Alan Bleviss, a ubiquitous voice-over artist who could be heard in everything from presidential campaign ads to blockbuster film trailers and television commercials, died on Dec. 30 at his home in Manhattan. He was 76.
His death was announced by his daughter Sarah Bleviss. He had lung cancer, she said.
The Canadian-born Mr. Bleviss’s warm, sonorous voice was heard in countless commercials for companies like AT&T, Heinz, Pampers, Enterprise Rent-a-Car and MasterCard, as well as in trailers for films, including “Scarface,” “Dirty Dancing” and “Ragtime.” He was the voice of the Democratic Party in campaigns for Bill Clinton, Joseph R. Biden Jr. and others.
Mr. Bleviss once told CNN that he made political advertisements only for Democrats because their political beliefs lined up most closely to his own.
He also provided narrations for ABC, the Discovery Channel, PBS and Animal Planet.
Mr. Bleviss’s work for the Children’s Defense Fund, Heinz tomato juice and other commercial clients won six Clio Awards, which honor creativity in advertising.
His career was interrupted in the late 1980s when a neurological disorder, chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, made it difficult for him to speak.
Continue reading the main story“It’s a bit like a Greek tragedy to have this profoundly beautiful and commanding voice and to lose it,” Sarah Bleviss said in a telephone interview. “He went through a period of complete paralysis, including his vocal cords.”
She said he regained his voice with the help of a vocal specialist who had been an Israeli drill sergeant. The same woman helped him again, she added, when chemotherapy and radiation damaged his vocal cords during his cancer treatment.
Alan David Bleviss was born on Aug. 6, 1941, in Edmonton, Alberta, to Joseph and Lee Bleviss. His mother was a homemaker, and his father owned businesses in Edmonton, including a carwash, nightclub and skating rink.
He studied at the University of Alberta. To appease his father, who wanted him to become a lawyer, Mr. Bleviss told him he was studying law, although he was really studying theater.
“When his father found out,” Ms. Bleviss said, “he actually stopped funding my father’s education.” He paid for his own schooling by winning money at poker and bridge, she said. He received a bachelor’s degree in drama from the university in 1963.
In 1966 he graduated from the National Theater School of Canada in Montreal, where he became a lifetime governor and has a library named after him and his family.
“His training, which I think is unusual for voice-overs, came not from broadcasting but from a theater background,” Ms. Bleviss said. “So even watching him in the booth, you could see him emoting.”
Mr. Bleviss was married and divorced three times. In addition to his daughter Sarah, he is survived by his partner, Tessa Needles; a son, Joshua; and another daughter, Lisa Bleviss.
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