César Felipe Millán Favela ( , ; born August 27, 1969) is a Mexican-American dog trainer. He is widely known for his Emmy-nominated television series Dog Whisperer with Cesar Millan, which was produced from 2004 to 2012 and is broadcast in more than 80 countries worldwide.
Millan is a New York Times best-selling author and has his own line of dog products and instructional DVDs. Prior to The Dog Whisperer series, Millan focused on rehabilitating severely aggressive dogs and founded a rehab complex, the Dog Psychology Center, in South Los Angeles (2002–2008).
Millan's first three books, including Cesar's Way, all became New York Times best sellers, have cumulatively sold two million copies in the United States, and are available in 14 other countries.
With Ilusión Millan, his former wife, he founded the Millan Foundation – later renamed the Cesar Millan Foundation and currently called the Cesar Millan PACK Project. The foundation was established to provide financial support to animal shelters and organizations engaged in the rescuing, rehabilitating, and re-homing of abused and abandoned animals, and to fund spay/neuter programs.
Early life
Millan was born on August 27, 1969, to Felipe Millán Guillen and María Teresa Favela in rural Culiacán, Sinaloa, Mexico. Millan grew up working with animals on the farm in Sinaloa where his grandfather, Teodoro Millán Ángulo, was a tenant farmer. Because of his natural way with dogs, he was called el Perrero, "the dog herder". The family later moved to Mazatlán.
Millan illegally crossed the border into the United States when he was 21 years old, speaking no English and with only US$100. In an interview with long-time friend Jada Pinkett Smith in July 2018, Millan described his harrowing journey. On crime along the Mexican border: "Once you get to the border, what you see is [that] people wanted to take advantage of you. So that's when you learn about the streets. But that's another level of streets: they can sell you; they can kill you for organs. I mean, that is more likely than jumping [the border wall]." On United States Border Patrol: "There were many times I let the border patrol catch me because Americans feed you. So when they catch you, they feed you. Mexican police don't feed you." On his friendship with Jada Pinkett Smith: Millan met her shortly after arriving in Los Angeles and confided in her his dreams of working with pets on television; she told him that he needed to learn English and set up one of her friends to teach him. "Because of Jada, I speak English."
Career
Millan's first job in the United States was at a dog grooming store. He later created the Pacific Point Canine Academy. Jada Pinkett Smith became one of Millan's first clients and supporters when he was working as a limousine driver, providing him with an English tutor for a year. Subsequently, Millan created the Dog Psychology Center, a two-acre (0.81 ha) facility in South Los Angeles, specializing in working with large breed dogs. In 2009, the Dog Psychology Center moved to Santa Clarita, California. Millan also opened an East Coast clinic at the Country Inn Pet Resort in Davie, Florida, near Fort Lauderdale.
In 2002, after a profile in the Los Angeles Times, Millan worked with MPH Entertainment, Inc. developing a television pilot for Dog Whisperer, a reality television series that follows Millan as he works in the field of dog rehabilitation. The series premiered on September 13, 2004, on the National Geographic Channel, subsequently moving to the Nat Geo WILD channel. The show would become National Geographic's No. 1 show during its first season and was broadcast in more than eighty countries worldwide during its run. The final episode of the show was broadcast in the U.S. on September 15, 2012.
In 2009, in conjunction with IMG, Millan introduced a monthly magazine also titled Cesar's Way, with The Wall Street Journal reporting at that time that half of American consumers recognized Millan. The magazine combined advice from Millan along with articles about the relationship between dogs and humans. The magazine ceased publication after its November/December 2014 issue.