By Angela Marshall
Morrone is no stranger to TV, having hosted cable shows offering pet owners advice for years. But he hopes that teaming up with Stewart and her company, Martha Stewart Omnimedia, will make it possible to produce a higher-quality show.
Dipping a big syringe-like feeding device in a bucket of gooey bird food, Morrone explained that his family couldn't afford pets when he was growing up. So he raised sparrows, pigeons and even insects. Basically, he said, "whatever I could catch." He took care of them and learned about them.
As he walked from cage to cage, dipping the syringe into the bucket and squirting the food into the open mouths of the birds, Morrone recalled how one crow he had raised used to follow him to school. It would go from window to window, he said, until it found him.
After he graduated from high school, he and a friend, Nick Guerra, pooled their money and, in 1978, opened Parrots of the World in Rockville Centre. The shop offers all kinds of pets and exotic animals, from cats and dogs to flying squirrels, prairie dogs and a room full of birds.
"I always had the animals that no one in the country had," Morrone said. He advertised the business's rare animals all over the country and soon had a worldwide customer base.
He gets a kick out of the fact that people talk about Rockville Centre in places like Japan and the Middle East because of his penchant for carrying Bengal cats, hedgehogs, sugar gliders and more.
The business has become a popular attraction in the village, too, one longtime customer calling it "the poor man's Bronx Zoo." Morrone's attitude toward the perennial browsers is the more the merrier. He's happy that others share his love for animals.
When Cablevision approached him a few years ago to appear on a pet show, Morrone balked, saying he was too shy. But Guerra wouldn't let his partner miss out on a great opportunity and, Morrone said, "practically forced me to [go on]." It wasn't long before Morrone was offered a show of his own. His current nationally syndicated show, "Pet Show with Marc Morrone," airs Saturday and Sunday mornings for Heart Entertainment.
Each show features Morrone, Harry the macaw perched on his shoulder, and a menagerie of pets on a counter in front of him. Counting the small ones, Morrone said, there are up to 50 animals on the counter, all the species intermingling in peace.
Many of the show's "pet squad" members live at the store. Harry, whom Morrone has had since he was 16, has a special cage behind the counter. There's a big sign over Splash the ferret's home announcing his TV-star status.
Morrone's deal with Martha Stewart Omnimedia will include more than a new show, which will be titled "Petkeeping with Marc Morrone" and will debut in September on more than 130 stations nationwide. He will write a column in Martha Stewart Kids magazine, and there are plans for a Marc Morrone line of merchandise.
The deal with Stewart came about because she was a fan of Morrone's cable shows. Early one morning, she gave him a call, and he has made appearances on her own show ever since. The two have a lot in common, since Stewart has a slew of pets of her own.
