The BBC's Animal Magic programme, began in 1962 and ran for 21
years and more than 400 editions.
As the presenter, naturalist Johnny Morris adopted the persona
of a keeper at Bristol Zoo and created a startling range of voices
for each of the zoo's animals. He was later assisted by Terry Nutkins.
Animal Magic was dropped in 1984, when the idea of giving animals
human qualities fell out of favour. Afterwards, Morris said that
he was not really sad about it.
One of Johnny Morris's animal tales was sampled at the beginning
of cult Nineties band Pop Will Eat Itself's 'Box Frenzy' album:
'They're very much like scruffy pigs to look at.... they're very,
very ugly indeed.'
