Precious (Passions character)
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Precious was a minor anthropomorphic character on the NBC soap opera Passions. The character, identified as female, was portrayed by an actual trained orangutan named BamBam (who was male).
Precious was the non-speaking live-in nurse and caregiver for the elderly Edna Wallace (Kathleen Noone). Unable to afford adequate health care for her disabled mother, Beth Wallace (Kelli McCarty) employed Precious instead. Though the character was portrayed as a competent caregiver with implied medical credentials, she was intended for comic effect.
Precious also held an unrequited love for Beth's love interest Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald (Galen Gering), which was depicted in elaborate fantasy sequences.
In 2003, Passions submitted BamBam for a Daytime Emmy Award. In early 2004, the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, which administers the awards, disallowed the entry, with the following statement:
Our ruling is based on the belief that the Academy must draw a line of distinction between animal characters that aren't capable of speaking parts and human actors whose personal interpretation in character portrayal creates nuance and audience engagement that uniquely qualifies those performers for consideration of television's highest honor.
