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Ken Page, the Broadway star and voice actor who played the character Oogie Boogie in The Nightmare Before Christmas, has died at the age of 70.
Page was a prolific actor who also lent his voice to All Dogs Go To Heaven and appeared opposite Beyoncé in Dreamgirls.
On stage, he was known for originating the role of Ken in the Broadway production of Ain’t Misbehavin’ and playing Old Deuteronomy in a production of Cats that was filmed for television.
TMZ reports that Page died “very peacefully” at his St. Louis home on September 30.
The publication quotes his representative Lance Kirkland as saying: “He was a beautiful, talented man who was larger than life. Ken was loved and adored by so many and will be missed so much.”
Kenneth Page was born in St. Louis on January 20, 1954. He attended St. Bridget of Erin and St. Nicholas elementary schools, and while attending the latter was inspired to pursue a career in theater. He majored in the subject at Fontbonne College in Clayton, Missouri.
Page made his Broadway debut in The Wiz, playing the Cowardly Lion. He then went on to play Nicely-Nicely Johnson in Guys and Dolls and was featured in the original cast of the Fats Waller musical Ain't Misbehavin'. He won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Musical for his performance, and reprised the role for a 1982 television broadcast.
That same year, Page played Old Deuteronomy in Cats, and he later returned to the part for the 1998 video release.
In 1993, Page landed arguably his best-known role as Oogie Boogie, Halloween Town’s villainous bogeyman in Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.
In an interview with DirectConversations, Page recalled that he was initially hired just to sing “Oogie Boogie’s Song” but subsequently drew on several characters he’d played before to voice the dialogue as well.
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“At first, the filmmakers were looking for someone to just sing ‘Oogie Boogie’s Song,’ and they wanted something like a Cab Calloway-esque, Fats Waller-esque kind of vocalist. Somebody who could characterize the vocal,” said Page.
“So my lawyer said to Danny Elfman, ‘I know the person for you – there’s nobody else that fits that description other than Ken Page. He’s done these things and embodied many critters.'”
Composer Elfman and director Henry Selick then asked Page how he would do Ooogie Boogie’s speaking voice.
“I said, ‘My take on him would be somewhere between [Cowardly Lion actor] Bert Lahr and the voice of the demon in The Exorcist, Mercedes McCambridge,’” Page remembered, laughing.
“Danny and Henry kind of looked at me and went, ‘Wow — that’s wild.’ So, that was the take I gave them, and said, ‘If I go too far in either direction, you can stop me.’ So, along with the Cab Calloway and Fats Waller stuff for the singing, that’s how we came up with Oogie Boogie.”
In his later years, Page developed and performed a cabaret show, Page by Page.
