Richard Kinard Sanders is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 actor

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

 best known for playing the quirky news anchorman Les Nessman

Les Nessman

Les Nessman is a fictional character on the television situation comedy WKRP in Cincinnati played by Richard Sanders. He reprised his role in the sequel series, The New WKRP in Cincinnati.-Background and Appearance:...

 on the television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 sitcom, WKRP in Cincinnati

WKRP in Cincinnati

WKRP in Cincinnati is an American situation comedy that featured the misadventures of the staff of a struggling fictional radio station in Cincinnati, Ohio. The show was created by Hugh Wilson and was based upon his experiences working in advertising sales at Top 40 radio station WQXI in Atlanta...

.

Sanders was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Harrisburg is the capital of Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 49,528, making it the ninth largest city in Pennsylvania...

, the son of Thelma S. and Henry Irvine Sanders. He was enrolled in the Fine Arts Department at Carnegie Institute of Technology

Carnegie Institute of Technology

The Carnegie Institute of Technology , is the name for Carnegie Mellon University’s College of Engineering. It was first called the Carnegie Technical Schools, or Carnegie Tech, when it was founded in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie who intended to build a “first class technical school” in Pittsburgh,...

 (now known as Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon University is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States....

) as an acting major from 1958-62. There he was a classmate of Rene Auberjonois

Rene Auberjonois

René Murat Auberjonois is an American actor, known for portraying Father Mulcahy in the movie version of M*A*S*H and for creating a number of characters in long-running television series, including Clayton Endicott III on Benson , Odo on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Chef Louis in The Little...

 and Aubrey Wilson, among others.

After graduation, Sanders studied Shakespearean theatre in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 on a Fulbright Scholarship, and served a stint with the Peace Corps in Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

.

Sanders joined Gordon Jump

Gordon Jump

Alexander Gordon Jump was an American actor best known as the clueless radio station manager Arthur "Big Guy" Carlson in the TV series WKRP in Cincinnati and the incompetent "Chief of Police Tinkler" in the sitcom Soap...

 and Frank Bonner

Frank Bonner

Frank Bonner is an American actor and television director best known for playing sales manager Herb Tarlek on the television sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati.-Life and career:...

 in reprising his original WKRP role on The New WKRP in Cincinnati

The New WKRP in Cincinnati

The New WKRP in Cincinnati is a sequel/spin-off of the original CBS sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati. It was made for the syndication market from 1991 to 1993....

in the early 1990s. He has guest appeared on other television shows, including Lou Grant

Lou Grant (TV series)

Lou Grant is an American television drama series starring Ed Asner in the titular role as a newspaper editor. Unusual in American television, this drama series was a spinoff from a sitcom, The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Aired from 1977 to 1982, Lou Grant won 13 Emmy Awards, including "Outstanding Drama...

, Kojak

Kojak

Kojak is an American television series starring Telly Savalas as the title character, bald New York City Police Department Detective Lieutenant Theo Kojak. It aired from October 24, 1973, to March 18, 1978, on CBS. It took the time slot of the popular Cannon series, which was moved one hour earlier...

, The Rockford Files

The Rockford Files

The Rockford Files is an American television drama series which aired on the NBC network between September 13, 1974 and January 10, 1980. It has remained in regular syndication to the present day. The show stars James Garner as Los Angeles-based private investigator Jim Rockford and features Noah...

, Alice

Alice (TV series)

Alice is an American sitcom television series that ran from August 31, 1976 to July 2, 1985 on CBS. The series was based on the 1974 film Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. The show stars Linda Lavin in the title role, a widow who moves with her young son to start her life over again, and finds a job...

, Newhart

Newhart

Newhart is a television situation comedy starring comedian Bob Newhart and actress Mary Frann as an author and wife who owned and operated an inn located in a small, rural Vermont town that was home to many eccentric characters. The show aired on the CBS network from October 25, 1982 to May 21, 1990...

, Murder, She Wrote

Murder, She Wrote

Murder, She Wrote is an American television mystery series starring Angela Lansbury as mystery writer and amateur detective Jessica Fletcher. The series aired for 12 seasons from 1984 to 1996 on the CBS network, with 264 episodes transmitted. It was followed by four TV films and a spin-off series,...

and Married...with Children, and has also acted in the mini-series Roots: The Next Generations

Roots: The Next Generations

Roots: The Next Generations is a 1979 television miniseries that continues the story of the family of Alex Haley from the 1880s, and their life in Henning, Tennessee, to the 1960s, with Haley researching his family history and his travels to Africa to learn of his ancestor, Kunta Kinte...

and the Robert De Niro

Robert De Niro

Robert De Niro, Jr. is an American actor, director and producer. His first major film roles were in Bang the Drum Slowly and Mean Streets, both in 1973...

/Cuba Gooding Jr. film Men of Honor

Men of Honor

Men of Honor is a 2000 drama film, starring Robert De Niro and Cuba Gooding, Jr. The film was directed by George Tillman, Jr...

.

Besides being an actor, Sanders is a screenwriter

Screenwriter

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

, having written, among other works, several episodes of WKRP in Cincinnati

WKRP in Cincinnati

WKRP in Cincinnati is an American situation comedy that featured the misadventures of the staff of a struggling fictional radio station in Cincinnati, Ohio. The show was created by Hugh Wilson and was based upon his experiences working in advertising sales at Top 40 radio station WQXI in Atlanta...

. In 1993, he starred in the computer game Day of the Tentacle

Day of the Tentacle

Day of the Tentacle, also known as Maniac Mansion II: Day of the Tentacle, is a 1993 graphic adventure game developed and published by LucasArts. It is the sequel to the 1987 game Maniac Mansion...

as the voice of Bernard.

External links