- I Am Not an Animal
infobox television
show_name = I Am Not An Animal
caption = The cast of "I Am Not an Animal" (featured from left to right are Hugh the monkey, Mark the bird, Philip the horse, Claire the rat, and Winona the pittbull)
format =Comedy
runtime = 30 minutes
starring =Steve Coogan Amelia Bullmore Julia Davis Kevin Eldon
Arthur MathewsSimon Pegg John Shrapnel
country = UK
network =BBC2
first_aired =10 May 2004
last_aired =14 June 2004
num_episodes = 6
imdb_id = 0348943"I Am Not an Animal" is an animated comedy series telling the tale of highly intelligent animals rescued from a
vivisection ist laboratory and forced to live on their own. The series was made and directed byPeter Baynham . It was produced byTriffic Films and ran onBBC2 in theUnited Kingdom fromMay 10 toJune 14 2004 . It has also aired on the ABC inAustralia .tory
In the laboratory Vivi-Sec UK, a group of five animals are part of the fourth batch of Project S, an experiment designed to create talking animals.
The animals are given a sophisticated lifestyle in order for them to develop their intellect, living a luxurious life run by
computer s in something similar to a four-star hotel, unaware they are really part of a laboratory experiment. They have human-like personalities and names, wear specially designed clothes, speak in a pseudo-intellectual fashion, eat gourmet food, drink fine wines, read books and magazines and generally live like humans in luxury. Meanwhile, the other animals outside Project S are tortured with horrific experiments.The animals in the experiment include:
*Philip Masterson-Bowie the
horse (voiced bySteve Coogan )
*Niall therabbit (voiced by Arthur Mathews)
*Winona Matthews thepit bull (voiced byAmelia Bullmore )
*Hugh Gape themonkey (voiced byKevin Eldon )
*Claire Franchetti therat (voiced byJulia Davis )
*Mark Andrews (aka Glen Belt) thesparrow (also voiced by Steve Coogan)
*Kieron thecat (voiced bySimon Pegg )A group of
animal rights activists break into the laboratory to rescue the animals. Kieron is left behind, having his head removed from the rest of his body and being kept alive by machines. As the other animals are boarded into the activists' truck they don't know what's going on, and are joined by Niall, arabbit from an earlier batch of Project S which can only speak computer advice (a reference to "Planet of the Apes ").When one of the animals asks the activists if they will be stopping for a toilet break, they panic and crash the truck into a tree. The animals escape, and go their separate ways. After running into humans who are shocked, and other animals who can't speak like they do, they deduce they have somehow been transported into an alternate reality where only humans can speak and the other animals are enslaved by them.
Meanwhile, Vivi-Sec UK graft Kieron's head onto the body of a
gorilla and send him out to assassinate the other animals. Vivi-Sec UK also alerts the media that dangerous talking animals are on the loose.The animals take shelter in an elderly lady's house, who calls her
psychiatrist to tell him that there are talking animals at her house. Believing the elderly lady to have snapped, he has the medics take her away, leaving the animals to live in her house.Episodes
Trivia
*The title comes from the famous quote in "The Elephant Man.
*The narrator wasJohn Shrapnel External links
*bbc.co.uk|id=comedy/guide/articles/i/iamnotananimal_999040510.shtml|title="I Am Not an Animal" Comedy Guide (Currently Unavailable as of Oct 2007)
* [http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/features/story/0,11710,1186728,00.html Peter Baynham's rebuttal to criticism that animal testing "isn't a suitable subject for comedy."]
* [http://www.triffic.co.uk "Triffic Films" site]
* [http://www.slate.com/id/2127584/ Slate- A Horse Walks Into a Bar... "I Am Not an Animal" is a cheerfully sicko social satire from the BBC.]
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