'Anything for a buck' - the Discovery Channel has already done some work promoting Yukon Quest and Yukon dog mushing industry propaganda in the last year with its 'Out in the Cold' series - a suitable name for a sporting/recreational activity in which the athletes are typically chained out in the cold. The Yukon government put in a lot of money for the production of the Yukon episodes. Not known how much public money was spent subsidizing this propaganda, but apparently the cost to produce an episode was around $200,000.
[The Anchorage Daily News is a major supporter of the Iditarod and makes a lot of money off advertising for the race - we have our own media villains in the Yukon, including CBC, who uncritically support the Yukon Quest]
'Iditarod goes Hollywood'
Discovery Channel will broadcast the first of six programs starting Oct. 14
By MIKE CAMPBELL
mcampbell@adn.com
Can Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race mushers Lance Mackey or Bruce Linton become household names across the nation like Captain Sig Hansen on the Discovery Channel's "Deadliest Catch," recently nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards?
Can racers DeeDee Jonrowe or Darin Nelson attract the same attention as Drew Sherwood of the popular History Channel program, "Ice Road Truckers?"
Audiences -- and producers -- will begin finding out on Oct. 14 when the Discovery Channel airs the first of six hour-long programs, "Toughest Race on Earth: Iditarod," one of the most ambitious video storytelling efforts ever for the Last Great Race. Footage for the programs was shot during last year's Iditarod
At Discovery, we look at ordinary men and women doing extraordinary things and show the heroic side," Discovery president John Ford said. "We're going out there into the tough places of the world where the temperatures and conditions are extreme."
Discovery purchased the series from the California production company Original Productions, which is responsible for "Deadliest Catch," "Ice Road Truckers" and "Ax Men," among others.
"We've all long been fascinated by the Iditarod, the toughness of it," said Jeff Conroy, one of the program's executive producers. "We always look for a show that brings you into a new world.
"But this ranks up there as one of the most difficult production settings ever -- a set that is spread out by 1,000 miles. It's really, really difficult."
To bring the race into focus, producers focused in on eight mushers:
• Lance Mackey, the defending champion who shattered prevailing notions of what was possible by winning the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race and Iditarod back to back two consecutive years.
• Jeff King, the four-time champion who battled Mackey to the finish line in March.
• Martin and young Rohn Buser, with dad a four-time champion and his son an 18-year-old rookie.
• DeeDee Jonrowe, the popular Willow musher and breast cancer survivor who's started 26 Iditarods, finishing as high as second.
• Darin Nelson, a rookie from Kotzebue and the son of popular rural musher Louie Nelson.
• Rick Holt, a rookie from Willow and teacher who finished 58th in March.
• Bruce Linton, who moved from Vermont to Kasilof and who's committed to inspiring fellow diabetics that they, too, can achieve their dreams.
SOMETIMES AN INCONVENIENCE
"They were looking for characters, and I guess I qualify," said Buser of Big Lake.
"I'm the gimp," offered Linton, who uses an insulin pump attached to him while mushing to regularly inject insulin.
And what "role" was Jonrowe filling?
"I said something to them about that, and they told me, 'As a woman you add texture.' Hmmm, I'm not sure exactly what 'texture' is."
For an intimate look, producers mounted two tiny bullet cameras about two inches long on the sleds, one pointed at the dogs and the other on the mushers' faces -- what Jonrowe called "that lipstick camera." Mushers wore wireless microphones around their neck or, in Buser's case, sewed into a pocket.
In mushers' sleds was a battery pack that lasted about five hours, hard drives and an audio receiver, all in a small case. The gear added about seven pounds to the sleds' loads. But that wasn't the only problem.
Producers mounted the bullet camera on the handlebar of Jonrowe's sled "so it would film back into my face.
"By the time I got (to the halfway point in Cripple), my knuckles were bloody."
She told producers to move it before she left after taking her 24-hour layover.
"It hadn't been moved by the time I was done with my 24, so I ripped it off."
Throughout the race, mushers were asked to verbalize their thoughts; a microphone was recording all the time.
"It created an interesting mindset," Jonrowe said. "Even when the camera wasn't on, I found myself reflecting. It made me think back to a lot of competitors I've shared the Iditarod with who are no longer on the race trail -- but through my memories, in a way, I felt they were right there with me. People like Joe (Redington) Sr., Herbie (Nayokpuk), Susan (Butcher), Sue Firmin and Norman (Vaughan)."
All together, Conway said, Original Productions had 18 people on the trail, including six cameramen, "although we work off the principle that everybody's a cameraman. We're all trained on camera." Helicopters and planes shuttled them around.
"We lost two cameras, which is really good considering that on 'Deadliest Catch' we lost all of them," Conway said.
But it wasn't easy.
"I'd be lying to say it went smoothly,' Conway said. "Truthfully once a musher gets into a checkpoint, you swap batteries, make sure (the camera) is pointed the right way. And then they're gone."
VIEWER APPEAL IS GREAT
In addition, Original Productions paid the Iditarod Trail Committee for the rights to the high-definition footage the Iditarod shoots during the race for its own Web site.
But Conway said the money, logistics and technology aren't what he thinks makes this Iditarod show special -- it's the characters' story.
"That's what's so great about Alaskans, they're straight shooters. As far as TV goes, they're great characters. They say it like it is, and they're honest and forthright.
"Someone like Lance Mackey, he could be a crab boat captain. He's in charge, but he's honest and straightforward. You couldn't cast somebody like that."
And with more than 40 million dog owners in America, the show has a certain built-in appeal.
"There's certainly a lot of dog lovers out there, and you'd be hard pressed to find people who love their dogs more than mushers in the Iditarod," Conway said.
"That's going to make a lot of people drawn to it. It's wild, it's raw. (Viewers) want to go there for a while."
But the field of shows highlighting dangerous jobs is growing rapidly (see related story).
Can Iditarod mushers stand out amongst crab fishermen, loggers, bug exterminators and oil drillers?
Buser thinks so.
"We might be experiencing the perfect storm" with Gov. Sarah Palin's vice presidential selection and this national exposure for the Iditarod.
And fellow musher Linton agrees.
"With all the money, the fact that there's dogs involved and the fact there's a race involved, I think it's going to be big."
And if not, mushers best known to their friends and relatives will bask a little.
"This show has been a big deal in my life," Linton said. "It's not every day you get to become a little movie star."
ADN story:
http://www.adn.com/front/story/532339.html
Discovery Iditarod program trailer:
http://www.iditarod.com/flashmap/free/video_493154D2-3FFF-1FD7-BF65C70E368C131A.html
THE YUKON QUEST ORGANIZATION IS GOING TO BE REALLY PEEVED WHEN THEY FIND OUT THAT THIS IDITAROD FILM HAS STOLEN THEIR SLOGAN FOR ITS TITLE - "TOUGHEST RACE ON EARTH" (TOUGH ON THE DOGS, THAT IS]
Entertainment for morons.