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  • From: Carrie McLaren <carrie AT stayfreemagazine.org>
  • To: monkeywire AT franklin.metalab.unc.edu
  • Subject: Koko reviews "Gorillas" documentary
  • Date: Mon, 11 Mar 2002 20:58:39 -0500



Los Angeles Times
March 9, 2002
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/printedition/calendar/la-000017336mar09.story

A&E's gorilla special gets an opposable thumbs up from Koko, the first of her kind to learn sign language.

BYLINE: VALERIE FELDNER, SPECIAL TO THE TIMES

BODY:
"They're our bridge to the past. Without the great apes where are we? We're fragments floating in the universe without a past, without a future," says Dr. George Schaller in the A&E special "Gorillas: Primal Contact" airing Sunday night at 8. The show, narrated by Martin Sheen and produced by Greystone Communications in association with the Bronx-based Wildlife Conservation Society, is itself a rarity since it's about both captive and wild gorillas and man's fascination with them.

WCS' Congo Gorilla Forest, a $43-million exhibit in the heart of New York's Bronx Zoo that took 10 years and 200 people to build, is the hub of this special. Commentary from the society's gorilla experts, including Schaller, the first to study wild gorillas in 1959, and Amy Vedder and Bill Weber (authors of the recently published book "In the Kingdom of Gorilla"), offer insights into the gorilla mind as well as anecdotes about living and working closely with them.

To get a different perspective on this special, we consulted another kind of expert--a 280-pound lowland gorilla named Koko. Opposable thumbs up or thumbs down? Koko, whose full name is Hanabi-Ko (Fireworks-Child in Japanese), drew widespread attention more than 20 years ago, as the first gorilla in the world to learn American Sign Language (Ameslan), though not the first or only primate to do so. She's got her own Web site. She's a city girl--born on July 4, 1971, in the San Francisco Zoo--who knows more than 1,000 gestural words and uses signs to lie, insult and rhyme. Her first school days at the zoo and then Stanford University are chronicled in Francine Patterson's book "The Education of Koko" (1981).

With the permission of the Gorilla Foundation based in Woodside, Calif., which is home to Koko and its director Patterson, Koko was sent a copy of the A&E special for her take on it. At times, Ameslan can be limiting for Koko. For instance, there isn't a sign for "mind blowing," though this never stops her--she makes up her own signs. Patterson puts Koko's IQ between 70 and 95 on the human scale and says she comprehends 2,000 words of spoken English.

Gorilla Watches Wildlife Documentaries

Koko is not shy about her preferences in entertainment. Her favorite movie is "Free Willy," though this can change from week to week. Like Steve Irwin, "The Crocodile Hunter," she is fixated on crocodiles and alligators. However, a local travelogue that airs on KCET called "California Gold" is her bliss. Patterson and her staff are mystified by Koko's obsession with the show because it's so tame. "She's just fascinated by the host, Huell Howser. We don't know what it is about him or that show, but she gets very annoyed if anyone blocks her view." In one episode of "California Gold," Patterson and staff thought Koko might be reacting to shots of a geyser, but it was Howser who captivated her, perhaps not that surprising because she prefers the company of men to women.

We also asked (via Patterson signing in Ameslan) Koko some lifestyle questions. Keep in mind, as Patterson wrote in her book, "There are marked contrasts between a way a statement is made in English and the way it is made in sign language ... the written translation of statements made in sign language has a stilted telegraphic quality."
Question: What do you like to do in your free time?

Koko: Drink, fine, fine, free time, free, have time free, time, chocolate mouth, from lipstick have--swallow, people, polite people have, glasses take off. (Patterson breaks it down this way: 'Have time to walk around freely, have more chocolate,' and 'take glasses off people to wear herself.' She often does this when she gets a chance and thinks she is really cool in glasses.)

Q: Have you met gorillas in the wild, and what do you think of them?

A: Fine gorillas.

TV is an integral part of her routine after lunch. As much as she enjoys programs and movies, she thinks nothing of hitting the off switch or fast forwarding through the parts she finds annoying or boring. And Patterson explains, "Like a child, we shield her from certain content on TV. In fact, in general we only allow her to watch PBS."

However, during the week of Sept. 11, live coverage was so pervasive that Koko accidentally saw the explosions of the twin towers and signed "Shame." Her comprehension that the explosion was bad has convinced Patterson even more so that Koko is empathetic. As Vedder, who has lived intimately with wild gorillas, points out, "They're intellectually curious; they're not coming up with mathematics and philosophy [but] the more we look at it, the line [that separates us] is not so clear as we thought."
Koko's screening of the A&E special is one of the few exceptions to the PBS viewing rule. Patterson says, "We got the videotape and started to show it to Koko, but her attention was elsewhere." Koko has personally met many of the world's greatest primatologists, such as Schaller and Dian Fossey, who spent 18 years studying Rwanda's mountain gorillas before she was murdered in 1985. Schaller and Fossey are featured in the special that follows the fate of a wild-born giant silverback gorilla named Timmy. Until recently, Timmy lived in cement zoo enclosures at the Bronx Zoo before he and his gorilla troop moved into the 6.5 acres Congo Gorilla Forest. The troop's first steps from concrete to the grassy exhibit are touchingly documented by the program.
American Carl Akley first caught wild mountain gorillas on celluloid. It was this footage that fueled Hollywood to create such fearsome fantasies as "King Kong." This special offers rare glimpses of Akley's footage and interviews with make-up artist Rick Baker, who made the gorillas for "Mighty Joe Young," "Gorillas in the Mist" and "King Kong" (1976). A long segment shows footage of Fossey working with gorillas, as well as the making of difficult sequences of "Gorillas in the Mist"-- Baker's biggest challenge as real gorillas were intercut with fake ones.

Since many of the segments show the grisly destruction of gorillas in the bush, first in Akley's taxidermy for the American Museum of Natural History in the early 1900s, and the current slaughter linked to the bush meat trade, only certain segments of the special were approved by Patterson for Koko's review.

For Koko, TV watching is an interactive sport, including touching the screen. Like many of us she snacks while watching (usually greenery or fruit). During the shots where Timmy's troop is first released and tumbles across the grass, Koko comments, "Good. Koko love hurry there," she says pointing at the screen.

Not Always Easy to Understand Koko

During a long segment, about midway through the documentary where Vedder, Weber and other WSC officials talk about the exhibit and gorilla conservation, Koko signs, " Koko love, pick-fence." "Pick-fence" is a term Koko uses to convey bad "gossip," or literally a fence. Despite Patterson's thousands of hours working with Koko, she wasn't sure whether Koko was referring to the structure of the zoo exhibit or the scientists.
When actress Sigourney Weaver appears on screen portraying a terror-stricken Fossey in "Gorillas in the Mist" facing down a charging gorilla, Koko signs to the on-screen Fossey, "Good, kiss," and kisses her finger and touches the TV screen. Given the fact that the show intercuts shots of Fossey and Weaver, it wasn't surprising that Koko would take the actress for the real thing. After all, it had been 24 years since she had last seen Fossey in the flesh. Since then Koko has seen numerous nature programs about wild gorillas. She seems to enjoy them, particularly scenes where they are feeding DeeAnn Draper, Patterson's assistant and gorilla caregiver.

At the end of the Fossey segment, Koko remarked, "Show movie, chocolate time," and was quite ready to move on to another story or a game of chase. When asked about her overall impression of the show, Koko simply signed: "Good."

"Gorillas: Primal Contact" airs Sunday night at 8 on A&E. The network has rated it TV-PG (may be unsuitable for young children).


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  • Koko reviews "Gorillas" documentary, Carrie McLaren, 03/11/2002

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