Tiger King was one of the bright spots of 2020. I remember sitting quarantined in my house watching the show alongside my family. For its 15 minutes of fame, it really felt like a must-watch TV. Fans were dying for more, and well the follow-ups just didn't quite capture the magic again.
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Fortunately, Tiger King filmmaker's follow-up sounds like a weird crowd-pleaser. This time the filmmaker is lampooning the world of chimp owners in the new HBO documentary Chimp Crazy. The surprise documentary will air next month. Tiger King filmmaker Eric Goode captures the world of chimp mums. The four-part documentary features owners who raise their chimpanzees as pets or even as their own children.
Tonia Haddix describes herself as the "Dolly Parton of chimps." Shouldn't that be chimp owners? Haddix is a former nurse turned exotic animal broker. It's clear from the teaser trailer that she's the Joe Exotic of the documentary.
'Tiger King' Follow-Up
The trailer shows her in a pink bedroom with stuffed animals, interacting with her chimps. She has seven in total. The trailer shows one chimp named Tonka.
"Tonka and I just found each other," she said. "And Tonka loved me as much as I loved Tonka." However, Tonka apparently goes missing. Spoilers! PETA ends up suing the pet owner as a result. It also sounds very much like bonkers TV. From the sounds of the previews, there will be a true crime element.
"I would give anything I had, possession-wise, up for that child. I would give my life for him, and that's exactly what I did, to be honest," she said in the trailer.
That true crime element played an important role in Tiger King. That documentary featured the escalating conflict between Joe Exotic and animal rights activist Carol Baskins. It all eventually reached a boiling point when Exotic allegedly hired a contract killer to try to kill Carol. Currently, Joe is in prison as a result. While the documentary is unlikely to hit these extremes, it sounds very much like a spiritual follow up to the filmmaker's previous work. We'll see what happens when the documentary airs.
