Cree Summer

Cree Summer Francks (born July 7, 1969) is an American-Canadian actress, voice actress and singer.

She is known for playing Winifred "Freddie" Brooks on the NBC sitcom A Different World. In animation, Summer was the original voice of Penny in the 1983 cartoon Inspector Gadget. She also voiced Elmyra Duff in Tiny Toon Adventures and Pinky, Elmyra & the Brain, Susie Carmichael in Rugrats and ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Grown_Up! All Grown Up!], Numbuh 5 in Codename: Kids Next Door, Cleo the Poodle in Clifford the Big Red Dog, Princess Kida in the franchise of Atlantis: The Lost Empire, Valerie Gray in Danny Phantom, Rayna Cartflight in The Buzz on Maggie, Beast Girl in Teen Titans Go!, Priscilla Skunk in Sheriff Callie's Wild West, Maxine "Max" Gibson in Batman Beyond, Foxxy Love in Drawn Together, Magma in X-Men Legends, Yvonne and Gordon in Mrs. Munger's Class, Nebula in Guardians of the Galaxy and Witch Haggar in ''Voltron: Legendary Defender

Early life
Summer was born in Los Angeles, California, on July 7, 1969,  and grew up on the Red Pheasant Reserve in Saskatchewan. She is the daughter of Don Francks, a Canadian actor and musician, and Lili Red Eagle, a Native American from North Richmond, California, and adopted member of the Plains Cree First Nations. She and her family also traveled and lived around British Columbia during her childhood, and started public school at the age of nine in Toronto. Her brother, Rainbow Sun Francks, is a former MuchMusic VJ.

Acting career
Summer's acting career began in 1983 when she was cast as Penny in the original version of Inspector Gadget. Her unique, throaty voice was instantly recognizable to viewers, as well as casting agents, who began frequently casting her in animated programs. Many of these were part of cult franchises, like The Care Bears Movie (1985) and Ewoks (1985, part of the Star Wars franchise).

In 1988, Summer was cast as the freespirited Winifred "Freddie" Brooks in The Cosby Show spin-off A Different World. She remained a regular cast member of the show from 1988 through its end in 1993.

During the run of A Different World, Summer continued working in voice acting. She was cast in the short-lived television series Sweet Justice in 1994 until its cancellation in 1995. Apart from guest appearances on other live-action television shows such as Living Single and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Summer's professional work since has been limited to voice acting.

At the start of the third season of A Different World in 1988, the cartoon series The Real Ghostbusters episodes were expanded from their original half-hour format to an hour. The show was changed to be more youthful. Episodes had a lighter tone designed to be less serious and frightening. In these lighter episodes, Cree voiced the sweet and helpful Chilly Cooper, the neighborhood ice-cream woman and innocent love interest of Slimer.

Summer voiced over 101 animated characters between 1983 and 2006. These have spanned video games, cartoon television series, animated films and commercials. Among her most famous roles was in Inspector Gadget (Season 1) as Penny (a role she reprised in the Robot Chicken episode "Adoption's an Option"), WB's Tiny Toon Adventures (1990) as Elmyra Duff (which she reprised for Pinky, Elmyra & the Brain) and Mary Melody, Aka Pella in WB's ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histeria! Histeria!], Susie Carmichael in Nickelodeon's Rugrats and its spin-off [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Grown_Up! All Grown Up!], Cleo the Poodle in PBS Kids' Clifford the Big Red Dog, Miranda from Nickelodeon's As Told by Ginger, Foxxy Love in Drawn Together, Dulcy the Dragon in Sonic the Hedgehog, Princess 'Kida' Kidagakash for the franchise of Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire, Valerie Gray in Nickelodeon's Danny Phantom, Numbuh 5 (Abigail Lincoln) and Cree Lincoln in Cartoon Network's Codename: Kids Next Door, Penelope in Barbie As Rapunzel, octogenarian villain Granny May on WordGirl, Tiff from Nickelodeon's My Life as a Teenage Robot, and Blackarachnia in Transformers: Animated''.

In the first season DVD commentary of Drawn Together, she stated that she was originally hired to do the voice of Meg Griffin on Fox's animated series Family Guy, but the producers recast the part as they felt having a black woman voice a white character would be racially insensitive.

In December 2016, Summer reprised her role as Penny from Inspector Gadget in an episode of the web-series, Nostalgia Critic.

Summer is a frequent co-star of Canadian-American actor Tara Strong; the two are childhood friends, both having grown up in Toronto, Ontario.