From the Monkey Vault - "Feel Good" by Gorillaz

Feel Good by Gorillaz. An awesome video with excellent graphics!

Gorilla birth to feature in alternative Czech reality show

Gorilla Birth will be featured on a Czech alternate reality show. Click on this hyperlink to see the details.

Bride of the Gorilla

Bride of the Gorilla Starring Raymond Burr and Lon Chaney Jr. Of all the Gorilla Marriage movies, this one is the best!

Bela Lugosi Meets The Brooklyn Gorilla

Bela Lugosi Meets The Brooklyn Gorilla The comedy team in this movie look like clones of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis!

Silverback Gorilla at the San Francisco Zoo

Silverback Gorilla at the San Francisco Zoo. In part of the video, he is walking upright, which is unusual.

OKC Zoo Ape

OKC Zoo Ape A young gorilla plays chicken with a young girl visitor. Funny!

Santa Clause With Gorilla

Santa Clause With Gorilla Just a typical street scene in Berlin.

Mighty Joe Old

What happened to Mighty Joe Young after his blockbuster movie in 1949? Thanks to the godlike powers of Google, I was able to locate him and (believe it or not) he is still alive!

Mighty Joe Young was born in 1930, in Ottawa, Ontario. His Canadian heritage does a lot to explain why he was so much nicer than King Kong. Canadians are the nicest people on the planet, with the possible exceptions of Mother Theresa and my second grade teacher, Miss Walkowsky.

His father, Mighty Quinn Young, was a stage director, who was passionate about Eugene O'Neill. His production of Mourning Becomes Electra (with an all chimpanzee cast) stunned the Canadian critics. His mother, Loretta, appeared as an extra, in a number of early Tarzan movies.

With such strong dramatic roots, it was inevitable that Joe would gravitate to the theatrical profession. This talent manifested itself early in his life. Picking up a coconut was transformed into Alas, poor Yorick! A breast beating would be accompanied by a piercing cry of Hey Stella!

Zookeepers recognized his talent and encouraged him to participate in the animal park's theatre productions. Along the way he developed a passion for dancing. His greatest love was the tango, at which he excelled. When performing La Salida Simple, Joe became the very embodiment of fluidity and grace.

But by the time Joe was 18, he recognized that Canada was far too limited a jungle for him to develop his talents. He was drawn to Hollywood like a chimp to bananas. His parents supported his move, and six months later, he attended his first casting call.

Joe quickly discovered his greatest auditioning skill - It's tough to say "No" to a 500 lb. gorilla! Joe won small parts in film noir flicks, typically playing "the heavy" His performances impressed Ernest B. Schoedsack, who directed King Kong.

In 1948, Schoedsack was developing a sequel to King Kong, and realized that Mighty Joe Young was a natural for the part. Merian C. Cooper, who wrote the screenplays for both movies, actually rewrote the script to accent Joe's rugged good looks, and animal magnetism. He even adopted Joe's name for the movie title. The result was, as we all know, box office boffo!

But what happened to Mighty Joe Young after his movie success?

After the movie run finished, and he was no longer invited to A List parties (Hollywood has such a short memory!) Joe became disillusioned with Tinseltown, and realized that his happiest memories involved dancing the tango in the Argentinean nightclubs that Ottawa is so famous for. No one in Hollywood could perform a decent el Paseo, or even a rudimentary la Caminata.

Joe made the most important decision of his life. He turned his back on Hollywood, returned to Ottawa, and opened up a dance school. His movie fame and exceptional dancing skills quickly made it a success! And there he remains, to this day.

In 1992, Joe made one brief return to Hollywood, to be choreographer for Scent of a Woman. Director Martin Brest, credits Mighty Joe Young with propelling Al Pacino to his stellar performance in The Tango Scene.

At 76, Joe can no longer bend with his dance partners like he did in his youth, but he still exudes el Alma del Tango (the Soul of the Tango)! I wish you many more tango years. Joe!

Painting an Ape (time lapse)

Painting an Ape (time lapse) This is from a cool site, TheDailyDrawing.com I used to be a portrait artist (among 8,000 other careers!) so I appreciate the talent of these people.

G is for Gorilla - Part 2

G is For Gorilla - Part 2

G is For Gorilla - Part 3

G is For Gorilla - Part 3 One of the better amateur videos that I have seen. I am posting two of them on my blog. This one is my favorite. The filmmaker has incorporated a lot of sophisticated tools into these videos - slow motion, sound effects, etc. I think that this person is very talented!

Dance obsessed Gorilla

Dancing Gorilla One of the better CG (computer generated) monkeys that I have seen. If you lived through the 80's you may also recognize the lyrics.

Recycle Your Cell Phones and Save Gorillas

Recycle Your Cell Phones and Save Gorillas This is actually a serious post. Check out this group. They are doing some very good things to save gorilla habitats. I encourage you to participate!

Shower With Gorilla Commercial

Shower With a Gorilla A Public Service Commercial from Your Government!

Giant Gorillas Prove that Fords ARE Built Tough!

Ford Built Tough Commercial What! Another Ford truck and giant monkey commercial? How many do they think that we can watch?

King King Does a Commercial.

King Kong Commercial The Kongster goes commercial, with a surprise ending. Very clever!

Gorillas Are Just as Snarky as New Yorkers!

After a recent visit to the Bronx Zoo, I confirmed a long time suspicion; gorillas are just as snarky as people in New York City. For example:

Koko, a 5 year old female, was seen to frown at a younger female who wore the same banana leaf skirt two times in the same week.

None of the residents would give directions to a new gorilla who was trying to find the food dispensing area.

As soon as a gorilla wandered away from a group, the remaining apes appeared to be chattering and laughing about the departee.

Zoo keepers are not sure if this behavior is unique to NYC gorillas, or if it is widespread. My guess is that it is a New York thing, acquired by contact with visitors from The Big Apple.

However, snarkiness may not necessarily be a bad thing! It may very well give these animals an evolutionary edge. New Yorkers are well known for their survival skills. Ask anyone who has ridden on the F Train!