MONKEY BUSINESS : MEET DON MCLEOD, THE HARDEST-WORKING FAUX APE IN HOLLYWOOD.

Byline: Carol Bidwell Daily News Staff Writer

Nobody makes a monkey of Don McLeod.

Except American Tourister, Eddie Murphy and, of course, Tarzan.

McLeod makes a living portraying a gorilla in everything from feature films to personal appearances. He figures he's one of less than a half-dozen ape actors in the world - and one of the few who has worked steadily for the past 20 years.

``I would guess I've spent more time in a gorilla suit than any human alive,'' said McLeod, 48, staring out the window of his rustic Sherman Oaks home at a life-size inflatable gorilla perched in a tree in his front yard. ``I know I'm not doing brain surgery or curing cancer, but I try to be the best gorilla I can be.''

Monkey business wasn't on his mind in his younger days when he studied with famed French mime Marcel Marceau, trained at the Pasadena Playhouse and played Shakespeare at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego.

Before donning a gorilla suit, McLeod toured the world as a mime with singer Diana Ross, and he recently performed as a living statue clad in a judge's costume at the kickoff party for the Jim Carrey movie ``Liar Liar.'' He also appeared as Peter Pan's shadow in the 1991 Robin Williams movie ``Hook,'' and has done dozens of commercials, both in and out of a gorilla suit.

But it's gorilla gigs that pay the bills.

Of course, there's the occasional role that got away. The 5-foot-7-inch McLeod initially was cast as the lead ape in the film ``George of the Jungle'' but lost the part to a taller ``gorilla'' after actor Brendan Fraser, who stands well over 6 feet tall, was picked to star as George.

McLeod was just the right size for another part, though: He appears as Bolgani, Tarzan's gorilla friend, on the new television series ``Tarzan: The Epic Adventures,'' and doubles as virtually all the show's monsters and other beasts.

The show's creature effects master, John Beuchler, suggested McLeod for the role as the head gorilla, recalling for producer Mike McGreevey the 1980s American Tourister commercials that showed an angry gorilla jumping on a suitcase.

``I said, `That was an ape,' '' McGreevey recalled. ``Beuchler said, `No, that was Don McLeod.' I hired him - and he does a terrific job.''

From mime to monkey

McLeod's first role as a gorilla came in 1979 after a film producer caught the actor's one-man mime show in which he depicted the creation of world, playing an ape - sans ape suit - in one segment.

On the spot, he was cast as one of six apes who inhabited a lost planet in the low-budget flick ``The Galactic Connection.'' Even though he'd never worked in an ape suit before - they're hot, claustrophobic and there's no trap door for going to the bathroom - he soon found himself playing five of the six apes as other actors, overwhelmed by the physical demands of the role, quit.

``In one scene, I even fought with myself, with camera cuts making it look like I was more than one ape,'' McLeod said. ``Scorpions crawled on me, I fought with a trained bear, I got attacked by a wolf pack.''

The movie was the actor's entree to the world of professional monkey business, but he still had to learn his craft. Armed with a video camera and a notebook, McLeod settled himself in front of the gorilla cage at the San Diego Zoo, filming and watching how the big apes stood, moved, handled objects, ate and interacted with each other.

``They have very distinct personalities, just like people, and they're incredibly gentle animals,'' he said. ``They'll never attack humans, even though they look pretty scary. The most they'll do is rush up and beat their chests and growl.''

By the time he was offered the part of a gorilla in the 1983 Eddie Murphy/Dan Aykroyd film ``Trading Places,'' he was rehearsed and ready to be the big magilla of gorillas. In the movie, the good guys overpower a bad guy on a train, zip him inside a gorilla suit and lock him in a cage with another gorilla - McLeod.

``I was supposed to be convinced that he was a lady gorilla,'' McLeod said. ``Let's just say I was very affectionate.''

Once the movie premiered, ``Suddenly, I was cookin','' he said.

No excess baggage 

One of many job possibilities came from American Tourister, which was looking for an actor to put on an ape suit and try to demolish a piece of its hard-sided luggage to demonstrate its durability.

But company officials were auditioning only big, powerful stunt men. McLeod - who weighs only 160 pounds - showed up to try out, but was brushed off before he could even get in the door. He waited a bit, then ``crashed the audition - and literally went ape. I took off my shoes and my coat and became an ape for these people,'' climbing on furniture and ape-walking around the studio while screaming like an angry gorilla.

He got the gig. Soon, he was beating up suitcases on TV commercials and in print ads all over the world.

He starred in seven American Tourister commercials all together; two of the commercials received Clios, the advertising industry's version of the Oscar, and one was recently chosen by Entertainment Weekly magazine as the third (of 50) greatest commercial of all time.

Since then, he's done ``some really strange jobs'' dressed in a gorilla suit, he said.

For a posh jewelry company, he modeled Princess Diana's diamond necklace. For a liquor company, he drank tequila. For a greeting card company, he cuddled a kitten, donned a swimsuit and climbed into a cannibal's stewpot.

Once, he was paid $1,700 - his going daily rate for gorilla roles - by a Texas oil millionaire to deliver divorce papers to his about-to-be-ex-wife. ``I could have been shot, but she just jumped back and went, `Oh, my God!' The husband was in the other room laughing hysterically.''

Swingin' threads

McLeod's acting career just wouldn't be the same without the 40-pound, $26,000 hairy suit crafted by creature creator David Miller of Sherman Oaks.

Each suit - McLeod has owned several over the years - is fitted to his body by Miller, who makes a foam rubber ``muscle suit'' covered with a mesh fabric that duplicates a gorilla's big-shouldered, barrel-chested musculature. The fur suit, made of artificial materials, is worn over the ``muscle suit.''

(After McLeod got locked out of a Nashville hotel room in his gorilla getup, a tiny pocket was sewn into the muscle suit to hold a hotel key.)

Each suit comes with two sets of hands and arms - short arms with movable fingers for scenes in which he must handle objects, long arms for scenes in which he must scoot along using all four paws - and two heads - one with immovable features for long shots, one with remote-controlled, motor-driven features for close-ups.

The feet slip on like big, unwieldy fur boots. Underneath the claustrophobic, hot suit, McLeod wears an ice vest that helps keep his body temperature from rising to dangerous heights under all that fur.

Still, wearing all that apparatus can be dangerous, he discovered while filming ``Tanya's Island,'' a beauty-and-the-beast-type story with the actress Vanity in sweltering Puerto Rico in 1979.

``I'd been in the suit way too long,'' McLeod recalled. ``I was down in this cave with 90 percent humidity at 90 degrees. I was a tough guy then, and I wasn't about to show I couldn't take it. But I got so hot, I passed out from extreme heat exhaustion.''

By the time the film crew had hauled his limp body out of the cave, peeled the gorilla suit off and driven him 90 minutes to the nearest hospital, he was suffering seizures and had nearly stopped breathing. At the hospital, his body was cooled down and a heart stimulant was administered, but he was paralyzed for several hours until his muscles could begin to recover from the shock.

He was back at work in the hot suit a few days later - but with a paramedic standing by and mandatory cooling-off breaks.

``I learned the hard way that the heat can kill you,'' McLeod said. Now, all his job contracts specify ``head breaks'' - he can take off the gorilla head - every half hour, and he must be allowed to climb out of the whole suit for a few minutes every hour.

``I learned my lesson early,'' he said. ``I don't try to tough it out anymore. I know my limits, just how long I can stay in the suit. Now I know when I start seeing stars and tiny black spots, I have four minutes to get the head off.''

Today, in between gorilla gigs, McLeod writes poetry, publishes a poetry magazine and is working on an autobiography centered around his career as a movie ape, tentatively titled ``Gorilla Tales.'' He's also planning a Sept. 29 wedding to his fiancee, Lisa Ritner, 27, a professional singer and saxophone player.

McLeod envisions a long future as an ape actor, given people's fascination with simians. And he wishes his parents, who died when he was 20, could have lived to see his success - even though his life is vastly different than they imagined.

``My mother wanted me to be a doctor or a lawyer; my dad wanted a ballplayer,'' McLeod said with a laugh. ``No one plans to have their offspring become a primate. But if they could see me now, they would love it. I've made a nice living being an ape.''

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Photo: (1--5--Color) Don McLeod uses a costume and mannerisms to act as a gorilla in movies, TV and print ads, top.

Myung J. Chun/Daily News