Davis Monkey Lab Targeted in New PETA Video From ‘American Psycho’ Director Mary Harron
For Immediate Release:
May 21, 2025
Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382
In a new, hair-raising PETA video, horror director Mary Harron exposes other violent predators—experimenters who mutilate and kill monkeys in cruel laboratory tests—in time for the 25th anniversary of her cult classic American Psycho.
The terrifying TV spot debuts today in Davis and Sacramento, targeting the federally funded California National Primate Research Center at the University of California–Davis (UC-Davis), and will run on Adult Swim, MTV, and TV Land through May 27.
The video shows a human strapped to a chair in a barred prison cell. A circular metal device has been screwed into the victim’s head, immobilizing it. A man in a lab coat and surgical mask enters. Pupils dilate. A needle plunges. Screams ring out as a power drill bores into the skull, and there’s a sudden cut to an image of a real monkey in a real laboratory enduring the same kind of invasive torment.
A screen capture from Mary Harron’s new PETA video.
“I’m working with PETA to call for an end to the use of monkeys and other animals in laboratories, and I hope this video shines a light on the immense pain that experimenters inflict on tens of millions of animals every year,” Harron says.
UC-Davis and its primate center have a long history of violating animal welfare law. In March, the U.S. Department of Agriculture levied an official warning against the university for violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act that resulted in monkeys’ deaths. In one incident, a monkey was euthanized after workers left her unattended in a van with the heater blasting and returned to find her unresponsive. In another, a macaque was found dead after becoming entangled in a loose bungee cord.
In nature, monkeys form deep emotional bonds with their family members. Those born in laboratories are often torn from their anguished mothers, sometimes within just days of birth, and confined to barren steel cages.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.
