Comments from Ken Kawata and Richard Reynolds

Good afternoon from sunny New York: A few years ago I was totally turned off by the 'tiger whisperer' ('Come here, kitty kitty' and that politically correct nonsense) and stayed away from RBBB since. But I changed my mind on 2 April. Getting around in NYC, especially from Staten Island, is not as convenient as one would expect; I drove to the ferry parking lot and took the ferry to Manhattan; from there it was subway No. 1 to Penn Station, then to the Madison Square Garden on foot. For the noon show (I think it was the Red unit) I paid $32.50 for a decent seat. The entire show, minus the intermission, took about one hour and 50 minutes. I'll focus on animal acts. Before the intermission they had three-ring liberty horse act and the tiger act. During the liberty horse act, at the ring (closest to the exit) were six zebras; one was fairly young. They were the common (plains) zebras, seemed to be the east African race (e.g., the Grant's) but not of the southern origin. They trotted around and held still, which may not be much but was still impressive. There were 11 tigers in the tiger act, of varying shades of yellowish brown; three were white, two were nearly stripe-less with yellowish background. Some of the full-colored ones had the appearance of the northern race (e.g., Siberian). The live band was loud and you couldn't hear the tigers clearly; in some shows they used to explain to the audience about the act, but no narration this time. The act was an improvement from the 'tiger whisperer' for sure. But the thrill, the danger and the excitement of the M. Stark or C. Baumann era are gone now. No hoop jumping, no real whip-cracking. After the intermission there were two animal acts, dogs (two rings) and elephants (all rings across). Elephants had been paraded, singly or in fives, etc. throughout the performance, and at the act 10 appeared, all adult female Asians. The act was average and fine, head stands and all, nothing really spectacular. Overall, it was an enjoyable afternoon outing. We cannot see animal acts on Staten Island (Cole Brothers annually performs here on a city-owned lot, and cannot bring in animal acts by law.) At the Garden the public can still enjoys animal acts; how long this will last we do not know. All best, Ken Kawata Ken - - - Liked your report. Glad to know the new Red is offering more. I like zebras. Those must be the ones that the celebrated European trainer Sacha Houcke presented on the Red for the past few years. It was his daughter, Sara, who did the disappointing tiger whisperer thing. She's sure a knockout but the act was awful. I have seen her defended on the basis that she had to present what the Feld staging and production folks wanted. Coming from theatrical and other entertainment genres, none of them have circus backgrounds, let alone any understanding of animal training and presentation. They just assume that the animals can be worked into any sort of routine and on cue when they want. If you want a good description of circus elephant handling, make sure to read the excellent account by George Emerson in the current BW - -based on his 1944 diary. Quite a contrast from the picture painted by our PETA friends. Incidentally, PETA is preparing to wage holy war against any zoo consortium take over of Scott Riddle's elephant center in Arkansas. They've already gone to the Arkansas legislature describing it as a horrible elephant torturing place, urging the lawmakers to deny any requests for funding. They say the scheme is but a shallow cover for elephant breeding so zoos can have a steady supply of new calves to put into their horrible environments. Manifestly, PETA and their allies want all zoo elephants farmed out to the Buckley sorts so they can live out their days without any further breeding, thus ending the keeping of elephants in zoos and circuses. Next they'll go for gorillas or whatever other marquee animal they can target. Richard