Rainbow BriteTurned 40 This Year! The Woman Behind the Voice Reveals Secret to Show's Success (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Bettina Bush in 2017 (left); Rainbow Brite and Twink (right) in a 1985 cartoon.Photo:David Livingston/Getty; Warner Bros./Everett

David Livingston/Getty; Warner Bros./Everett

Back in 1984, Bettina Bush was a 12-year-old voice actress who was working on her first series,The Littles, when producers asked her to read for a new role.

“They brought in this black-and-white drawing of a girl named Wisp, and they said, ‘What do you think she sounds like?’ And I just did the voice. And then I was cast,” Bush, now 52, tells PEOPLE.

Rainbow Brite in 1986.Hallmark Entertainment/Everett

Hallmark Entertainment/Everett

Rainbow Brite’s message of positivity is timeless, she adds. “If you’re feeling down, look up. You might see a rainbow. Everybody feels that way,” Bush explains.

Back in the ‘80s,Rainbow Britealso led a feature film,Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer. But Bush says she didn’t realize how big the Rainbow Brite phenomenon was until they decided to release a Rainbow Brite album titledPaint a Rainbow in Your Heartaround that same time.

At first, producers looked for a singer whose voice could match Bush’s. When they couldn’t find someone, they decided to see if she could do it. Without telling her why, they asked her to sing “Happy Birthday.” “And they said, ‘That was great. Can you sing something else?’ ” she recalls. “And so I sang ‘Tomorrow’ fromAnnie, because I just happened to be in the play the summer before. And they said, ‘Okay, great. Rainbow Brite is going to have an album and so we’re going to need you to sing for her.' "

Rainbow Brite merch from the 1980s.Simon Evans/Alamy; Jayne Lloyd/Alamy

Simon Evans/Alamy; Jayne Lloyd/Alamy

“When that album came out, and it was so popular, that was when I was like, ‘Okay, wait, this is kind of a bigger deal.’ ” A Christmas-themedRainbow Britealbum followed, and the character and her animated friends were turned into toys, games and countless other pieces of memorabilia.

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Bush was set on being an actress from a young age. “I remember being in a Christmas pageant when I was 4. I was a little lamb around the nativity scene, and I was super meticulous about getting my lines right,” she remembers. “And I got them right.” Acting, she says, “wasn’t a want, it was just a given.”

And both her parents were “ride or die” when it came to her dreams. Her father was Charles V. Bush, the first Black graduate of the US Air Force Academy and the first Black Supreme Court page. “My dad, because of his background … he was very much like, you stay true to who you are, and you don’t let anybody tell you who you are. You tell them who you are,” she says. “And so I came out the gate knowing who I was, and he was just going to be supportive of it, period. And as long as I kept my grades up, which I did, then there was no issue.”

Bettina Bush in 2015.Earl Gibson III/WireImage

Earl Gibson III/WireImage

“I had a lot of freedom to explore who I was and who I wanted to be,” she shares, adding that both her parents went the extra mile to make sure there was always someone in her corner as a child star.

Other series Bush ended up working on as a young actor includedThe Karate KidandMy Little Pony. The latter was particularly special for her because every one of the 65 episodes she was in had a new song. Bush continued to work in voiceovers as she grew up, including voicing Alisa Carmichael onRugrats. When people recognize her voice in public, she says, it’s usually for one of two things: a series of McDonald’s commercials she did, or her work voice-matchingJada Pinkett Smith’s character Gloria fromMadagascarfor the video game.

Starlite, Rainbow Brite and Twink in 1985.Warner Bros./Everett

Warner Bros./Everett

Now Bush is a mom of two: daughter Cassie, 14, and son Jesse, 13. Both of them have seen their mom’s work as Rainbow Brite, and Cassie even sang her mom’s favoriteRainbow Britesong — “Make Room for a Rainbow Inside” — in a talent show when she was younger.

Bush’s next projects include a children’s book with NFL legend Keyshawn Johnson and a children’s album. Being a mom, she says, gives her a good idea of “what works for” kids and “what delivers messages that land with them.” She explains, “I think that this generation particularly needs that hope and needs to be elevated, and they need to be able to carry that along with them in their hearts for their whole lives.”

As for theRainbow Britereboot, she’s “really hoping” to be involved. She says, “It would be really fun to play a role, to write a song, to just be a part, to be included.”

Until then, Rainbow Brite will always be alive in her heart.

source: people.com