Clifton Avon Edwards (June 14, 1895, Hannibal, Missouri, USA – July 17, 1971, Hollywood, California, USA) — known as "Ukulele Ike" — was an American singer and voice actor who enjoyed considerable popularity in the 1920s and early 1930s, specializing in jazzy renditions of pop standards and novelty tunes. He had a number-one hit with "Singin' In The Rain" in 1929. He also did voices for animated cartoons later in his career, and is best known as the voice of Jiminy Cricket in Walt Disney's Pinocchio (1940) and Fun and Fancy Free (1947), and Dandy (Jim) Crow in Walt Disney's Dumbo (1941).
In 1929, Cliff Edwards was playing at the Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles, California, where he caught the attention of movie producer-director Irving Thalberg. His film company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer hired Edwards to appear in early sound movies. After performing in some short films, Edwards was one of the stars in the feature Hollywood Revue of 1929, doing some comic bits and singing some numbers, including the film debut of his hit "Singin' in the Rain". He appeared in a total of 33 films for MGM through 1933. He had a small role as Mike, playing a ukulele very briefly at the beginning of the 1931 movie Laughing Sinners (1931), starring Joan Crawford.
Edwards was very friendly with MGM's comedy star Buster Keaton, who featured Edwards in three of his films. Keaton, himself a former vaudevillian, enjoyed singing and would harmonize with Edwards between takes. One of these casual jam sessions was captured on film, in Doughboys (1930), in which Buster and Cliff scat-sing their way through "You Never Did That Before". Buster was battling a drinking problem at the time, and Cliff was nursing a drug habit, both of which are evident in the finished film. In scenes when Keaton is sharp and alert, Edwards appears befuddled; when Edwards regains his sobriety, Keaton is now stumbling and fumbling. (Edwards was ultimately replaced in the Keaton films by Jimmy Durante.)
His most famous voice role was as Jiminy Cricket in Walt Disney's Pinocchio (1940). Edwards's rendition of "When You Wish Upon A Star" is probably his most familiar recorded legacy. He voiced the head crow in Disney's Dumbo (1941) and sang "When I See An Elephant Fly".
Arthur Godfrey's use of the ukulele spurred a surge in its popularity and those that played it, including Edwards. Like many vaudeville stars, Edwards was an early arrival on television. In the 1949 season, he starred in The Cliff Edwards Show, a three-days-a-week (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings) TV variety show on CBS. In the 1950s and early 1960s, he made appearances on The Mickey Mouse Club, in addition to performing his Jiminy Cricket voice for various Disney shorts and the Disney Christmas spectacular, From All of Us to All of You.
In his final years, Edwards lived in a home for indigent actors and often spent his time at the Walt Disney Studios to be available any time he could get voice work. He was sometimes taken to lunch by animators whom he befriended and told stories of his days in vaudeville.
Edwards died on July 17, 1971, at the age of 76 from a cardiac arrest brought on by arteriosclerosis. At the time of his death, Edwards was a penniless charity patient at the Virgil Convalescent Hospital in Hollywood, California. His body was unclaimed and was donated to the University of California, Los Angeles medical school. When Walt Disney Productions, which had been quietly paying many of his medical expenses, discovered this, they offered to purchase his remains and pay for the burial. Instead, it was done by the Actors' Fund of America (which had also aided Edwards) and the Motion Picture and Television Relief Fund. Disney paid for his grave marker.
| Year | Image | Character | Title |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 
|
Jiminy Cricket (Archive) | Once Upon a Studio |
| 1941 | 
|
Jim Crow | Dumbo |
| 1940 | 
|
Jiminy Cricket | Pinocchio |
| 1947 | 
|
Jiminy Cricket | Fun and Fancy Free |