And the winner for today’s greatest press release:
English actress Lesley Nicol, star of international hit TV show Downton Abbey, has completed a visit to Animals Asia’s China Bear Rescue Centre (CBRC) in Chengdu, China.
Nicol—who plays the “highly-strung and quick-tempered” cook Mrs. Patmore—has previously tweeted her love for the Chinese bears:
Animals Asia, headquartered in Hong Kong, is an organization dedicated to protecting “moon bears” in China; here’s an example of moon-bear abuse.
Lesley Nicol isn’t even the first actor in the acclaimed British period drama to go rescue tortured bears in China. That honor belongs to Peter Egan, who earlier this year traveled to Chengdu, a city in southwest China, to work with Animals Asia. Egan played the Duke of Argyll in a Downton Abbey Christmas special.
On a related note, there was that one episode of Downton Abbey in which under-butler Thomas Barrow teaches kitchen maid Daisy Mason an old dance move called “the Grizzly Bear“; Mrs. Patmore shows up in that scene near the end.
So now you know.
