Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore Sterling Holloway elected not to continue the role of Pooh and Sebastian Cabot, the original narrator, died shortly after the release of the feature film "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh". The deaths of Junius Matthews in 1978 and Barbara Luddy in 1979 also necessitated changes in Rabbit's and Kanga's portrayers; Will Ryan began a three-year stint as Rabbit's voice in this featurette while Julie McWhirter portrayed Kanga only once. Additionally, Laurie Main, Hal Smith, Will Ryan, and Kim Christianson later appear in the live-action series "Welcome to Pooh Corner" as the Narrator, Winnie the Pooh, Owl, Rabbit, and
Gopher (Winnie-the-Pooh) original character and not based on a character from the A.A. Milne books, a fact he notes in his first appearance when he says "I'm not in the book, you know!" Instead, he was initially developed by Disney as a replacement for Piglet. Apparently, the proposed character of Gopher was thought to have a more "folksy, all-American, grass-roots image" than Piglet. While American audiences loved the character, British audiences were less than pleased. Like most Winnie the Pooh characters, Gopher is named after his own species. Gopher is also known for his unique voice characterization. He tends to whistle his