PETA is going ape over NBC's new sitcom Animal Practice - and not in a good way.
The animal-rights group descended on the network's North Hollywood, California, offices this week for a protest that saw protesters donning monkey masks as they decried the new series.
According to PETA, the series - which stars former Weeds actor Justin Kirk as a veterinarian with a list of famous animal patients - practices cruelty to animals on multiple levels. At the demonstration and news conference, primate experts Dr. Mel Richardson and Kari Bagnall took exception to Animal Practice's inclusion of a capuchin monkey named Crystal as a central character on the show.
According to Richardson and Bagnall, when Friends - also an NBC show - featured a monkey on the series (as a pet of character Ross Geller) - numerous people began buying pet monkeys, which were subsequently abandoned to animal sanctuaries when the owners realized they couldn't care for them.
PETA further claims that the creatures used on Animal Practice spend their lives "deprived of everything that is natural and important to them., stolen from their mothers shortly after birth - a cruel act for both the baby and the mother that denies the infants the care and nurturing that they need."
NBC did not respond to a request for comment.
And though Crystal might appear happy in promos for the show, which premières Sept. 26, don't be fooled - behind that seemingly happy simian grin lies a world of furry-tailed misery, PETA says.
"The 'smile' that Crystal exhibits on the show is actually an expression that indicates fear and stress in capuchin monkeys," PETA claimed on its website. "As capuchin authority Dr. Eduardo Ottoni explains, 'Since we do not usually understand their communicative behaviours properly, fear, submission or avoidance displays can easily be mistaken for smiles."
Earlier this year, PETA targeted the HBO series Luck, calling for lawenforcement to investigate the deaths of horses that expired during the series' production. PETA claimed that the show was racing retired horses that were unfit for the work, and of overworking the horses by racing them twice in the same day.
HBO pulled Luck from its schedule in March, after a third horse died during the show's production.
