Richard Alan Orkin (July 9, 1933 – December 24, 2017) was an American voice actor and commercial radio producer who created the '' Chickenman'' radio series and ''The Secret Adventures of the Tooth Fairy''. His voice was used in many radio advertisements and public-service announcements.RadioRanch-How the Radio Serials, Chickenman and Toothfairy Were Born

Biography

Born in

Williamsport, Pennsylvania Williamsport is a city in, and the county seat of, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, United States. It recorded a population of 27,754 at the 2020 Census. It is the principal city of the Williamsport Metropolitan Statistical Area, which has a popul ...

, Orkin received his Bachelor of Arts degree in speech and theater from

Franklin & Marshall College Franklin & Marshall College (F&M) is a private liberal arts college in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. It employs 175 full-time faculty members and has a student body of approximately 2,400 full-time students. It was founded upon the merger of Frankl ...

. He received a master's degree in clinical psychology from the Phillips Graduate Institute, and attended

Yale Drama School The David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University is a graduate professional school of Yale University, located in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded in 1924 as the Department of Drama in the School of Fine Arts, the school provides training in e ...

, studying for a Master of Fine Arts degree in theater. Orkin began working in advertising in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

in 1963. He gained acclaim with his comedy radio commercials (until 1982 in collaboration with Bert Berdis) for ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...

'' magazine, GMAC, the Gap and other clients. His radio spots, mini dramas dubbed by ''

Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...

'' as "The Advertising Theater of the Absurd", won many awards. Orkin and Christine Coyle co-wrote two animated specials for CBS, ''Christmas Every Day'' and ''The Canterville Ghost''. Orkin and Coyle are the founders of Radio Ranch. Orkin died of a

hemorrhagic stroke Stroke (also known as a cerebrovascular accident (CVA) or brain attack) is a medical condition in which poor blood flow to the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and hemorrhagic, ...

in Thousand Oaks, California, at the age of 84.

Honors and awards

Orkin was inducted into the

National Radio Hall of Fame The Radio Hall of Fame, formerly the National Radio Hall of Fame, is an American organization created by the Emerson Radio Corporation in 1988. Three years later, Bruce DuMont, founder, president, and CEO of the Museum of Broadcast Communicatio ...

, the NAB Broadcasting Hall of Fame, the Illinois Broadcasters Hall of Fame, the Pennsylvania Broadcasters Hall of Fame and the Radio Advertising Bureau Hall of Fame. On January 21, 2010, Orkin wrote to the National Association of Broadcasters, requesting them to remove his name from the Hall of Fame, because he did not wish to share the honor with radio talk show host

Rush Limbaugh Rush Hudson Limbaugh III ( ; January 12, 1951 – February 17, 2021) was an American conservative political commentator who was the host of '' The Rush Limbaugh Show'', which first aired in 1984 and was nationally syndicated on AM and FM r ...

. According to Orkin, Limbaugh showed "reckless insensitivity" with his remarks regarding the

2010 Haiti earthquake A catastrophic magnitude 7.0 Mw earthquake struck Haiti at 16:53 local time (21:53 UTC) on Tuesday, 12 January 2010. The epicenter was near the town of Léogâne, Ouest department, approximately west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti's ca ...

. Orkin referred to Limbaugh as a "dangerous hate-monger" and a "perfidious human being".

References

External links

Billboard June 5, 1982 Yesterday's Deejay Heroes: Where Are They Now? Pages 28 & 31
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Orkin, Dick 1933 births 2017 deaths Franklin & Marshall College alumni Yale School of Drama alumni American male voice actors American radio personalities People from Williamsport, Pennsylvania Male actors from Pennsylvania