BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book

Subject: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 07 Jul 24 - 08:22 PM

Chongo has given his highest recommendation to a fantastic Hollywood biography... "Me Cheetah - The Autobiography", written by Cheetah with assistance from James Lever. It's a truly moving tale of the life and times of the Chimp who acted in so many films with Johnny Weismuller, the silver screen's most famous Tarzan.

This is seriously an excellent book in every way, both entertaining, amusing, and ultimately heart-breaking. It's a story that's got everything. I kid you not!

"In 1984, Johnny Weissmuller, Hollywood's greatest Tarzan, passed away. His coffin was lowered into the ground to the recorded sounds of his famous jungle call. Maureen O'Sullivan, his Jane, followed him in 1998. But their co-star Cheeta the chimpanzee, the 'World's Funniest Animal', lives on. At seventy-six, he is by some distance the oldest chimp ever recorded.

Now, in his own words, Cheeta finally tells his extraordinary story."

It's been out since 2008, so you may have heard about it before, but Chongo wanted to remind everyone. Hence, this message to all of you. Cheers!

Me Cheetah

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: leeneia
Date: 07 Jul 24 - 08:52 PM

Hello, Little Hawk. It's nice to hear from you and Chongo after all this time.

I suggest a true story called "The Cowboy and his Elephant."

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: keberoxu
Date: 07 Jul 24 - 09:18 PM

... which brings to mind "The Cowboy and his Cow," by Edward Abbey;
but that one is more up Stilly River Sage's alley,
with its talk of the wide open ranges (and incidentally rangers).

I agree, it's good to have Little Hawk back with us.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Jul 24 - 11:07 PM

Wow. It took a lot to bring Chongo's amanuensis into the logged-on world. This must be a spectacular story!

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: JennieG
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 01:04 AM

It's about time that Chongo received the recognition that he so richly deserves!

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 06:48 AM

Indeed. Dare I say...an ape without peer! But the book is not about Chongo. It's about his friend, Cheetah, a star in many motion pictures from the Golden Age of Hollywood.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 10:46 AM

Yeah, right. Cheetah would have died wealthy except for those card games with Chongx. Dealing off the bottom, marked cards, stacked decks -- poor Cheetah spent his last days in the workhouse, pounding oakum for the Royal Navy. I understand that his last days were terrible, with him bewailing his lost billions and placing terrible curses upon Chongx.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 11:39 AM

AHA! I wondered when the catspaw of the political Establishment would emerge like a Moray Eel from his hole and start spreading scurrilous gossip to embarrass Chongo. You have no shame, sir! Return to your vile lair of disinformation and trouble us no more!

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: The Sandman
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 05:14 PM

Chongo   is he a Letter lost in an African country? or even an unsolvable crossword clue

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: rich-joy
Date: 08 Jul 24 - 07:56 PM

Aw, don't stay away so long this time, LH :)
Great to see you and The Chong (and Cheet) back!!!

R-J
(Down Under)

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: JennieG
Date: 09 Jul 24 - 01:07 AM

Indeed, Chongo didn't write the book.....but he recommends it, so he is still worthy of note.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Jul 24 - 08:36 AM

It is truly a wonderful book. I read it a few years ago, and enjoyed it immensely. It's full of hilarious anecdotes about Hollywood, lots of name-dropping, salacious tales about famous movie stars of the time, and many interesting takes on how a Chimpanzee actor navigates his way through the many temptations and trials of Tinseltown. Cheetah's close friendship with Johnny Weismuller and his somewhat strained collaboration with Maureen O'Sullivan are closely examined, and the book concludes in a manner that will bring a tear to the eye of any reader who is not made out of stone...

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: leeneia
Date: 12 Jul 24 - 07:42 PM

Now we need a movie with cheetah named Chimp.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Jul 24 - 08:19 PM

We've already got one called "Chester". The one who says "It's not easy bein' cheesy!"

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Rapparee
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 04:03 PM

I’ve been reluctant to reveal this but I am the hereditary Lord Greystroke.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Rapparee
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 04:11 PM

Tarzan’s MONKEY (not chimpanzee) friend was Nkima, not Cheetah. And I misspelled “Greystoke” earlier.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Jul 24 - 06:03 PM

Yes, Tarzan's friend in the long running comic strips was indeed a small monkey, not a chimpanzee, and his name was N'kima. The Hollywood movie people thought that American audiences were too stupid to handle a slightly complex name like N'kima, so they renamed the monkey "Cheetah", and replaced him with a young Chimp. So now almost everyone thinks of the movie version..."Cheetah"...rather than the comic magazine version...N'kima.

It's sad. Hollywood does everything they can to keep Americans as ignorant as possible, and with considerable effect, unfortunately!

And no, you are not the hereditary Lord Greystoke. But if it makes you happy to think so, why should I stand in your way? Enjoy your fantasy. Buy a banana suit. You can get them on Amazon.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: leeneia
Date: 18 Jul 24 - 10:47 PM

When I was a kid, I read several old Tarzan books. I don't remember the adult Tarzan having a simian buddy, but I do remember that when he was orphaned in wildest Africa, he was befriended by a female "gray ape." I remember vividly that once when little Tarzan was sick, his ape-mother brought water to him the only way she could - in her mouth.

(He and his parents had been shipwrecked on the African coast, a wild and forested coast.)

Tarzan's parents had left a dictionary behind, and I remember him trying to get hold of the pictured items, but he couldn't scrape them off. Improbably enough, he mastered crude English by looking at the dictionary.

I remember him meeting Jane, but I don't remember anything that happened after that.

Subject: RE: BS: Chongo recommends Me Cheetah book
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Jul 24 - 06:05 PM

The first Edgar Rice Burroughs book about Tarzan was a tour-de-force of imagination, and the subsequent Tarzan stories made great reading, specially for younger readers. I read through the entire series in my mid-teens. They were naturally tailored to suit the cultural expectations of English-speaking people in the late 19th to early 20th century. Pretty exciting stuff! I remember that the ape tribe was led by a brutal silverback named Kerchak, if I recall correctly, and that he would periodically fly into a frenzy of blind rage for no particular reason, attacking others without reason, and that Tarzan eventually had a battle to the death with him. Tarzan's adoptive ape mother was named Kala.

Chongo is, of course, a big fan of those books, even though he's not exactly fond of gorillas.