Farmer's first job, at the age of 15, involved doing voices, especially those of Western stars like John Wayne or Walter Brennan. He and his friends would sometimes go through fast food drive-thrus and order foods in his voices. In college, he found work in radio and TV and then moved on to stand-up comedy as an impressionist until he moved out to Hollywood where he voiced Goofy since 1986.
During his stand-up years, Farmer worked at a comedy club called the Comedy Corner in Dallas. Tuesday nights were open mike nights there and he had just taken a job at an electronics store. He had just recently stopped working in show business and radio and he missed his audience. So he went to the club on Tuesday nights and he created his own five-minute routine. Starting on March 16, 1982, he started going to the Comedy Corner every week and started working on his routine and it became a career inside of six months. He worked at the Comedy Corner from 1982 until he moved to California in 1986.
Farmer's decision to move to California came from a Dallas commercial agent who suggested that, given his talent for voices, he should try his luck in California. He was recently married, but he and his wife talked it over and came to an arrangement. She stayed back in Dallas while he commuted for a year after he got an apartment. Then four months after his moving out to Hollywood, his agent asked him if he could do any Disney characters. His very first animated character audition was for Goofy. When he auditioned for the voice, he studied all the cartoons with Goofy in them, especially the ones released in the 1930s. He studied the hilarious laugh and the distinctive "gawrsh". He inherited the voice of Goofy (as well as Pluto and Horace Horsecollar), around the same time Tony Anselmo inherited Donald Duck, and Wayne Allwine and Russi Taylor did likewise for Mickey and Minnie Mouse, respectively.
Bill believes that cartoon voices are not about funny voices, but rather acting. His mentor was the late Daws Butler, the voice behind many of the old Hanna-Barbera characters. Daws put it in Bill's mind that when doing cartoon voices, you're not merely doing a funny voice, you're an actor and the acting is premier and that you have to think like the character you're doing and he is also best known as the voice of Goofy in A Goofy Movie in 1995 and as the voice of Goofy in the sequel An Extremely Goofy Movie in 2000.
Awesome in-depth interview:
Credit List:
| Animated American (2008, Live Action / Animated Short Film) | Bogie Bear | |
| Astro Boy (2003, Anime Series) | Detective Tawashi | |
| Baldur's Gate (1998, Video Game) | Brunos | |
| Irlentree | ||
| Yeslick | ||
| Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000, Video Game) | Demson | |
| Dermin | ||
| Garren Windspear | ||
| Beauty and the Beast (1991, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Bongee Bear and the Kingdom of Rhythm (2006, Animated Film) | Tyler the Candlestick Maker | |
| Brother Bear (2003, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Bug's Life, A (1997, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Cars (2006, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Cars Mater-National (2007, Video Game) | (additional voices) | |
| Cars Race-O-Rama (2009, Video Game) | (additional voices) | |
| Cars: The Video Game (2006, Video Game) | (additional voices) | |
| Cats Don't Dance (1997, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Crash Tag Team Racing (2005, Video Game) | Old Man | |
| Park Drones | ||
| Dead Rising (2006, Video Game) | (additional voices) | |
| Cletus Samson | ||
| Floyd Sanders | ||
| Jeff Meyers | ||
| Ryan LaRosa | ||
| Death Becomes Her (1992, Live Action Film) | (loop group) | |
| Destroy All Humans! (2005, Video Game) | Narrator | |
| Rural Male | ||
| Disney's House of Mouse (2001, Animated Series) | Goofy | |
| Horace Horsecollar | ||
| Pluto | ||
| Practical Pig | ||
| Sheriff of Nottingham | ||
| Epic Mickey (2010, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Horace Horsecollar | ||
| EverQuest II (2004, Video Game) | Bartender Berrystein | |
| Bhaelthrezish | ||
| Blight Sage Destroz | ||
| Commissioner Dogweed | ||
| Davish | ||
| Felderin Beddleknops | ||
| Generic Floating Skulls | ||
| Generic Ghosts | ||
| Generic Male Dwarf Enemy | ||
| Generic Male Gargoyle Enemy | ||
| Generic Water Elemental | ||
| Gren Stiles | ||
| Grozmag the Trainer | ||
| Kai Vhri Jah | ||
| Karg Icebear | ||
| Lodo Bightn | ||
| Pelle Shinkicker | ||
| Phen Dominson | ||
| Rukir Pineleaf | ||
| Sashra Thaltalis | ||
| Sir Thothur Dorarr | ||
| Tilzak N'Lim | ||
| Urban Ratonga Chef | ||
| Wiseman Oluran | ||
| Extremely Goofy Movie, An (2000, Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | Goofy | |
| Full Throttle (1995, Video Game) | Gas Guard Pilot | |
| Horace | ||
| News Anchorman | ||
| Goof Troop (1992, Animated Series) | Aunt Goofilla | |
| Goofy | ||
| Goofy Movie, A (1995, Animated Film) | Goofy | |
| Happily N'Ever After (2007, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law (2000, Animated Series) | Secret Squirrel | |
| Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law (2008, Video Game) | Secret Squirrel | |
| Higglytown Heroes (2004, Computer Animated Series) | Janitor Hero | |
| Jasper | ||
| Home on the Range (2004, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Horton Hears a Who! (2008, Computer Animated Film) | Willie Bear | |
| Hunchback of Notre Dame, The (1996, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Innoventions (Attraction) | Alec Tronic | |
| Iron Giant, The (1999, Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| King's Quest: Mask of Eternity (Video Game) | King Gryph | |
| Weirdling Tradesman | ||
| Kingdom Hearts (2002, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Pluto | ||
| Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (2009, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Kingdom Hearts II (2005, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Pluto | ||
| Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories (2008, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep (2009, Video Game) | Goofy | |
| Horace Horsecollar | ||
| Lion King 1 1/2, The (2004, Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | Goofy | |
| Loonatics Unleashed (2005, Animated Series) | Mr. Leghorn | |
| Looney Tunes Racing (2000, Video Game) | Foghorn Leghorn | |
| Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (2006, Computer Animated Series) | Goofy | |
| Mickey's House of Villains (2002, Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | Goofy | |
| Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas (2004, Computer Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | Goofy | |
| Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers (2004, Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | Goofy | |
| Pluto | ||
| Monsters, Inc. (2001, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Over the Hedge: The Video Game (2006, Video Game) | Lou | |
| Rottweiler | ||
| Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World (1998, Animated Film (Direct-to-Video)) | (additional voices) | |
| Porco Rosso (1992, Anime Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Prince and the Pauper, The (1990, Animated Short) | Goofy | |
| Horace | ||
| Pluto | ||
| Weasel #1 | ||
| Robot Chicken (2005, Stop-Motion Animated Series) | Bugs Bunny | |
| Daffy Duck | ||
| Lots of Laughs Bear | ||
| Pubertis | ||
| Rover Dangerfield (1991, Animated Film) | Farm Voices | |
| Shrek 2 (2004, Computer Animated Film) | (ADR group) | |
| Space Jam (1996, Live Action /Animated Film) | Foghorn Leghorn | |
| Sylvester | ||
| Yosemite Sam | ||
| Surf's Up (2007, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Tales of Symphonia (2003, Video Game) | Dorr | |
| Toy Story (1995, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Toy Story 2 (1999, Computer Animated Film) | (additional voices) | |
| Ty the Tasmanian Tiger (2002, Video Game) | Captain Wedgewood | |
| Frill Lizard | ||
| Ty the Tasmanian Tiger 2: Bush Rescue (2004, Video Game) | Captain Parrotbeard | |
| Johno | ||
| Squeaver | ||
| Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald (1998, Live-Action/Animated Series (Direct-to-Video)) | Knight #2 | |
| Mob Leader | ||
| What-A-Mess (1995, Animated Series) | (additional voices) | |
| Yakuza (2005, Video Game) | Date |
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