The Tiger King story has been wild both onscreen and off-, with two outsized characters — zookeeper-turned-convicted felon Joe Exotic and his nemesis, big cat conservationist Carole Baskin — providing plenty of dramatic fodder after the Netflix doc series became a sensation. So here we go again: As per The Hollywood Reporter, mere days after the trailer for the sequel dropped, Baskin has sued Netflix.
Baskin’s beef? She doesn’t want to see herself (or her cats) in Tiger King 2. In an emergency motion, she and her legal team are seeking to ban Netflix “from any use of film footage of the Baskins and the Big Cat Rescue sanctuary in Tiger King 2 or in any related promotion or advertising.”
The filing claims that they agreed that footage of her and her sanctuary, named Big Cat Rescue, would only be used in one documentary project. Baskin and her husband Howard also alleged that they never gave permission for additional filming at their place of business, and that they weren’t paid for those services.
Baskin also didn’t exactly enjoy the first Tiger King. She’s been vocal against the series before, even decrying the sequel when it was announced. In the filing, her attorney says it portrayed “Joe Exotic as a sympathetic victim and Carole as the villain.” Indeed, one of the seven episodes is devoted to a conspiracy theory that alleged, without much proof, that Baskin may have played a role in her previous husband going missing.
Not that Joe Exotic, née Joseph Allen Schreibvogel, came off all that well either. The series follows him as he’s convicted on 17 federal charges of animal abuse and two counts of attempted murder for hire, having plotted to have Baskin killed. What it doesn’t show — and which will likely be in the sequel — is him begging everyone from then-president Donald Trump to Cardi B to get him out of jail.
Tiger King 2 is set to drop on Netflix on November 17, but now it could wind up delayed.
(Via THR)