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So, there's this extended family of strong personalities — photogenic, outgoing, all living under one roof. A camera follows their daily lives: What they eat, their sexual liaisons, power struggles, jealousies and sacrifices for one another. But the hook — for those who want more reality in their soap operas — is that these family members are meerkats living in the Kalahari Desert.

The Whiskers, stars of Animal Planet's unscripted Meerkat Manor airing Episode six of its first 13 on Friday night, must learn how to eat scorpions, battle rival clans and obey the iron rule of a female leader. The winners get to survive.

For a documentary, Meerkat Manor is unusually anthropomorphized, dispensing with the familiar "voice of God" narration that accompanies most such shows in favour of characterization, story arcs and close-up reaction shots. As in any soap or reality show, the characters are presented to engage viewers' emotions: Will Shakespeare survive the poisonous snake bite? Will Flower evict Mozart from the family for good?

So far, the series has "all the makings of a hit," at least by the cable network's standards, said Maureen Smith, Animal Planet's executive vice president and general manager. The premiere drew more than a million viewers, and more in subsequent episodes. "Even more interesting, it was the adults that were driving the increases," she said. Though not intended, many viewers said they related to the power struggles in the family, producers said. Working in conjunction with Oxford Scientific Films, the network has already planned a second season and is negotiating for a feature film, Smith said. "We just hope they don't get agents, or negotiating for Season three will be tough," she joked. Already, the meerkats are listed individually as actors ("Flower the Meerkat") on the Internet movie database IMDB.com.

Documentarians have tried, but often failed, with such personality-driven animal films. According to executive producer Mick Kaczorowski, Meerkat Manor succeeds partly because it is episodic and partly because of the animals themselves, mongoose relatives with strong community behaviour, an alert, prairie dog stance and dark, wide eyes. Think Timon from The Lion King.

A camera placed underground managed to capture footage of a poisonous snake biting Shakespeare as he was trying to dig it out. The camera crew then followed the wounded animal hobbling home and, later, curled up in a fetal ball, accepting sustenance from community members. In another scene, a young meerkat babysitter gets bored with the job and runs off, leaving the baby to find its own way back to the burrow. Kaczorowski said the series, intended for parents and children ages two to six, was edited to excise scenes of extreme brutality or mating behaviour. While some scenes show meerkats babysitting Flower's children and grandchildren, others show the dark side of community life. Outcast females become tick-infested and look longingly at the group from afar. In one episode called "Daisy's Choice," a meerkat abandons her babies in exchange for being allowed back into the group. Producers included a caveat for sensitive children before each episode.

With the ongoing struggles of predator and prey, romance, childbirth and sibling rivalry, the series has the potential to last generations, like some soap operas, Smith said. Next season, Kaczorowski promises, there will be increasingly innovative camerawork beyond the first season's, which utilized cameras planted in underground burrows. More rival gangs will appear, but if the worst should happen, characters will be allowed to die off as the animals do. They won't be replaced with new meerkats stepping in with the same names.

"We could never do that. Each one has such a personality. Each time a new character is revealed, they have such interesting quirks. We see them coming of age themselves," he said.

Smith said Animal Planet will continue its more traditional documentaries, with experiments in storytelling and other formats. Just because "Meerkat Manor" is unscripted, he said, "that doesn't mean we wouldn't do a scripted drama, completely fictitious, down the road."[[In-content Ad]]

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