Gregory Popovich - You CAN Train Your Cat: Secrets of a Master Cat Trainer

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No book is produced by the author alone. I gratefully acknowledge the contributions of my wife, Izolda, cofounder of the World Famous Popovich Comedy Pet Theater; our daughter, Anastasia, a stalwart performer in the show and helper with our menagerie of pets; my writing helper and researcher, Michael Sion; my editor at St. Martins Press, Rose Hilliard; andof coursethe cats and dogs, ferrets and mice, geese and doves that make Comedy Pet Theater the hit sensation it is.

G regory Popovich, a native of Kiev, Ukraine, is an alumnus of the Great Moscow Circus and the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus; a trained clown and a world recordholding juggler; and founder of the World Famous Popovich Comedy Pet Theater. The shows cast includes 20 domestic cats and 16 dogseach of which once was a stray rescued from an animal shelter. Popovich himself trains these animals to jump rope and leap through hoops, balance on hind legs, and perform in humorous sketches. His award-winning, family-oriented act also includes his unique comedy and juggling, and performances by European-style clowns and balancing acts.

Popovichs Comedy Pet Theater has performed in 25 countries and been featured on televisions The Tonight Show , Late Night with David Letterman , The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson , Animal Planet, and Americas Got Talent (on which Popovich was a finalist in 2007). Comedy Pet Theater also has been written about in People magazine, The New York Times Sunday Magazine , the Los Angeles Times , and the NewYorker . While periodically touring, the Comedy Pet Theater is based at the V Theater inside the Miracle Mile Shops, at Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas. (For information on tour dates, tickets and DVDs, plus videos and pictures of the show, go to www.comedypet.com .)

Popovich resides in Las Vegas with his wife, Izolda, and their daughter, Anastasia, who also perform in the act. The Popoviches extended family in Las Vegas numbers more than 50 furry or feathered members, which not only include cats and dogs but also ferrets and white mice, geese and doves.

You CAN Train Your Cat is Popovichs first book.

An Afternoon of Comedy Pet Theater

He who dislikes the cat was in his former life a rat.

CHINESE PROVERB

It is a weekday afternoon on the Las Vegas Strip, the entertainment epicenter of the world. The brightest stars in show business have their names emblazoned on the towering marquees fronting the most famous mega-casinos on Earth. Forty million visitors a year, from six of the seven continents, come to Vegas to soak up the 24-hour excitement. Among the hordes of fun-seekers are not only those bent on gambling, nurturing the age-old fantasy of a jackpot courtesy of Lady Lucks caprice, but families with wide-eyed children marveling at the themed resorts, state-of-the-art amusement parks, Oz-like atmosphere and unforgettable stage shows.

From the wealthiest of the whalesthe highest of thehigh rollers treated as royalty, their penthouse suites and gourmet feasts comped by their casino hoststo the humblest of working folk taking advantage of bargain room rates and budget-friendly buffets, theyre all seeking sensational thrills and lasting memories in this immense playground of casino castles, whose nighttime neon dazzles in a rainbow spectrum of rich hues.

Las Vegas. The name itself casts a magical spell on tourists. And on entertainers, too. As a stage performer, whether you headline in the grandest showroom or ply your profession in a little lounge, if youre playing Vegas, baby, it means you have attained a high level of proficiency, and you maintain a consistent standard of excellence. It means you have arrived. You know a good-size audience will be at your show. You know the attendees will be expecting not only to be entertained, but delighted and surprised. They have entered an enchanted amusement zone, here on the Strip. They are riding a wave of excitement that lifted them up the moment they landed at McCarran International Airport or motored out of the stark desert into the grid of the great metropolis sprawling in the Las Vegas Valley. Your job is to keep them surfing along, to give them something special to applaudand then to laugh at, or gasp at, and applaud even harder.

Its just a few minutes before four oclock at the V Theater, an ornate 400-seat showroom with pillared arches, tucked into a corner of the enormous Miracle Mile Shops, which is connected to the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino. The retail promenade has 170 stores and kiosks and 15 restaurants, all under a towering ceiling painted with white clouds and blue sky that gives the impression of being outdoors. Outside the theater, a line of eager show-goers of all ages snakes from the ticket counter and out into the malls corridor, oppositean Italian restaurant. Inside the theater, backstage, Im dressed in my clowns outfit of baggy brown trousers, oversized black boots, a tattered black tunic, checkered vest, red bowtie and wide-brimmed red hat. My pancake makeup is brushed on, cheeks and chin dotted with blush, lips reddened, eyelids blued, eye rims and eyelashes blackened, the tip of my nose beaming a bright crimson.

Right on cue, adrenaline surges through my body. This feeling of nervousness mingled with glee never goes away. It is part of a performers addiction to the stage. I have spent my entire life in show business. I grew up in a circus family. My great-grandparents, grandparents and parents all made their living under the big top. Today I am founder and producer of the World Famous Popovich Comedy Pet Theater. My act is regularly engaged five afternoons a week at the V Theater, except when touring. If you include all the dates that the Comedy Pet Theater has played around the nation and in 25 countries, the number of people whove seen my show in person exceeds 1 million. Millions more have watched my cats perform their tricks on television on The Tonight Show, Late Night with David Letterman , Americas Got Talent , and other programs in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Ive also produced a series of three DVDs featuring the various animal segments of Comedy Pet Theater.

But there is nothing better than performing in front of a live audience, just as there is no complete substitute for seeing a show live, rather than on a screen. As my cohorts and I make our final preparations backstage, the bustle and buzz of the attendees as they take their seats in the darkened theater is electric. All the cast members of Comedy Pet Theater feel this vibrant energy. Including the animals.

I make my final rounds of the dressing rooms, looking in,asking if everyones ready, informing them the show will start in two minutes. We have a good crowd! I say. I squeeze my fists and give a lets go! pump of confidenceplaying the part of the combination producer/stage director. Among the dressing rooms is one reserved just for the dogs, and another for the cats. As usual right before a show, the animals are perched on chairs or tables, alert and obedient, feeling at ease in the company of their longtime comrades. The separation of species is only temporary. Soon, dogs and cats will be mingling on stagealong with rats, doves, and ferrets, human acrobats and clowns. My wife, Izolda, will perform her quick-change costume routine. Our daughter, Anastasia, will wow the crowd by juggling balls and limberly spinning 30 hula hoops. I will clamber up a freestanding ladder, juggle pins, catch and stack tossed pans and blocks, and perform Chaplinesque sketches with my trained animals, delivering my very best clown personas.

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