Elke Gazzara - No Better Friend: Celebrities and the Dogs They Love

Also by Elke Gazzara:

Madison Avenue Maxi

No Better Friend

Celebrities and the Dogs They Love

Compiled and edited by Elke Gazzara

Lyons Press
Guilford, Connecticut
An imprint of Globe Pequot Press

Copyright 2013 by Elke Gazzara

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission should be addressed to Globe Pequot Press, Attn: Rights and Permissions Department, P.O. Box 480, Guilford, CT 06437.

Lyons Press is an imprint of Globe Pequot Press.

Text design: Lisa Reneson

Layout artist: Justin Marciano

Project editor: Ellen Urban

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Gazzara, Elke.

No better friend : celebrities and the dogs they love / compiled and

edited by Elke Gazzara.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-4930-0120-0 (ePub)

1. DogsAnecdotes. 2. CelebritiesAnecdotes. 3. Dog

ownersAnecdotes. 4. Human-animal relationshipsAnecdotes. 5.

DogsPortraits. 6. CelebritiesPortraits. I. Title.

SF426.2.G393 2013

636.7dc23

2013022666

To the memory of my best friend and husband of thirty years, Ben, and our beloved Maxi.

You will both remain in my heart forever.

Contents

Introduction: SOUTH BEACH

January isnt the most pleasant month for a little dachshund in New York City, especially a short-haired one like Maxi. Rain, snow, and the cold keep those little legs busy jumping puddles and dodging slush. Unlike rugged New Yorkers, with their boots and galoshes, our furry-pawed friends have to bear the winters barefootand that nasty sidewalk salt isnt good for their feet. My husband, actor Ben Gazzara, kept the rest of Maxi bundled in warm sweaters and fuzzy coats, just like us. But often, when we returned home and took off her clothes, sometimes damp and city-soaked underneath, we discovered what a trooper she really wasalways joining us on our trips around the city (sometimes hidden in her traveling bag at places that were not dog-friendly), never complaining, rain or shine.

Not surprisingly, no one was happier than Maxi when we left Madison Avenue in Manhattan for Ocean Drive in South Beach, for a promotional tour in January and February for my book about her, Madison Avenue Maxi. The book tells the story of our beloved little dog and the profound impact she had on our lives. You might call it my valentine to Maxi, a moving tribute to an extraordinary dachshund. Although Maxi has since passed on, her memory remains with me always, nowhere more so than in that book.

On the very first evening in Florida, we had a festive dinner sitting under the stars on Lincoln Road. Two of our friends, acclaimed novelist Russell Banks and his wife, the celebrated poet Chase Twichell, joined us. Ben and I had met them in Monte Carlo. As usual, we talked a lot about movies and books, and then the conversation turned to dogs, Maxi in particular. She somehow always became the center of attentioneven when she wasnt. She had a special way of commanding attention. Besides, dogs had been on my mind a lot lately. Id spent a considerable amount of time talking about Madison Avenue Maxi with other dog lovers at book events, and I mentioned to Russell, almost casually, that my next book might be about other peoples dogs. Everyone Id spoken with had personal stories to share. Russell and Chase loved the idea, and even promised me a story themselves. That inspired me to go to work.

When I got back to New York, I compiled a list of famous people I knew who owned or might own dogs. During my long marriage to Ben, Ive had the pleasure of meeting countless celebrities from the various worlds of art, entertainment, and politics: actors, designers, directors (both film and theater), elected officials, journalists, novelists, painters, and moremany with dogs that they adored and loved to talk about, just like me.

So I began making phone calls, and the response soon pleased me. People I knew, and even those I didnt, who all had busy lives, were willing to take the time to talk or write about their pooches. In the end, more than fifty people contributed their fond recollectionsto No Better Friend. As youll see, their stories and photographs make it clear that for many of us, nothing in the world grabs hold of our hearts so completely as do those four-legged friends, our gentle and faithful dogs.

I am happily donating a portion of the proceeds from the sale of this book to support animals looking for homes through the ASPCA, and if this book moves just one reader to rescue or adopt an abandoned or homeless dog, he or she would be so thankful, and I would be so proud.

Elke Gazzara

No Better Friend

Russell Banks

The best-selling author of numerous highly acclaimed novels, including Affliction, Cloudsplitter, Continental Drift, The Darling, Lost Memory of Skin, Rule of the Bone, and The Sweet Hereafter, Russell Banks is past president of the International Parliament of Writers and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has won many awards for his work, including the Ambassador Book Award, American Book Award, Commonwealth Writers Prize, John Dos Passos Prize, and more. Years ago, Prince Albert of Monaco invited both Banks and Ben to an international literary event, and we met there at the Htel Hermitage Monte-Carlo.

Im not a Muslim or a fundamentalist Mormon, nor was meant to be, and all my adult life I have been whats called a serial monogamista man with only one wife at a time. That is, until Kili came into my life. We got Kili, a Border collie / Australian shepherd mix, as a puppy. My main wife, Chase, has written about this event elsewhere, so I wont go into Kilis provenance here. From the day we brought her home, Kili was headstrong, bossy, emotionally intense, and highly intelligent (a little like my main wife). She made it very quickly clear to both of us that she regarded Chase as competition in the contest for main wife, a contest that Chase and I hadnt realized existed. As far as we were concerned, it had never been a position up for grabs.

It began with a tussle between the two, Chase and Kili, over who got to sit in the passenger seat of the car when I was driving. The backseat, Kili seemed to think, was for the second wife. I drive a station wagon, and from Kilis perspective, the back of the car was strictly for cargo and for less-interesting and -attractive dogs, which is to say, the other dog, her mother, Nan, who is in no way uninteresting or not fully as attractive as Kili. She refused to go there unless I publicly humiliated her by picking her up and lifting her over the tailgate, after which she sulked, ears lowered, refusing to meet my gaze. Then, as soon as I got into the car myself, she scrambled over the backseat, squirmed her way into the front between me and Chase, pointedly squeezed Chase aside, laid her paw across my arm in a proprietary way, and give Chase a snarky triumphant smile that said, Next time, honey, make it easy on yourself and get in back .