Emily Fairfax

The beavers sit on their tails, but Mabel, the fake beaver, she puts her tail out behind her when she sits down as a tell that she is not a real beaver.

She doesn't know their behaviors.

Emily, what brought you to Beavers in the first place?

I first got interested in Beavers seriously by watching a documentary about Beavers.

I was on a totally different career path and struggling to find out what I was going to do.

I wasn't happy in the direction I was going and just happened to turn on the TV and see a PBS documentary called Leave It to Beavers.

And I was so hooked.

I couldn't stop thinking about it.

And I trusted my gut and said, yeah, I'm going to go to grad school and study beavers.

I will find a job later that could potentially work with this path.

But right now, I just need to understand this animal.

So maybe this Pixar movie will be someone else's launch point like that documentary was for me.

I was a weapons engineer, so it was a pretty big pivot.

Yeah.

Yep.

I was working on weapons and had top secret clearance to work on bombs and was applying my science that way.

And, you know, I had student loans to pay and that's one thing that that path is really good for.

Yeah.

But very quickly into it, I realized I just couldn't.

I needed to do something that felt more aligned with my goals and my values.