Did Audrey Hepburn really raise a deer and take it grocery shopping?
Yes. Her name was Ip, Hepburn nursed her by hand for the film Green Mansions, and the fawn went along to the grocery store in Beverly Hills. In this episode of Talking With Pets, Ip, a deer who notices light before anything else, tells both chapters of her person's life, the actress and the UNICEF humanitarian, and finds out they were never two chapters at all.
History remembers the famous. Their pets remember the person. On Talking With Pets, a brown tabby cat named Prince MoRee runs a most unusual practice: he contacts the pets of history's greatest figures and lets them tell what they really saw. This episode is part of the Older Kids tier, for families ready to go a little deeper: same show, same honesty, told up a band and never grown-up. Tonight, the gentlest guest in the catalog, a fawn from a sunlit house in California.
This episode is fully scripted and has passed the Talking With Pets accuracy review. The recording is in production. The audio player and the full transcript will appear right here the day the episode goes live. Join the founding list below and we will write to you when it does.
From the episode
Ip: (a pause, genuinely thinking about this) I understand knowing when something is right. When it fits the light. I know that.
Chaco: (after a beat, writing) âKnowing when it fits the light.â
Chaco: (quietly) That might be the whole thing.
[Prince MoRee gives a slow blink.]
What's true, what we filled in, what we imagined
Every episode of Talking With Pets is built in three honest layers. Here is how this one breaks down.
Documented in the historical record
Hepburn nursed the fawn Ip for Green Mansions (1959), raised her at her California home, and took her to the grocery store in Beverly Hills. Roman Holiday won her the 1953 Academy Award, and she is one of the few EGOT completers in history. The Givenchy collaboration began in 1953 and produced the black dress of Breakfast at Tiffany's. As UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador from 1988 to 1993 she traveled to Ethiopia, Sudan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Somalia, and Ecuador, and her documented statement is that the UNICEF work was the most important thing she ever did. She was diagnosed with cancer during the 1992 Somalia mission and died three months after returning home, on January 20, 1993. Her two-hands quote, that as you grow older you discover one hand is for helping yourself and the other for helping others, is documented.
Grounded inference from the record
That the actress and the humanitarian were the same impulse, a person who looked at a room, or a set, or a famine, found what needed doing, and went toward it, is the episode's synthesis of a documented life. That she was the person who could go, and so she went, is a grounded reading of the UNICEF years.
Story, voice, and feeling
Ip's voice, gentle, present-tense, noticing light before anything else, the séance, and Chaco's three-color agenda quietly collapsing in front of a deer who has no concept of categories are imagined. A fawn cannot really be interviewed by a cat. The films, the fawn at the grocery store, and the UNICEF record are real; the deer describing a whole life in one sentence about light is the storytelling.
Sources and further reading
- Ip the fawn: nursed by Hepburn for Green Mansions (1959), raised at her California home, taken to the Beverly Hills grocery store. Documented accounts and photographs of the period.
- Roman Holiday (1953) and the Academy Award; Sabrina; Breakfast at Tiffany's; the Givenchy collaboration from 1953. The documented record. oscars.org
- The EGOT: Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony, one of a small documented group in history to complete it.
- UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, 1988 to 1993: Ethiopia, Sudan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Somalia, Ecuador; her documented statement that this was the most important thing she ever did. UNICEF. unicef.org
- The 1992 Somalia mission, the cancer diagnosis, and her death on January 20, 1993, three months after returning home; the documented two-hands quote. The biographical record.
All historical claims above were checked in the Talking With Pets accuracy review, most recently the full editorial pass of July 2026.
Did Audrey Hepburn really have a pet deer?
Yes. For the 1959 film Green Mansions, Hepburn nursed a white-tailed fawn named Ip so the deer would bond with her for filming. Ip lived at her California home and famously went along to the grocery store in Beverly Hills. The photographs are real. Source: documented accounts and photographs of the period.
What did Audrey Hepburn do for UNICEF?
She served as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador from 1988 to 1993, traveling to Ethiopia, Sudan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Somalia, and Ecuador. She said, in a documented statement, that the UNICEF work was the most important thing she ever did. Source: UNICEF.
What awards did Audrey Hepburn win?
She won the Academy Award for Roman Holiday (1953) and is one of the few people in history to complete the EGOT: an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony. Her collaboration with the designer Givenchy began in 1953 and produced the black dress of Breakfast at Tiffany's. Source: the documented record.
How does the episode handle the end of Hepburn's life?
Honestly and gently. She was diagnosed with cancer during her 1992 UNICEF mission to Somalia and died three months after returning home, in January 1993. The episode does not dwell there; it lets Ip say the true thing in one sentence about light: she looked at what needed doing and went toward it.
What is Talking With Pets, and is this episode good for kids?
Talking With Pets is an educational history podcast where a brown tabby cat named Prince MoRee contacts the pets of history's greatest figures, who tell the true story of the person they knew. The core episodes are for ages 6 to 10, and this one is part of the Older Kids tier for ages 9 to 12, for families ready to go a little deeper. Every episode is sourced and divided into what is documented, what was filled in, and what was imagined. It is a Talking With Pets production.
Talking With Pets · the true stories only the animals saw.
Chaco, Roxie, Moose, Prince MoRee, and Armando are getting the pilot ready. Join the founding list and we will write to you when the first episodes go live. Listen with someone you like.