DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT

One Sunday afternoon, I took a drive to Arcadia, a quaint suburb east of Los Angeles known for its thoroughbred racetrack, a beautiful botanical garden and, surprisingly, wild peafowl–that is, male peacocks, female peahens, and baby peachicks. I’d heard that the city took pride in their birds, and one could encounter a few fowl lounging around on any given day. I imagined a picturesque postcard of an elegant peacock on a manicured lawn. The scene I encountered was indeed postcard worthy, but far from picturesque: there were hundreds of wild peafowl taking over a few neighborhood blocks–they grouped together on lawns, in full feather displays, vying for a chance to mate; peahens darted across the street, dodging cars, looking for the best offering of worms and flowers; peacocks flew into trees by the dozens, and lept roof to roof. Most alarming, was the cacophony of screeching that can only be described as a yee-awh akin to the yell of a thousand dying cats.

I returned to Arcadia month after month with my camera. I fell in love with the neighborhood and the peacocks. Perhaps I felt some kinship to the peafowl, who were brought here from India in the late 1800s by the town’s founder Lucky Baldwin. My grandparents immigrated from India and had to make a home for themselves in a strange new land. Peacocks are revered in India, as auspicious blessings, and I felt a sense of the divine observing this dizzying and delightful melodrama unfolding before my eyes in Arcadia. I was in constant disbelief that the birds lived here in this manner, and the neighbors did not mind. Eventually, I met neighbors and began investigating how this could be. What I discovered is that the neighborhood does have a history of discontent and drama, where disgruntled neighbors get fed up every few years and take the issue to the City Council. But each time this happens, an overwhelming majority of neighbors band together and petition any kind of peafowl intervention or relocation plan. These neighbors feel a sense of pride and responsibility for this bizarre living condition they inherited.

Aside from my curiosities about the inner workings of a neighborhood, what surprised me and charmed me the most during the course of making this film, was the overwhelming desire from the residents of Arcadia to find a way to peacefully coexist with, and respect the natural world, even in the most unnatural of circumstances.