The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 99

Mora The man of many voices and names NETWORKINDEPENDENT 8 11 WOI AmesDes Moines ABC KCCI Des Moines CBS IOWA PUBLIC TELEVISION KDIN Des Moines WHO Des Moines NBC KCBR Des Moines 3 on Cable In 1959, if anyone had told John Frick of Cedar Rapids that be could make a six-figure salary as "a voice," he probably would have laughed and told the guy to go jump in the Cedar River. But 26 years and about a half-dozen name changes later, he is doing just that Today Frick is known in television and broadcast advertising circles as "Mark Elliott," one of the premier announcers in the business and a principal voice of CBS-TVs on-air promotions. If the name "Mark Elliott" still doesn't ring a bell, that's because Iowans know him better as "Sandy Shore," a popular disc jockey at KCRG radio in Cedar Rapids (1959 to 1964) and KIOA radio in Des Moines (1964 to 1968). Before he finally settled on the name "Elliott" in 1970 at a San Francisco radio station, you might say he had a real identity problem. 'John Harrison' was the first name I used at a little now defunct) 250-watt station in Cedar Rapids, called KPIG," says Elliott, who was in Des granola bars to cars to toilet paper to flowers.

"The CBS job takes a lot of time, and they have first dibs on me," Elliott says. "Network jobs are very rare and precious. And there is a lot of money at stake." When Elliott became a free-lance "voice," he looked at it as strictly supplementary income. "I had no idea you could actually earn a living at it But I found out very quickly that is not the case. You can do very well doing According to Elliott, there are two men in Los Angeles who earn more than $2 million a year as "voices." Another three or four make about $1 million a year, and 15 to 20 others earn about 1500,000.

He puts himself in the latter category. "It's ludicrous, it really is," Elliott says. "There is no way in the world that any of us are worth that amount of money. When you stop and think about it, the job just doesn't warrant that kind of pay. All you are doing is telling about a TV snow or a new kind of toilet paper on the market "If you are talking about a physician, an attorney or somebody who actually provides a service or saves lives pay them whatever it takes.

But voice-over guys? I'm sorry, they come in very low on the scale of importance. Life would continue if nobody ever did another voice-over." Elliott, who has branched out in the last few years to become part owner of a Los Angeles restaurant, a record company and a small lingerie company, admits to being a bit stunned by his financial success. "I will confess I have had some real problems with guilt, by virtue of the fact that I have been earning an amount of money I never dreamed possible," Elliott says. "And all for doing something that in essence is just a hell of a lot of fun. It's a hoot; it's a kick.

What better possible job could a guy have?" Money and success aside, a mystery remains: When Elliott returns to Cedar Rapids on June 22 to be master of ceremonies for a sock hop sponsored by WMT-FM to benefit Camp Courageous, will he return as native son John Frick, or will he return as "Mark Elliott," or "John Harrison," or "Sandy Shore," or "Buddy Harrison," or 13 17 3 CABLE CABLE ESPN 24 Hour Sports IOWA CABLE NETWORK CNN 24 Hour News ACTS American Christian TV REGISTER PHOTO BY WARREN TAYLOR C-SPANlc-SPAN 9 1 Gov.Public Affairs utf r- COUNTRY MUSIC TV Variety. MCTV "9 12 WEATHER CHANNEL HBO A-14 KBLE B-15 CIN C-16 D-17 SHO E-18 F-19 fifty "1 "i I vvte fciniMMmrMnmM.wiil,ir fen niniin. m. 1 iiii DIS G-20 Mark Elliott (alias "Sandy Shore," alias "Ed Mitchell," alias etc.) relaxes at KIOA studios. VH-1 1-22 Fine tuning- Moines last week to attend a reunion of KIOA personalities.

"Then I became 'Sandy Shore' at KCRG and KIOA. Then I went to Cleveland, where I was 'Buddy Two months later he found himself in Detroit as "Ed Mitchell," "which is a great name for a truck driver." When he arrived at a San Francisco radio station in early 1970, management wanted him to become "Johnny Baron." He wanted to use "Sandy Shore." "Mark Elliott" was a compromise, and the name stuck. "That feels like my name now. It says it on my driver's license. It says it on all my credit cards.

The only people who don't call me that are my ex-wife and the IRS." While working for a Los Angeles station in the mid-1970s, Elliott began doing more and more advertising and promotion "voice-over" work this is where you hear the announcer's voice describe a product or scenes from a movie or TV show. His big break came when he was hired as the "voice" to promote three movies that did very well at the box office: "Star Wars," "Smokey and the Bandit" and "The Goodbye Girl." It wasn't long before he left radio behind to become a full-time, free-lance "voice." Elliott's first job at CBS was doing promos for "The Bad News Bears." But it was his versatility the ability to sound like a teen-ager one second, then lower his voice several octaves to pitch a serious drama the next second that convinced CBS to give him more work. "I was just doing 'Bad News Bears' when CBS asked if I could help out. They had a show called 'California Fever an abortive teen show that was going to be followed by a movie that was bizarre when juxtapositioned to 'California So I thought I'd have a little fun with these guys." Using his highest teen voice, Elliott screamed: "Leif Erickson helps Jimmy McNichol and his friends with a beach party blowout on 'California Then, in less than a second, his voice plunged to the lower bass levels and eerily continued, "Then it's Death Car on the "I was giggling, it was so bizarre. And the CBS guy comes in and says, 'Heeeey, real Well I realized then that there is no time for subtlety or nuances here.

You have to hit people over the head with these promos. Just go all out from beginning to end. "And it starts to sound a little ludicrous after a while not 'after a while' it sounds a little ludicrous from the beginning, to me. But that is the way the game is played. You just be as broad as you can possibly be." Among Elliott's regular duties these days are handling the prime-time CBS promos for the Monday and Thursday night lineups.

He also does an occasional movie promotion campaign and has been the "voice" advertising everything from HBO KBLE Cable Guide CINEMAX 24 Hour Movies COLLEGE Drake, Grand View DMACC SHOWTIME REUTERS 24 Hour News Financial Information DISNEY CHANNEL VIDEO HITS 24 Hour Video Music CNN 2 24 Hour News Headlines LIFETIME MTV 24 Hour Video Music NASHVILLE CHANNEL Country Music WTBS- Atlanta 24 Hour Independent USA NETWORK Variety ARTS ENTERTAINMENT Culture CNN2 K-24 LIF L-25 MTV M-26 NSH N-27 TBS 0-28 USA P-29 plans. Participants will be Dr. Lehman Fletcher, professor of economics at Iowa State University, Brian Kline, deputy director of East Africa for the U.S. Agency for International Development; U.S. Representative Cooper Evans and James Gannon, editor of The Des Moines Register, and the person who conceived the Iowa Cares program.

The show will be repeated at 7 p.m. April 14 and at 9 p.m. April 16. "Hail to the Chief" (8:30 p.m. Tuesday, ABC) -Nasty insults are funny.

Bigotry is hilarious. Philandering husbands are a laugh a minute. Gays are a stitch. That's what ABC is telling the American viewer by putting this new comedy on the air. "Hail to the Chief" stars Patty Duke Astin as the first female president of the United States.

Unfortunately, she is the only sane person in the White House. Among the rest of the cast are: The president's husband (Ted Bessell), whose secret love life would make a great miniseries. A Jewish chief of staff (Herschel Bernardi), who calb Iranians "ragheads" and advises bis boss not to call the Soviet leader until "the rates go down after 5 p.m." A "Let's nuke 'em" general (John Vernon) FINE TUNING Please turn to Page 19 Mini-reviews "When Iowa Cares" (8 p.m. Thursday, Iowa Public Television) Producer-director Marty Zell has crafted a startling and emotional look at the relief efforts being made in the drought-stricken provinces of northern Ethiopia and how the nearly $700,000 raised by the Iowa Cares effort is being put to work in that area. Zell and cameramen Mark Engler and Greg Baker spent 25 days in Ethiopia during February and early March, visiting relief settlements and talking with American medical teams and rag-clothed refugees from the mountain and farming areas.

The first half of the program concentrates on harsh images of drought and death that have ravaged that country. The crew visit the villages of Gewaha and Makelli, where hastily built medical centers are treating Ethiopians assembly-line style amid intolerable conditions. They talk with officials of Church World Service and Catholic Relief Services, which are coordinating the distribution of food and medical supplies, and interview several African officials including Dr. Seme Debela, the Ethiopian director of agricultural research and a 1982 graduate of Iowa State University in Ames. The second half of the program will be a studio discussion on how Iowa agricultural expertise might help Ethiopia in its long-range recovery ART Q-30 "nTT NICKELODEON Q-30 WGN R-31 Youth WGN Chicago 24 Hour Independent CBN Family Entertainment PUBLIC ACCESS CBN S-32 V-35 Guide refers only to Moines cable system Editor: Dave Rnein Log Desk: Pam Heilskov, Karen Pauly.

Bart Haynes Art Dtrtctor: John Wright! ieW Des Moines Sunday Register April 7, 1985 3-TV.