[3] After the Gentle Ben series ended, Bruno made another well-received appearance in the 1972 John Huston-directed film The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean, starring Paul Newman.

Africa U.S.A., at that time located in Soledad Canyon near Saugus, California, provided trained animals to Hollywood for film and television work, including many Ivan Tors productions.

[6] According to Ken Beck and Jim Clark, Bruno and a brother were orphaned in Wisconsin as cubs, and later acquired by Helfer from a private party.

[8][9] Ralph Helfer confirmed in 1970 that one of the bears who appeared in Gentle Ben was obtained from Ivan Walters' game farm in White Lake.

(According to the Milwaukee Journal, the other two cubs were given to a game farm near Langlade, Wisconsin, and eventually appeared on the Ivan Tors-produced TV series Daktari, which was filmed primarily at Africa U.S.A. using its animals.)

Smokey, who eventually grew to an adult size of 650 pounds, would allow a man to put an arm in his mouth without biting and would back away from a dog rather than fight.

[17][22] He also appeared on Tors' hit television series Daktari as a guest star, playing a sick circus bear who escapes into the African bush.

The Ivan Tors production unit, via radio and newspapers, asked area residents not to shoot him on sight, and assured the public that he had no teeth and was "harmless and just loves Cokes or fruit.

[6][18][24][25] On July 12, 1966, a runaway Southern Pacific locomotive (or according to some accounts, a flatcar carrying a steam-powered crane) suddenly derailed and crushed several cages in the Africa U.S.A. compound, killing a railroad employee.

The film and series concern the adventures of a large male bear named Ben and his human companion Mark Wedloe, a little boy whose father is a wildlife officer in the Florida Everglades.

[31] (In addition to Bruno, other bears who had appeared in or been involved with the series were also publicly exhibited under the name "Gentle Ben" throughout the late 1960s and 1970s.

[1][3][17] Head trainer Cox lived with Bruno in a Miami apartment in order to give him the necessary affection and attention he needed.

[32] After the Gentle Ben TV series ended in 1969, Bruno moved back to the Soledad Canyon area near Saugus and Acton, California, with trainer Ron Oxley, who had worked as a trainer on Gentle Ben and was now setting up his own business, Action Animals, to provide trained animals for film and TV work.

[33][34] (At that time, Africa U.S.A. had been forced to close and go through a lengthy relocation after suffering extensive damage from two major floods and a fire during early 1969.

[29][39][44][45] Other feature films in which Bruno appeared included the family adventure movie The Adventures of the Wilderness Family (1975), the horror film Shadow of the Hawk (1976) starring Jan-Michael Vincent,[46] and the TV movie Guardian of the Wilderness (1976), a biopic of Yosemite National Park protector Galen Clark.