Kemal Amin "Casey" Kasem (April 27, 1932 — June 15, 2014) was a Lebanese-American broadcaster and animation voice actor. As himself, he is best known for his radio program, American Top 40, and its various spinoffs, including Casey's Top 40, Casey's Countdown (for adult contemporary radio stations), and so on. He also hosted a television adaptation, America’s Top 10, and has made guest appearances in other shows such as Saved by the Bell and Hawaii Five-O.
Besides his radio and on-screen work, Kasem has done character voices for Saturday morning cartoons, most notably Scooby-Doo (as Shaggy) and Filmation's version of Batman (as Robin, a role he carried over into Super Friends). He portrayed Cliffjumper and Bluestreak in the Generation 1 The Transformers TV series and reprised Cliffjumper in the 1986 film. He was also the off-camera quizmaster on the U.S. version of 100%, and an announcer for NBC during the '70s and '80s, including their Saturday-morning promos and Ad Bumpers.
Kasem also worked on behalf of promoting understanding towards the Arab-American community (which is why he quit The Transformers, after they featured a thinly-veiled takeoff of Muammar Gaddafi who led the country of Carbombya), and later wondered if all his hard work would be undone by the tragedy of September 11th.
He also had a very minor hit record of his own. 1964's "Letter from Elaina", a recitation where he reads an actual letter sent to him by a young fan of The Beatles who met George Harrison after a concert, just barely missed making the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at #103 on the Bubbling Under chart.
He passed away at the age of 82, on June 15, 2014.
His second wife (from 1980 until his death) was Jean Kasem née Thompson, mostly known for playing Loretta Tortelli on Cheers. In fact, Casey and her were also a short-guy, tall-girl couple
, rather like Loretta and her husband Nick.
His name is used as a nickname for one of the soldiers in the documentary book (and later TV show based upon the books) Generation Kill.
