Kay Bergman (June 5, 1961 – November 11, 1999) was an American voice actress with numerous roles and bit parts in television, movies, direct-to-video animation, and advertising. She was best known for voicing many characters on South Park.
Bergman was born in Los Angeles, California. Her parents were Jewish, but Bergman was non-practicing and converted to Catholicism after exploring several Christian denominations; she later referred to herself as a "Catholic Jew".
Bergman was known for voicing most of the female characters in the animated series like Fox Kids' The Secret Files of the Spy Dogs where she played a dog named Mitzy and a number of other characters. She also voiced characters for South Park and the 1999 feature film South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. Her characters included Liane Cartman, mother of Eric Cartman; Sheila Broflovski, mother of Kyle Broflovski; Sharon Marsh, mother of Stan Marsh; Mrs. McCormick, mother of Kenny McCormick; and Wendy Testaburger. Originally, Bergman was credited on South Park as Shannen Cassidy because she was also serving as Disney's official Snow White voice. The South Park episode "Mr. Hankey's Christmas Classics" was dedicated to her, as was the episode "Starvin' Marvin in Space", the first episode to air after her death.
Another large role was her voice work in Captain Planet and the Planeteers as Dr. Blight for five seasons with the show.
Bergman's other voice credits included over 400 television commercials, including the voice of Mrs. Butterworth in Mrs. Butterworth's syrup commercials, as well as various Disney films (Beauty and the Beast, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Toy Story 2), and as the voice of Jay Jay the Jet Plane, Daphne Blake in more recent Scooby-Doo animated movies, Timmy Turner in Oh Yeah! Cartoons episodes of The Fairly OddParents (When the pilot episodes were aired as actual episodes in 2001, Bergman's voice was overdubbed by Tara Strong), and several female voices in The Tick animated series. She also sang in the "Weird Al" Yankovic song "Pretty Fly For A Rabbi", alongside Tress MacNeille. According to IMDb, her final film role was Balto II: Wolf Quest.
Bergman, who suffered from an anxiety disorder, committed suicide by shooting herself in the head with a shotgun, in her West Los Angeles, California apartment, on November 11, 1999. Her husband Dino Andrade, who (along with a friend), discovered her body and suicide note, established the Mary Kay Bergman Memorial Fund, which contributes to the operation of the Suicide Prevention Center at the Didi Hirsch Community Mental Health Center.
Mary Kay Bergman was laid to rest under one of the most unique gravemarkers at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills).
After Bergman's death, the voice actress Eliza Schneider took over all of her voice roles on South Park.
