Michael Sheen - an animal link

Bele

Well-Known Member
15+ year member
A BBC Wales programme about the family History of the Wesh-born actor Michael Sheen had an interesting animal link .

A great-grandmother of his had been a lion-tamer with , I think , Bostocks and had toured America with them about 1900 before retiring to domestic life . The programme featured Jim Clubb , Circus Historian , of Heythrop , who had newspaper clippings of the lady . This sequence was filmed at Zippo's Circus , which it was pointed out , is animal-free . Jim reckoned she would have also worked with a mixed group of bears , wolves and hyenas , cheap to obtain and easier to manage and often presented . In those days there were few tigers in circuses .
 
Are horses and birds not animals any more? Zippo's features both!

The programme only showed humans in the ring and gave the impression that the circus did not feature any animal acts , this being often the case in the UK now .

Just did a quick Google search . Seems that Zippo's have a number of shows . the 'Encore' show features liberty horses , the 'Phoenix' show is non-animal . It is possible the show featured on the progranmme did not have any animal acts as many UK Local authorities ban circuses with animals .
 
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