Sunday, February 24, 2008

Who handles the dogs when they are out?

NPR had an interesting post about animal wranglers in hollywood. Check it out here.

From the article:
Forbes was most surprised by the porcupines. He expected them to be really slow — and kind of dumb. Turns out they have a lot of personality.

"They learned to go to a mark," Forbes says, meaning they'd walk to a designated spot and stop. "They'd come up and put their front paws on your legs."

He didn't touch the porcupines much, however.

"We certainly didn't pet them backwards."


Funny how the segment starts with "If you are someone who stays until all the credits of a movie run out...", and indeed, I am one :).

The article also lets out another secret of the trade:
Sometimes there will be three or four identical cats for a single role. There's the Holding Cat, who can stay still. There's the A-to-B cat, who can run from one point to another. There's the Action Cat, who can do the tricks. It all depends on the animal's personality.


I wonder if animals make documentaries of us, and cannot distinguish between two of "those hairless ape creatures" :-).

1 comment:

  1. The identical cats' thing reminds me of a revised tortoise-and-hare story I saw long back. In that the tortoise was so smart that wherever the hare reached, there was an identical tortoise already waiting... Needless to say that by the end the hare vowed never to challenge a tortoise again! :D

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