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Wednesday, June 21, 2017
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7 comments:
GUY GOSSING !!
Some other famous trainer was reported to have said that he would not go in with Guy's cats with a bazooka.
Most of the older trainers with 'fighting acts' would provoke the cats into looking like they were highly pissed off and ready to attack. One example, Beatty would face a cat, raising his closed, gloved hand and then opening the hand all the way open. The cat predictably would roar and swat. Rehearsed. Just watch the old films.
Moral of my story is that after watching Mr.Gossing perform many times from up close, in the 70's, it appeared to me his cats needed no provoking.
The above observations are predictably superficial. The outsider, inexperienced and misguided, will misinterpret both the animals and the trainer. The words "appeared to me" means you're guessing. Beatty, and his fighting act colleagues, did not "provoke" attack responses. Those are born to the animals, and are readily demonstrated in response to proximity of the trainer. Nature needs no provocation. Get close enough, strike any pose, and the cats will flash fang and claw. The trick is to stay out of reach. Animals will manifest themselves even for those who walk among them like a potato farmer. We who thrilled to work the fighting style, knew the violent rush of air from the swinging claws and felt the thunder-throated roars face-on, knowing we gave the audience evidence of the animals' nature to see and remember.
Your romantic account of wild animal training is good reading but I standby my account how the
fighting acts were mostly show. I did not say all show. I am not an 'outsider'.
"Romantic" is a term mis-applied. The hard-core reality of wild animal work has a way of shading concepts of romance.
And in this industry, the operative word is "show". James Cagney said, "Give the audience something to take home." The impact of Clyde Beatty and Terrell Jacobs remained in the audience's imagination. If a wild animal performer is not able to give the patrons the memorable show they paid for, he should re-think his career.
There was little romance between
trainers who risked great danger
& often flesh & their charges no
matter how well trained or just
how many times they performed
together except in the eyes of
the lucky spectators who created
their own scenarios of such
Not only the fighting style acts
but most of the European version
of genteel style of presentation
left the majority of trainers
with lasting surgical repairs
Not so much of a romance & I for
one have the greatest respect
Some of us have been able to
learn our trade from the very
best in our industry yet we
are eager to learn forever
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