Anjelica Huston to Hollywood: 'No More Monkey Business'

Academy Award-winning actor Anjelica Huston cannot stand cruelty to animals. "I simply won't go on a set if I see an animal being abused", she told PETA US Senior Vice President Dan Mathews on the set of her latest project – a video for PETA US about the use of great apes in entertainment.

In the video – which PETA US and PETA India are sending to Hollywood and Bollywood film and TV producers and directors as well as to advertising agencies – Anjelica urges people in the entertainment industry not to use great apes in their work. She describes how newborn chimpanzees and orang-utans are taken away from their highly protective mothers and are often beaten with fists and kicked in the head during terrifying training sessions.

"It's a sad story that starts when the animals are babies, when they are torn away from their mothers and forced to depend upon human trainers", says Anjelica. "Great ape mothers are fiercely protective of their newborns, which means that they must be tricked, sedated or forcibly restrained when their infants are pulled from their arms. This cruel practice leaves lifelong emotional scars on both the mothers – who go into a deep depression – and the babies."

No Retirement for Ape 'Actors'
By age 8, young chimpanzees used for entertainment have grown too strong to be handled and are usually discarded, often at dismal roadside zoos or pseudo-sanctuaries. There, they languish for decades – chimpanzees can live to age 60 – in barren cages or dank, depressing concrete cells. At a pseudo-sanctuary which PETA US investigated, a chimpanzee who had reportedly been used in The Planet of the Apes was discovered living in an underground cement pit which resembled a dungeon and was strewn with rotten food and faeces.

"Chimpanzees and orang-utans belong in rain forests, where they can build nests, forage for natural foods, make and use tools, groom each other and raise families", says Anjelica. "Using great apes in TV, movies and advertising ... causes a lifetime of suffering ..."

Read Anjelica's interview on PETA US' blog.

Take Action on This Issue
Please use the form below to demand that the Animal Welfare Board of India refuse to grant filmmakers permission to shoot or air films and commercials in India which use chimpanzees or orang-utans. Also ask the Advertising Standards Council of India to amend its guidelines to prohibit the use of chimpanzees and orang-utans in commercials.