Monkey Business

There’s nothing funny about it

(Another from the archives)

Some pictures really are worth a thousand words

You know you’re in for a long day when the first scene on the call sheet features a monkey wearing a dress. Actually, it was a chimpanzee — three of them, all told — each of which was outfitted in human garb, then paraded before the cameras one at a time. This was supposed to be a hilarious laff-riot for the young children of the target audience for this show, but I’ve never seen much humor in chimps dressed as people. It seems more pathetic than anything else, but my job is to help light these shows, not write them, so I’m just trying to get through each day on set.

This may put me in the minority, but I’m not particularly fond of our primate cousins. The phrase “more fun than a barrel of monkeys” has never made any sense to me, and I strongly suspect whoever coined it never actually had to deal with these hairy beasts up close and personal. They’re fine romping about in the wild, where they belong — with a wide, deep ocean between them and me — but being in close proximity to monkeys and apes holds no appeal whatsoever. I’ve worked with them on set more than once, and didn’t like it.

Then there’s the matter of Monkey Butt … which has nothing to do with the subject at hand other than the term “monkey,” but serves to underline the point: I don’t like much of anything having to do with monkeys.

Each successive chimp was older and larger than the last, with the final one bearing a disturbing resemblance to a minature King Kong. Even the wranglers seemed nervous about handling that big ape, which became abundantly clear when the camera assistant — unable to get a head slate before the shot — darted in front of the cameras to grab a tail slate after the director yelled “cut!”

“No!” barked the head wrangler, frantically waving him away. “Not with this one!”

The urgency in his voice got the attention of everybody on set. I felt the hair on the back of my neck rise as the assistant retreated, eyes wide.

What’s the big deal, you might wonder — why be so skittish about a playful chimp?

Adult chimps are extremely dangerous: if for whatever reason one takes a dislike to you, you’re in Big Trouble. Take a good look at the hairless, heavily muscled chimp at the top of this page, and if that doesn’t impress, check out this and this, and if you still want to work around uncaged chimps, read this account from 2005 describing what happened to a man named St. James Davis, who was attacked by two adult chimps — named Buddy and Ollie — while he and his wife were visiting another chimp at an animal sanctuary. It’s a longish story, so here’s the crux of it:

Buddy and Ollie destroyed a majority of St. James’ fingers, his left foot, most of his buttocks, both testicles, part of his torso, and parts of his face including his nose and lips. A paramedic who arrived said, “It looked like a grizzly bear attack.”¹

The phrase “better safe than sorry” comes to mind — which to me means “stay far away from chimpanzees” — because anyone unfortunate enough to be in the path of an angry chimp certainly won’t be safe. They will, however, be very sorry for the rest of their blighted lives.

I have no idea what the person who wrote this scene was thinking, but can only hope that he or she will pause to think again the next time they dream up a scene involving chimpanzees. Nobody got hurt, but we were two full hours behind schedule by the time those chimps were back in their cages, which is why — despite plowing through the rest of the call sheet at a brisk pace — it took fourteen hours to “make our day.”

So it goes. Sometimes you just have to grin, bear it, and bank the overtime. At this point, I’m just trying to get through these last stages of my working career without falling off a twelve step ladder — or having my face ripped off by some deranged Hollywood ape.

That’s not too much to ask … I hope.

1. The LA Times carried an account of this horrendous incident.