David Kaye - Transformers Wiki (2025)

The name or term "David" refers to more than one character or idea. For a list of other meanings, see David (disambiguation).

For a Canadian, he sure does play a lot of American superheroes.

David Kaye (born David V. Hope on October 14, 1964) is a Canadian voice actor and, man, he is in everything. Some of his more popular roles in the world of animation include Professor Xavier in X-Men Evolution, Khyber and several Omnitrix aliens and characters in Ben 10: Omniverse (and later Grandpa Max, Shock Rock, and Humungousaur in the 2016 reboot along with a few others), Clank in the Ratchet & Clank franchise, Rock Miner in Rescue Heroes, Superman and Hawkman in DC Super Friends, and he's well known within the G.I. Joe franchise, having voiced General Hawk in both the final season of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero and in Sgt. Savage and his Screaming Eagles, and Patrick O'Hara (father to Scarlett) in G.I. Joe: Renegades.

In the world of dubbing, Kaye has played Treize Khushrenada in Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, Sesshomaru in InuYasha and Recoome in the Ocean Group dub of Dragon Ball Z. He is also the announcer for Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, and voiced all those commercials for Enzyte featuring the eternally-creepily-smiling "Bob".

Kaye originally began his voice acting career as a member of the Canadian voice acting union, doing voice over work out of Vancouver (though originally born in Ontario). In 2007, he moved to the US, joining the American voice acting union in LA and now does voice over work exclusively in the States.

Contents

  • 1 Voice roles
    • 1.1 Beast Wars
    • 1.2 Beast Wars Transmetals Game
    • 1.3 Beast Machines
    • 1.4 Armada
    • 1.5 OTFCC Live-Action Drama
    • 1.6 Energon
    • 1.7 Cybertron
    • 1.8 Transformers Animated
      • 1.8.1 Incidentals
    • 1.9 Transformers (2007 movie)
    • 1.10 Transformers Prime
    • 1.11 Bee in the City 2: Electric Bugaloo
    • 1.12 Transformers: Robots in Disguise
    • 1.13 The Hot Rod
  • 2 Convention appearances
  • 3 Notes
  • 4 External links

Voice roles

Beast Wars

  • Megatron
  • Teletraan I ("Nemesis Part 2")
  • Larry DiTillio (Visitations script reading)

Beast Wars Transmetals Game

  • Megatron
  • Megatron X

Beast Machines

  • Megatron
  • Savage/Noble

Armada

  • Megatron/Galvatron

OTFCC Live-Action Drama

  • Unicron Trilogy Megatron

Energon

  • Megatron/Galvatron
  • Unicron

Cybertron

  • Megatron/Galvatron (except "Fallen")

Transformers Animated

  • Optimus Prime
  • Lugnut
  • Security Bot ("Total Meltdown")
  • Grimlock
  • Trash Bot (Sound and Fury)
  • News Bot (Headmaster)
  • Sparkplug
  • Cliffjumper
  • Highbrow
  • Warpath
  • Dead End (Botcon 2011 Script Reading)
  • Toxitron (Botcon 2011 Script Reading)

Incidentals

  • Technician 1 ("Transform and Roll Out")
  • Firefighter ("Transform and Roll Out")
  • Fan #2 ("Transform and Roll Out")
  • Fan #1 ("Home Is Where the Spark Is")
  • Nature Show Narrator ("Home Is Where the Spark Is")
  • Customer ("Nanosec")
  • Man ("Along Came a Spider")
  • Intercom Voice ("Sound and Fury")
  • Irate Citizen ("Garbage In, Garbage Out")
  • Driver ("Velocity")

Transformers (2007 movie)

  • Optimus Prime (ABC Television Broadcast Promo)

Transformers Prime

  • Hardshell
  • Vehicon ("Hurt")

Bee in the City 2: Electric Bugaloo

  • Megatron
  • Lugnut

Transformers: Robots in Disguise

  • Hammerstrike
  • Slashmark
  • Race Annoucer ("Disordered Personalities")

The Hot Rod

  • Lio Convoy
  • Megatron

Convention appearances

  • BotCon 1997
  • BotCon 1998
  • OTFCC 2003
  • BotCon 2007
  • BotCon 2008
  • BotCon 2009
  • BotCon 2011
  • BotCon 2012
  • BotCon 2014
  • BotCon 2016
  • TFcon (2004, 2010, 2018, 2022)

Notes

  • He is the only voice actor who has voiced both Optimus Prime and Megatron as regular roles. Kaye has also lent his voice to eight separate Transformers series, the most for any single Transformers voice actor.
  • Ironically, when auditioning for Beast Wars, Kaye originally read for the role of Optimus Primal while Garry Chalk read for the sinister Megatron.
    • Kaye has stated that he's unsure as to how he was specifically chosen for the role of Animated Optimus.
  • Kaye has described his take on Megatron as being "a cross between Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery, and a lizard".
  • Kaye was interviewed as a special feature for Kid Rhino's Beast Machines The Complete Series DVD set, and also on Madman Entertainment's Beast Wars season 3 box set.
  • He has been known to oblige requests at conventions to sing the Sesame Street Rubber Ducky song in his Beast Wars Megatron voice. And to this day, it's very catchy.
  • When Transformers fan Moosetron was dying of leukemia in late 2013, Kaye recorded a private video greeting for him as a final Christmas gift, partially done in character as Armada Galvatron, along with Steve Blum.
  • As noted in the caption above, he's the only actor who's played Superman, Captain America and Optimus Prime. Talk about the red, white and blue!
  • Every year, on his YouTube channel, David Kaye gives Christmas greetings, partially in character as Megatron.
  • Kaye's favourite character in Beast Wars was Tarantulas.
  • Kaye also provided the voice of the live-action film series Optimus Prime for a commercial promo in character when Transformers was broadcast on the ABC Network in 2010, Kaye was specifically hired due to his long time work with the network as well as having previously voiced Optimus in Transformers Animated.

External links

David Kaye - Transformers Wiki (2025)
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