The Mammalian Daily

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Cornelio Lontra wins big at yesterday’s Toe-Hair Contest

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Cornelio Lontra

Cornelio Lontra flipped when he won The Park’s 21st Toe-Hair Contest

The winner of the 2016 Toe-Hair contest literally flipped when he heard the announcement.

“I really thought it would go to Chico [Chinchilla]. I couldn’t believe they called my name,” Cornelio Lontra said.

But call his name they did, after head judge Sierpinski Squirrel confirmed the judges’ unanimous choice.

“They were beauties,” judge Antonio Marcelo said on TMD radio this morning. “They were obviously carefully cultivated. No Animal in the contest could match them.”

And as for Lontra’s friend Chinchilla, he did, in fact, win second prize, while Indira Gecko took home third.

Meanwhile, Lontra is still waiting for it all to sink in.

“I am still stunned, even a day later,” he told The Mammalian Daily via telephone. “When I woke up this morning and it was still true, I was amazed.”

Park Animals sighted at celebrity can opening

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Hill of cats and dogsA number of Park citizens were caught on camera yesterday afternoon, eating, partying, and rubbing up against celebrities at a can opening outside The Park.

According to the gossip web site headsNtales, which published a series of pictures taken at the outdoor event, a “large group of Park Animals” attended the can opening hosted by Humans.

“The exceptionally well-attended event included a vast sampling of different canned foods, sparkling and still water served in bowls and on-site entertainment, as well as free grooming,” the gossip site said.

headsNtales co-founder Hortencia Guacamayo said her reporters could not verify that the Park Animals had been invited to the event.

“We aren’t able to say whether the Park Animals were responding to an invite or just came upon the event in their travels. It [the event] was well-publicized outside The Park, but no Park media we know of published any information about it,” she said.

Sierpinski Squirrel appointed head judge of 2016 Toe-Hair Contest

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Sierpinski

Sierpinski Squirrel:  head judge of the 2016 Toe-Hair Contest

Sierpinski Squirrel will serve as head judge of the 2016 Toe-Hair Contest.

At a press event held this morning at the Ancient, Open-Air Theatre, Aintza Kanariar of the Department of Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations, made the formal announcement:

“We are thrilled to announce that the very competent Sierpinski Squirrel has agreed to serve as head judge of the 2016 Toe-Hair Contest,” she said.

“As perhaps The Park’s premier financial advisor, Sierpinski Squirrel has proven himself to be a great judge in his own field and an outstanding team leader in all respects,” Kanariar said.

In making the announcement, the longtime Director of Public Relations for the body that chooses the judges emphasized the importance of the position of head judge:

“The position is an important one because, should there be a tie, the head judge, who is an Animal with greater expertise than the other judges, has the ability to choose the winner. It is a position of responsibility that calls for a great deal of knowledge and personal integrity,” she said.

The Chief Financial Officer of A. Corn and Partners has found himself in demand recently. Last December, he was asked, on very short notice, to join the Archon Transition Team, replacing Blandine Okapi who had resigned due to what she called  “philosophical differences.” Sierpinski Squirrel stepped up and by all accounts did an admirable job, according to Sylvana Rana, president of Save Our Political System (SOPS).

“He made the job his own, which is quite an accomplishment for an Animal who has never been formally involved in politics.”

At the press announcement yesterday, Kanariar also announced the other four members of the judging panel: Antonio Marcelo, Clementina Araña, Quinta Caribou, and S. Irving Gecko.

The Toe-Hair Contest, which is in its 21st year, is set to commence at 10:00 a.m. Park time on May 1.

TMD Exclusive: Millicent Hayberry and Gianfranco Colocolo in conversation

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MillicentHayberry

The Burrow Theatre is uncharacteristically bright this afternoon, as it will be every day and night that Millicent Hayberry is on stage here playing an unwitting—and unwilling—detective in the highly-anticipated series of mysteries written by Gianfranco Colocolo.

The first play in the series, Godwit, opens tonight at 8:00 pm.

We caught up with both Hayberry and the author during rehearsals at The Park’s Burrow Theatre.

TMD: Thank you for doing this. We know it’s a busy time for you.

MH: We’re delighted. We’re just taking a bit of a break anyway.

GC: Well, Millicent is taking a break. I’m pacing.

TMD: That’s funny. Are you nervous about the gala opening tonight?

GC: Not so much nervous as…well, nervous.

MH: You have nothing to be nervous about!

TMD: Do you have anything to be nervous about?

GC: I don’t, really. I just don’t take anything for granted. It’s been a long haul and I can’t wait to see the audience’s reaction to my work.

TMD: This is your first play…well, set of plays, really. You did have your bestselling novel, Murder at the Fishbowl, made into a movie. But what was different about this process?

GC: Nothing but everything. Night and day. I’ve never written anything that was meant to be performed. Up until now, everything I’ve done was meant to be read. It’s a much different perspective for a writer, to be thinking constantly of another person interpreting your work.

TMD: Did you have anyone in mind while you were writing?

GC: I didn’t and I see now that that would have made it much easier…if I had. If I were to write another set of these plays, I think there’s no doubt they’d be written with Millicent in mind, even if she declined.

MH: I can’t imagine declining.

GC: Even so. Millicent is such a brilliant actress that she’s made the part her own. Even when I read the play to myself now, I hear every word in her voice. It’s quite remarkable.

MH: That is humbling, Gianfranco.

TMD: What is it about the mystery genre that attracts you? I want to ask both of you, but Gianfranco first.

GC: Well, as I told Yannis Tavros on his show a few days ago, I’ve found that you can tell the truth, the honest truth, in the mystery genre and you don’t get the kind of backlash from it that you do elsewhere.

TMD: Do you know why that is? Do you have a theory?

GC: I think there’s a long history of it, but I don’t really know why. I don’t know why some ideas are accepted in one form, but not in another. You’d think that would apply to all fiction, but I’ve found that it doesn’t. You can throw off a line that would be stinging in another genre, but you get nods of approval for it in mystery.

TMD: So you can get away with a lot in the genre, then?

GC: Oh, I don’t think you’re getting away with anything! I think you’d better be right if you’re going to do it. But if you are, I think your audience will allow you to, is what I’m saying.

TMD: What do you think, Millicent?

MH: I agree with Gianfranco. Of course, this isn’t the first time I’ve heard him say it, so I may just be getting won over. But I do think there’s something to that. The truth is the least accepted thing anywhere. We gloss over it, we deny it, on a constant basis. I think there are perhaps two places where the truth wins out: here in mystery and in comedy.

TMD: You are most famous for your rôle in the autobiographical one-Chipmunk play, Mixed Nuts. Wouldn’t you say that autobiography is another area of truth-telling?

MH: You would think so, wouldn’t you? But you wouldn’t believe how much backlash writers get for their autobiographical material. There is a lot of arguing about the truth that goes on. Of course, we all have a different truth, so that’s probably the reason.

TMD: Was there a lot of backlash about Mixed Nuts?

MH: By the time I got involved with it, there wasn’t. But Imogen [Aardeekhoorn] experienced a great deal of it. Even I was surprised at that.

TMD: Millicent, I opened this interview by saying that The Burrow Theatre seemed uncharacteristically bright this afternoon. Am I correct in saying that?

MH: You are, indeed. I brought the very talented Constantine Lampris with me for that purpose. He did the lighting for Mixed Nuts at the [Park] Repertory Theatre. Constantine knows me so well. He knows I don’t see very well in the dark. He lights the stage so that I don’t fall or trip, but it doesn’t get in the way of the play or the audience. I don’t think I could perform live without him.

TMD: I just have one more question. What are you hoping for with this production? What would you consider a win? Gianfranco?

GC: Well, I suppose a win for me would be for the critics to say it was a well-written set of plays. But once it’s been lifted off the page and put on stage, I think a win is really for the cast. A play isn’t much without the cast. At least these aren’t. They’re meant to be dynamic, not static. So, I guess, a win in my view would be the audience’s appreciation of Millicent’s work, as well as that of the other talented actors here.

TMD: Millicent?

MH: I have to throw that right back at Gianfranco and say that a win for me would be appreciation of his words. But beyond that, if the audience comes away with a feeling of satisfaction, that they’ve been entertained and enjoyed themselves and if they’d like to do it again soon, I think that’s the biggest win we could have.

TMD: Thank you both for your time this afternoon. Break a tail tonight!

MH: My pleasure.

GC: Mine, as well.

Mammalian Daily becomes first Park newspaper to ban Human jokes

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BanDEVELOPING STORY

“A guy walks into a bar on two feet…”

So begins the most popular twenty-minute set at The Howler, The Park’s only comedy club.

The joke was written and is performed weekly by Dalmanik, who is widely considered to be the king of The Park’s “new comedy.” But as of today, Dalmanik will not be able to make that joke on the pages of The Mammalian Daily.

That’s because so-called “Human jokes” have now been officially banned by the newspaper.

In an “urgent memo” sent to all employees of The Mammalian Daily on Friday, managing editor Orphea Haas declared that poking fun at Humans, “our fellow Mammals,” is not appropriate in a modern Park.

“While it would be foolish of me to suggest that we in The Park have no issues with Humans, it would be equally foolish to suggest that making fun of them, denigrating and disparaging them, either in comedy, poetry, prose, or news coverage, is appropriate,” the memo says.

As a result, Haas has banned all of the above from The Mammalian Daily’s news pages, web site, radio, podcasts, and all other enterprises connected to Mammalian Daily Associated News Services.

This is the first time any kind of ban on joking or comedy has occurred in any Park media, according to Noburu Akita, Executive Director of the Centre for the Study of Newspaper Activity in The Park (C-SNAP).

“I don’t believe we’ve seen anything like it since the establishment of zoocracy,” he said in a radio interview this morning. “I thought zoocracy valued a free and open press. I think Haas is moving in a very dangerous direction by closing the paper rather than opening it up. What with refusing to name her journalists and this, she is taking a few steps backward and that is very disturbing.”

Not all media experts agree with Akita, though. Ludwiga Saimiri, UWT Professor of Journalism and former director of the Centre for the Incorporation and Integration of Interspecial Values in Journalism (CIIIVJ), issued a statement this morning in which she said she thought this was a positive move on Haas’s part.

“I support Orphea Haas in her determination to keep the news free of frivolous commentary and damaging and reprehensible jokes. Interspecial values demand that we attempt to understand and accommodate those who are different from ourselves. We have a duty to treat every Animal with respect,” the statement said.

Tickets for Hayberry mystery series gala opening on sale today: Burrow Theatre

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Ticket for Gala

Tickets for the gala opening of the new Gianfranco Colocolo mystery series will go on sale this afternoon at one o’clock at the box office of The Burrow Theatre.

The series of mystery dramas by the award-winning author of Murder at the Fishbowl will begin on April 8 with Godwit. The names of the next two plays in the series have yet to be announced.  All three will be directed by Jean-Luc Briard and star renowned actress Millicent Hayberry in the rôle of the “chirpy” detective.

The series has been in the works for several years, according to an interview given by Colocolo in Misterio magazine.

“This is my first foray into stage drama, but I’ve been thinking about doing it for some time,” he said.

He also admitted that he wrote the detective rôle with Millicent Hayberry in mind.

“I hoped that presenting her with a fait accompli would help get her on board with the project and I like to think that it did.”

For her part, Hayberry, who is best known for her portrayal of the late author Imogen Aardeekhoorn in both the stage and screen productions of Mixed Nuts, has said that she embraced the rôle because it was out of her comfort zone and she thought it was time to retire her Mixed Nuts image.

“It’s a problem with a huge success like that,” Colocolo said in the magazine interview. “You become identified with one character and the audience refuses to accept you as any other. The same thing happened to me with Fishbowl. I think both Millicent and I have come together at the right time.”

After its gala opening, Godwit will run until the first week of May.

PMoCA announces 2016 live art installation, “Anatomy of a Bath”

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Anatomy of a BathThe Park Museum of Contemporary Art (PMoCA) has revealed the details of its fourth annual art installation.

At a press conference held this afternoon, Aulikki Norsu, president of the museum’s board of directors and head curator Aamuun Maroodiga announced the museum will unveil its latest installation at the beginning of May.

Entitled, “Anatomy of a Bath,” the installation is the second live art installation the museum has hosted. The first was the wildly successful, “How Much Was That Doggie in the Window?” which was presented in 2013 by then PMoCA curator Dorika Pumi.

As Pumi did with “Doggie,” Maroodiga recruited Animals from The Park’s refugee communities, as well as from charities, including CatsCare, LynxLink, and EQUALSS, to staff the twenty-four hour exhibit. The Animals will be presented in groups of six and each individual will be showcased for ten minutes every hour during a shift of six hours. So far, Maroodiga has recruited four full-time groups and one back-up group and, she says, interviews are ongoing.

“We have to be prepared, once we open,” she says. “Once they see what we’re doing, more Animals will want to join in and others will tire of the work. I expect we’ll be hiring throughout the life of the exhibit.”

Details of the gala opening are expected to be released within a week.

Balls columnist lends private collection to Park Museum’s new Flyball exhibition

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Bailey Balls Columnist

Bailey: balls columnist and co-curator of Park Museum exhibition

The Mammalian Daily’s balls columnist has lent his private collection of balls to The Park Museum’s latest exhibition.

In a statement released today, the Board of Governors of The Park Museum and curator Dorika Pumi thanked Bailey for his “trust and generosity” in making the temporary donation and said the museum had benefitted immensely from his “vast knowledge of balls.”

Entitled, “Flyball and the Importance of Balls in the Everyday Life of Park Animals,” the exhibition is the museum’s first sports-related event. According to the pre-opening information, it will not only highlight the sport of flyball, but will also serve as “a tribute to the enduring relationship between Animals and balls.”

Last July, Bailey announced that he was taking a leave of absence from his column at the newspaper to co-curate the exhibition along with the museum’s head curator Dorika Pumi. His private collection of balls includes over twenty different types, most of which he or his ancestors have used in play. Some, which were bought at auction, date from pre-zoocratic times.

The opening date for the exhibition has not yet been announced, but a spokesAnimal for the museum says public viewing will follow a gala opening, “in the early Spring.”

Hair and skin colouring, stripe removal hurt Park, says Artifice Destiny author

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Look! No stripes on this Zebra.

The author of a controversial new book published by Prionailurus Press says that the growing popularity of aesthetic changes such as stripe removal and artificial hair and skin colouring will have devastating long-term effects on The Park and its citizens.

In an interview this week, Artifice Destiny author Marika Kaméleon told The Mammalian Daily that such alterations to our natural selves will not only change the way we see ourselves and each other, but they will also have a detrimental effect on Park politics, government, and our collective commitment to zoocracy.

“The basis of our life here is a commitment to viewing each other equally, regardless of species, size, or colour and this kind of artifice makes a mockery of that,” she said.

Kaméleon, who is also a therapist at The Park’s Extinction Anxiety Clinic, said she has already seen a number of younger patients who see procedures such as stripe removal as “adaptive” ways to avoid the extinction of their species.

“They come here talking about the hatred they’ve experienced and the threat to their lives and the future of their species, but they don’t see that caving in to hatred and prejudice is not an adaptation so much as a surrender. Some say it’s their version of ‘fight or flight’ but I say no to that. Moving in the direction of homogeneity is not the answer,” she said.

Kaméleon’s book became a bestseller almost as soon as it was released last week, but it has garnered its share of controversy, particularly from The Park’s business community and its grooming houses, some of which still offer stripe removal services.

“I have always been against the procedure, personally, but I don’t feel as if I have the right to deny it to Animals who seek it,” said Tallulah of Talulah’s Toilettage. “I don’t think it’s fair of Kaméleon, as a therapist, to advise her patients against doing something that might help them feel better.”

Rehearsals to resume in March on Millicent Hayberry mystery series

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Millicent Hayberry

Millicent Hayberry: Back onstage at the Burrow Theatre April 8

Rehearsals will resume next week at The Park’s Burrow Theatre for the Gianfranco Colocolo mystery series starring renowned actress Millicent Hayberry.

A spokesAnimal for the theatre confirmed director Jean-Luc Briard’s tweet of February 23, in which he said he was “Getting into shape for Tuesday rehearsal.” According to the theatre, rehearsals begin on Tuesday, March 1, a little over a month before the April 8 opening.

Hayberry, who is best known for her portrayal of author Imogen Aardeekhoorn in both the stage and screen productions of Mixed Nuts, emerged from hibernation on Groundhog Day and has been resting since, but is said to be anxious to return to work.

“Millicent lives for her work and if she could, she’d skip hibernation altogether in favour of working,” said a close friend of the actress.

Despite that, rehearsals that were scheduled for the month of February were cancelled, in part due to Hayberry’s physical state.

“She was weak coming out of hibernation, which isn’t surprising,” said the same friend. “But her spirits are high and they will carry her through the first gruelling days of rehearsal all the way to the opening.”

For his part, Gianfranco Colocolo, the award-winning author of Murder at the Fishbowl, has yet to name the mystery series, preferring to keep that as a mystery, as well. Tickets for the series (single plays or for the whole series) will go on sale in mid-March at The Burrow Theatre.

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