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How Velma discovered Daphne
A tale of two besties!
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? experienced a casting shake-up when the original voice of Daphne, Stefanianna Christopherson, left the show. After playing Daphne for the first season of the hit cartoon, Christopherson and her husband moved to New York, which meant she could not continue the role.
In the 2005 Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? Blu-ray special feature, "The Scooby-Doo! Gang: In Their Own Words", the cast of Scooby-Doo was interviewed about their roles on the show and its lasting legacy. One part of these interviews was with the voice actors of Velma and Daphne discussing how Velma was the one who found the voice of Daphne.
The voice of Velma Dinkley, Nicole Jaffe, decided to look for the voice of Daphne herself so they could get started on season two. She found a perfect fit for Daphne, her roommate, Heather North. A fellow actress, North had guest-starred on shows like Gidget, The Monkees, and Green Acres, but had not found a full-time acting gig.
"Nicole Jaffe was my roommate and said, 'Get in here! They're looking for Daphne, you can do Daphne..." North recalled, "We could do this together, this would be great fun!"
Jaffe recalled, "(North) was very right for the character. So, when the other girl left, I called Heather and I said 'Come down right away and audition for this because I think you'd be terrific."
"I didn't always listen to her, but for this I did," North admitted, "And I auditioned and got the part." Daphne turned out to be the role of a lifetime that North would play for 33 years. She played Daphne in the original series as well as The New Scooby-Doo Movies, The Scooby-Doo Show, Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo, The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries, The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, and many more television specials and movies.
Bringing North into the Scooby-Doo fold was also a career change for Jaffe. Shortly after Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? ended, Jaffe retired from acting and became a talent agent. She formed her own agency, which was later merged and then sold to William Morris Agency, and she represented celebrities like John Travolta, Whitney Houston, and Patrick Swayze.
"And that was my first, really my first job as an agent, was getting her this," Jaffe then entrusted Velma's glasses in the next voice actress's hands and used her experience with Daphne to help actors and musicians of all levels book their breakthrough gigs.
