Joaquin Walks the Walk

He may be the "Man in Black," but he's not the man in leather. Actor Joaquin Phoenix, who stars in the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, insisted that his entire wardrobe be cruelty-free from head to toe. "He refused to wear anything made of leather," a source told MSNBC.com. "So even Johnny Cash's signature cowboy boots had to be approved by PETA."

A vegan since childhood—along with his sisters, Summer, Liberty, and Rain, and his late brother, River—Joaquin always makes sure that no animals were harmed in the making of any of his costumes. While filming Gladiator, he belied his character's ruthless image by wearing nonleather clothing. In Quills, he clomped around the insane asylum in synthetic clogs.

Why is Joaquin so adamant about keeping skins off the set? Each year, millions of animals who are slaughtered for their skins suffer castration, branding, dehorning, and tail-docking—all without painkillers. A recent investigation into one of the nation's largest slaughterhouses revealed that cows were being trampled, dragged, jabbed in the head and mouth with electric prods, and dismembered while they were still conscious. Tanneries are notorious water polluters, and tannery workers have rates of cancer many times higher than the national average. The skins of dogs killed for meat in Korea, China, and the Philippines are often marked "cow hide" before they are exported to the West.

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