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Katie Holmes Wins Showdown with a Raccoon – by Barking!

08/03/2011 at 07:45 PM EDT

Katie Holmes Talks Raccoon Fear on Jay Leno

Katie Holmes on The Tonight Show

Kevin Winter/Tonight Show/Getty

There may be plenty of frightful things happening in Katie Holmes's new horror remake Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, but the spooky houses and strange creatures manage to stay safely on the big screen.

The actress has scarier creatures to worry about in her everyday life, and they're right in her backyard: raccoons.

"I'm really scared of raccoons," Holmes told Jay Leno on The Tonight Show on Tuesday.

What bothers Holmes most, she said, is that unlike other animals, raccoons don't seem to have a fear of humans. "I was recently sitting outside, and this raccoon comes right up, and I'm expecting it to be more afraid of me," she said. "I'm staring at it and it's staring right back like he's going to kick my butt! I didn't know what to do so I just stood up and I barked at him, and then he ran away."

The lesson? Raccoons might not be afraid of the dark, or of humans, but they're terrified of a barking Katie Holmes.

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