“I just learned that two bears from your traveling show, Bambi and Bruno, served as models for Disney’s Brother bear… “
👆 That was Joaquin Phoenix’s first line letter he sent operator Monica Velde to the Beardize ranch. After learning from PETA that the two bears that were used as models for the Disney movie (which Joaquin starred in) were living in a Florida roadside zoo and forced to perform in a traveling show, a longtime PETA supporter reached out to Velda, hoping she would consider the bear’s perspective. , just like the audience saw him Brother bear character to do.
“I voiced the film’s protagonist, Kenai, who, as a lesson in empathy, magically transforms to be able to see the world through the eyes of a bear, and now I ask you to see through their eyes,” Joaquin wrote. “These bears deserve more than life on the road, where everything that is natural and important to them is taken away from them, and if you put yourself in their place, I’m sure you will see that too.”
On the road, Bearadise Ranch operators keep the bears in cramped transport cages where they can barely turn around, let alone avoid their own waste. During performances, bears climb stairs, carry a basketball while walking on their hind legs, pull hoops over their heads and perform other tricks – probably because they are afraid of what will be done to them if they do not. Florida wildlife officials recently filed a misdemeanor charge against rancher Beardize after she forced a bear to act as a “ring bearer” during a wedding ceremony and led a film crew into the bear enclosure.
In his letter, Joaquin not only urges Velde to stop traveling shows, but also offers to help arrange the transfer of bears to an accredited sanctuary, where they will never be used for entertainment again. “Could you think about ending tricks and travel and giving all the bears in your venture a chance to just live like bears?” he asks Velde.
Join Joaquin and PETA in helping exploited and forced bears to perform at Bears of Bearadise Ranch. traveling show!
While Joaquin is addressing the show’s operators, you can remind the organizers of the event – including the Mississippi Valley fair where Bearadise Ranch is due this week – that this archaic form of entertainment should be classified as a history book. Click below to take action:
Urgent Events: “Please cancel the Beardize Ranch Show!”