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Reviews for Me Cheeta

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  • No (more) reel apes4

    Andrew Sheppard The silver screen Cheeta, friend and companion to Tarzan, who variously provided comic relief and got Tarzan out of many a desperate scrape, was actually played by a series of young chimps, male and female, often more than one in the same film, according to which of the required tricks they had been trained for. But never mind that; suspend your disbelief, this is the autobiography of the one and only Cheeta.
    Cheeta loves Johnny Weismuller, both as Tarzan and in real life, though Cheeta isn't always totally clear on the difference between the two. So far as Cheeta is concerned, he and Johnny are happily self-sufficient, and don't need any of the things that Jane brings to the forest. Cheeta is jealous of everyone who comes between himself and Johnny and, throughout Johnny's series of six wives and many another relationship, is not above pulling the odd trick to alienate the opposition and reclaim Johnny exclusively for himself. Along the way, we learn a lot about the Tarzan personnel and other stars and film people of the period - written-up in a clever parody of the bitchy style of the classic Hollywood autobiog. If someone is described as "a lovely, lovely person", watch out, the venom is sure to follow, prefaced by a but, or, just a little more subtly, I am sure he (or she) could not help it.
    Also running through the book is an animal rights theme. We learn of the cruelty involved in the capture of wild animals and their transport to another continent; in the case of staggering numbers of macaque monkeys and a great many chimpanzees, not for the glamour of Hollywood but to die a lonely, slow, and quite likely painful death in the name of medical and other experimentation. Notwithstanding his stardom, Cheeta himself spends long periods caged and alone, and when on the film set the threat of the ugly-stick is always present. But he draws the naive conclusion that man is embarked on a noble project to eliminate death from the world - removing animals from the wild, where for most sudden death can strike at any time, and eliminating altogether death-inflicting creatures such as panthers.
    Cheeta has no regrets about his own starry past and a serious plea for no reel apes' may seem an uncomfortable fit alongside that. But James Lever, Cheeta's ghostwriter, makes the point effectively, and without detracting at all from a hugely entertaining and informative read. by Andrew Sheppard

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