TV REVIEW
Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem, and Madness
Netflix
STREAMING service Netflix just dropped a new true-crime documentary series, Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem, and Madness, (Tiger King) a little over a week ago and the internet has not stopped talking about how crazy the people and the entire situation is. And seeing that the documentary hasn’t hit the Top 10 list in the Philippines just yet, here’s a review to whet the appetite of those who haven’t seen it yet.
Tiger King, directed by Eric Goode and Rebecca Chaiklin, is about a little-known but highly interconnected society of big cat conservationists and private zoo owners and their mutual dislike for each other. At the center of the conflict is Joe Exotic (Joseph Allen Maldonado-Passage), a flamboyantly gay owner of more than 200 big cats who runs a zoo called the Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park in Florida, and Carole Baskin, the owner of conservation group Big Cat Rescue, also in Florida.
While one of the directors of the documentary said that the series started when they were investigating the wildlife trade in the US (and saw a snow leopard sitting in the back of a truck under the hot Florida sun), it is quickly apparent that the seven-episode series isn’t as much about big cat conservation as it is about the crazy characters collecting big cats.
(Note: Snow leopards are listed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.)
We have, on the one hand, Mr. Maldonado-Passage, who runs a private zoo along with “other misfits” — former felons and such. He feeds his animals and his crew with rejected or expired meat from the local supermarket, and also roadkill. He also has a reality show called Joe Exotic TV and “makes” country music. Subsequent articles about the documentary revealed that he lip synced all his songs in the two albums he produced.
He was also married two husbands at one time.
On the other hand, we have Carole Baskin, who has made it her mission to give big cats a “good home until they die.” One of the main conflicts in the series from the third episode on is how Ms. Baskin may have had a hand in the disappearance of her second husband, Don Lewis.
Also featured in the series is Bhagavan “Doc” Antle who runs a high-end private zoo in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. He claims to spend $10,000 to feed one tiger a year, and yet has so many women working for him for pittance. He also sleeps with these women in something like the Playboy Mansion — but with tigers.
Mr. Maldonado-Passage and Ms. Baskin are involved in a years-long feud over Mr. Maldonado-Passage’s treatment of his animals. She manages to stop his performances in malls across the US, which put a huge dent in his finances, so he threatens violence.
The documentary so loves focusing on the hatred Mr. Maldonado-Passage has for Ms. Baskins that there is a montage of how many times he talked about her.
It all ends when Mr. Maldonado-Passage was arrested for hiring someone to murder Ms. Baskins, a crime that landed him in prison in 2018. He has to stay there for 22 years.
Is it a compelling documentary? Yes, if you can get over the cringe-inducing scenes showing how much of a mess they all are (a large part of that is Mr. Maldonado-Passage’s music which plays in several episodes), and the sadness one feels over the fact that none of these people are treating exotic animals the way they should be treated.
Tigers, in particular, have expiration dates once they get too big to be considered cute, and it’s expensive to keep an adult tiger.
For those who want to watch the series, know that this isn’t about conservation — it’s about people keeping big cats for money. So if you’re looking for a documentary about the ethics of exotic animal trade, this is not for you.
But the characters are colorful, and strange, and, frankly, nauseating — but it makes for good content. Tiger King was popular enough that Netflix ordered a limited series days after the documentary series hit the service. — Zsarlene B. Chua
