Based in Florida, his company consists of 50 professionals teaching animal training strategies and creating educational programs for zoos around the world. Others working with zebras were Australian Craig Bullen, and American Bobby Lovgren, credited as the film’s master animal trainer, who had just finished on Seabiscuit.Īll Racing Stripes’ livestock handlers benefitted from the presence of an experienced exotic animal trainer, Steve Martin, the head of Natural Encounters. Just occasionally, in some racing scenes, ‘painted’ ponies were used as substitutes.” And they worked under really trying circumstances such as night shoots, doing multiple takes lying down and performing in front of a lot of people. “The zebras never took a backward step and, despite being head-shy, learnt to wear bridles, halters and winkers. It’s said they can’t be trained but they did everything they were asked to do,” says Ian, who for many years has been a livestock contractor and rodeo clown, and is often seen at events entertaining audiences on an American bison, another animal traditionally regarded as being unrideable! The youngest was 10, the oldest close on 25 and a couple had been captured from the wilds of the Kalahari Desert. Ian took his time and really got a lot out of them.”Īnd these zebras were no spring chickens. They buck, rear and twist and it’s bred into them to be fierce and quick so as to protect themselves from predators. “I’d never ridden a zebra before doing this film. Laura worked alongside husband, Ian, who broke in some of the zebras to saddle and trained them to pull carts and a plough. Queensland horsewoman, Laura Bostock, who was the actress’s stunt double, says, “Hayden did a really good job”. At the end of filming she presented me with a silver whisky flask, engraved with a very kind message, which went straight to the poolroom!” From then on she never gave me any lip, showed respect and was quick to learn. “‘I can’t give you a lesson, you’re not suitably attired and you’re late,’ I said. She had on a skimpy pair of shorts and was wearing sandals. “She turned up with the producer and first assistant an hour after the appointed time.

Her first lesson didn’t go so well – in fact it didn’t go at all. ‘Now that’s a girl I can teach’, I told them.” Hayden got the role, a very different one to when she had played Maddie Harrington in Ally McBeal. Hayden had fallen off in her video, but she’d laughed and got back on. “The producers didn’t know who to select. While at home in Australia, he was sent riding footage of three young actors. The final decision was made by Heath Harris, Racing Stripes’ liberty horse master who also had the task of teaching the film’s star. The script required her to confidently ride horses, ponies and a zebra and interact with them naturally. Named ‘Stripes’, he finds an ally in Nolan’s 14-year-old daughter, Channing (Hayden Panettiere), who longs to be a jockey.įinding the right girl for the job was a lengthy process.

Rescued and taken to a farm belonging to widower Nolan Walsh (Bruce Greenwood), he grows up surrounded by barnyard animals. There were pelican, goat, dog, sheep, and rooster handlers, thoroughbred and pony wranglers, liberty horse and zebra trainers, grooms, stablehands and animal coordinators, all helping bring to life the story of a zebra, accidentally abandoned as a foal by a travelling circus, who longs to be a racehorse. These were later voiced in distant recording studios by actors such as Dustin Hoffman, Whoopi Goldberg, Snoop Dog and Frankie Muniz.ĭirected by Frederik Du Chau, a young Belgian filmmaker, the complex process of animation and animatronics was undertaken by over 150 people a team of 40, comprising many Australians, worked with the different creatures. With a budget of $30 million, the producers of Racing Stripes (Warner Bros 2005) cast a handful of on-camera humans working on location in South Africa alongside a variety of animals.

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