49 Fun Facts About TV Pets

Eddie, Martin Crane's dog on Frasier, was what breed?

Eddie was a Jack Russell terrier whose habit of staring down Kelsey Grammer became a running sight gag; the dog reportedly received more fan mail than the human cast.

What was the name of the dog who played Eddie on Frasier for the first several seasons?

Moose played Eddie from the 1993 premiere; his son Enzo, bred as a stand-in, took over the role later in the run and did the stunt work.

Buddy, the basketball-playing golden retriever of Air Bud, shot hoops in a 1995 episode of which sitcom?

Full House: Buddy played the Tanners' dog Comet for a single episode, Air Jesse, which fed a lasting myth that the role was his. The regular Comet was another golden retriever, who also starred in the film Fluke.

Why was Salem, the talking cat on Sabrina the Teenage Witch, sentenced to live as a cat?

Plotting world domination: the Witches' Council gave the warlock 100 years as a cat for it. The sitcom's wisecracking puppet, voiced by Nick Bakay, was such a hit that the comics rewrote their silent orange cat to match.

Co-star Alan Young admitted inventing which famous story about how Mister Ed 'talked'?

Peanut butter under his lip: Young made it up because the producers wanted the trick kept from children. The trainer really used a nylon thread, and Ed soon learned to move his lips at a tap on the hoof.

Mister Ed will only talk to which character?

Wilbur Post: only his owner ever hears Ed speak. George Burns, whose company made the show, wanted Alan Young for the part because he 'looks like the kind of guy a horse would talk to'.

The chattering 'voice' of TV's Flipper was really a dubbed recording of which Australian bird?

Kookaburra: the show dubbed the bird's laughing call over its dolphin. Flipper's body was no more authentic, since the male hero was played by five female dolphins.

The first dog to play Lassie on screen, and the founder of the Lassie line, was named what?

Pal was a male, though Lassie is female, and he set the pattern: the collies who have played her on screen since have all been males too.

Jon Provost, Lassie's Timmy, titled his memoir after which place his character never actually fell into?

A well: Provost read the synopses of all 249 of his episodes and found Timmy never fell down one, so he named his memoir Timmy's in the Well as a joke on the line everyone quotes.

In The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, the dog and the boy Rusty live at which cavalry post?

Fort Apache: the cavalry there take in Rusty and his dog after a raid on their wagon train. The part was billed to Rin Tin Tin IV, but unrelated German shepherds did much of the screen work.

The original Rin Tin Tin was rescued as a puppy from a World War I battlefield in which country?

France: American soldier Lee Duncan found the newborn puppy in a bombed German kennel there in 1918 and took him home to Los Angeles. His silent films earned so much that he is credited with helping to save Warner Bros. from bankruptcy.

On the 1990s PBS series Wishbone, the title dog pictured himself as the hero of what?

Classic books: each episode dropped him, in costume, into a story such as The Odyssey or a Sherlock Holmes case. Soccer, the dog who played him, beat more than a hundred rivals to the part after doing a backflip at his audition.

Brian Griffin of Family Guy is what breed of dog?

White Labrador retriever: the family's talking dog is a Lab. In 2013 the show had him run over and replaced by a new dog, then sent Stewie back in time to save him just two episodes later.

How did the Simpsons come to own Santa's Little Helper?

He was abandoned after losing a race: short of Christmas money, Homer bet on the 99-1 outsider because of his festive name. The greyhound came last, his owner threw him out, and Bart talked Homer into taking him home.

Alongside Santa's Little Helper, what is the name of the Simpsons' cat?

Snowball II: the first Snowball was run over before the series began. When Snowball II was killed in turn in 2004, Lisa went through two more cats before a fifth, which she renamed Snowball II to save buying a new dish.

Astro, the Jetsons' dog, talks with every word beginning with which letter?

R: Astro swaps the first sound of most words for it, so 'I love you, George' comes out as 'I ruv roo, Reorge'. Don Messick voiced him, and seven years later gave Scooby-Doo the same growling speech.

Dino, the Flintstones' pet dinosaur, was voiced for nearly 30 years by which legendary voice actor?

Mel Blanc: he was Barney Rubble too, and after a serious car crash in 1961 he kept both parts by recording flat on his back at home, the cast gathered round a microphone hung over his bed.

Scooby-Doo is what breed of dog?

Great Dane: designer Iwao Takamoto asked a breeder what makes a prize-winning one, then drew the opposite on purpose, bowing the legs a show dog needs straight.

Ross Geller's pet in the first season of Friends was a capuchin monkey named what?

Marcel was played by two female capuchins, Katie and Monkey. Ross gives him up to the San Diego Zoo late in season one, and David Schwimmer later admitted he had hated working with them.

On Lost, whom does Walt give his dog Vincent to before leaving the island on the raft?

Walt leaves Vincent with Shannon before boarding the raft in the season one finale 'Exodus'; the Labrador survives the whole series and lies beside Jack in the final shot.

On The Office, who killed Angela's sick cat Sprinkles and left her in the freezer?

Dwight Schrute: left to nurse the ailing cat, he put her down instead and thought it a kindness, then claimed he had found her dead. Angela worked out the truth, and it cost him their romance.

After Buck died on Married... with Children, he was reincarnated as which dog?

Buck came back as Lucky, a cocker spaniel, in season 10 (1995); the reincarnation plot let the ageing dog actor Michael retire.

After Tiger the dog vanished from The Brady Bunch, what stayed behind in the family's back yard for years?

His doghouse stayed to the end, hiding a damaged patch of the fake lawn. Tiger faded out after the first dog to play him was run over and an untrained stand-in had to be pinned to the set floor by his collar.

Cheddar, the beloved dog of Captain Holt and his husband Kevin on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, is what breed?

Pembroke Welsh corgi: Cheddar served as ring bearer at Jake and Amy's wedding, then passed out after eating the cake. Stewart, the dog who played him longest, died in 2019 aged 13.

Stella, Jay Pritchett's French bulldog on Modern Family, first belonged to an inventor played by which Broadway star?

Lin-Manuel Miranda, then known for In the Heights, played Guillermo in 2011, pitching Jay a dog-training kit. Jay's blunt verdict sent him back to school, and Gloria came home with the dog he could no longer keep.

On Star Trek: The Next Generation, which crew member keeps a cat named Spot?

Data: the android built without feelings dotes on Spot and recites an ode to the cat. The cat itself was less consistent, starting as a long-haired male Somali and ending up a female shorthair with kittens.

Bear, the dog on Person of Interest, is what breed?

Belgian Malinois: Reese sees that a white supremacist gang's attack dog is military-trained and obeys only Dutch, a language he happens to speak. He walks off with the dog and names him Bear.

On Gilmore Girls, Lorelai names her dog after which singer?

Paul Anka: Lorelai adopts the dog in season six while she and Rory are not speaking. The joke ran long enough that the singer played himself later that season, in an episode titled The Real Paul Anka.

What does Lieutenant Columbo call the basset hound that occasionally accompanies him?

Dog: Peter Falk resisted the basset hound as one gimmick too many until he met the sleepy old animal and fell for him. Columbo spends the hound's 1972 debut trying out names, and none of them sticks.

Punky Brewster's dog was named after whom?

The dog Brandon was named for NBC executive Brandon Tartikoff, who had also named the show after Peyton 'Punky' Brewster, a girl he had a crush on as a boy.

In Game of Thrones, which Stark child chases off the direwolf Nymeria to save the animal from execution?

Arya: after Nymeria bit Prince Joffrey, she drove the wolf away, certain the queen would want her dead. Cersei demanded a death all the same, and Sansa's blameless direwolf Lady was killed in her place.

In which animated series does Seymour the dog wait 12 years outside a pizzeria for an owner who never returns?

Futurama: a thousand years on, Fry finds Seymour fossilised and decides against cloning him, sure the dog had moved on. The closing montage shows he never did, and the 2002 episode earned an Emmy nomination.

Ladybird the bloodhound belongs to which animated TV dad?

Hank Hill: the reserved Texan shows his bloodhound a tenderness he shows almost nobody else. He and Peggy got her as a puppy while struggling to conceive, and she relaxed him enough that Bobby followed.

Arnold Ziffel, the pig treated as a son on Green Acres, first appeared on which sister show?

Petticoat Junction: Arnold turned up in its second season, shortly before Green Acres opened in the same town of Hooterville. Piglets grow so fast that the series director said six Arnolds were used, a new one each year.

Gentle Ben, the 1960s TV bear, lived with a wildlife officer's family in which region?

The Florida Everglades: game warden Tom Wedloe patrols them by airboat with Ben close by. Walt Morey's novel had set the story in Alaska with a brown bear, but the series moved it south and cast an American black bear.

What was the name of Jed Clampett's bloodhound on The Beverly Hillbillies?

Duke was played by a bloodhound named Stretch, who had already acted with Andy Griffith in the film No Time for Sergeants. Jed's hunting dog turned idle once the family struck oil, and a younger bloodhound later took over the part.

K9, the robot dog of Doctor Who, first appeared alongside which incarnation of the Time Lord?

The Fourth Doctor, Tom Baker, met K9 in 1977's The Invisible Enemy as the mobile computer of Professor Marius. Due back on Earth, Marius offered the dog to the Doctor and Leela, and K9 left with them in the TARDIS.

Wellard, Robbie Jackson's dog on EastEnders, was what breed?

Belgian Tervuren: though Wellard was male, he was played in turn by females: Zenna, her daughter Chancer and her granddaughter Kyte. Kyte had also appeared in the film Gladiator.

The first Blue Peter pet, introduced in 1962, was a dog named what?

Petra: the puppy shown at Christmas 1962 died two days after its first appearance, so the producers quietly bought a similar-looking mongrel from a London pet shop. Viewers, none the wiser, then chose her name.

Which Blue Peter presenter lived with the border collie Shep?

John Noakes: his cry of 'Get down, Shep!' at the unruly collie became a catchphrase and then a 1978 novelty song by the Barron Knights. Nine years after leaving, he went back on the BBC, fighting tears, to announce Shep's death.

The Munsters' family pet, Spot, was what kind of creature?

A fire-breathing dragon: Spot lived under the staircase at 1313 Mockingbird Lane, and the sitcom never once showed him whole. Viewers got only a tail, a shadowy head or a burst of flame.

Blue, the dog in Blue's Clues, leaves how many paw-print clues in each episode?

Three: once the third paw print turns up, the host settles into the Thinking Chair to work out what Blue wants. Blue is a girl, and her barks came from co-creator Traci Paige Johnson.

Neil, a ghostly martini-loving St. Bernard, haunted which 1950s sitcom?

Topper: Neil died trying to rescue George and Marion Kerby from an avalanche, so dog and couple alike came back as ghosts that only banker Cosmo Topper could see. The invisible dog kept lapping up other people's drinks.

Skippy the Bush Kangaroo was set in which fictional national park?

Waratah National Park was fiction, run on screen by head ranger Matt Hammond, whose son Sonny raised the orphaned Skippy. Its set north of Sydney later opened to visitors as the real Waratah Park, now heritage-listed.

How was Skippy's famous 'tchk tchk tchk' sound created, given that kangaroos make no such noise?

Clicking tongues: a member of the crew made the noise at a microphone and it was dubbed on afterwards. Skippy's nimble paws were faked as well, with kangaroo-paw bottle-openers held up for the close-ups.

On Phineas and Ferb, the boys' seemingly dull pet platypus Perry leads a double life as what?

A secret agent: as Agent P he slips away to foil the evil Dr. Doofenshmirtz without the boys ever knowing. The creators picked a platypus because no other cartoon had used one, so they could make the animal their own.

Jonny Quest's creator wanted the boy to own a monkey, but Hanna-Barbera insisted on which dog instead?

Bandit: Doug Wildey wanted a more unusual pet than a dog and never warmed to the bulldog, who was designed by another artist, Dick Bickenbach. Bandit is drawn far more cartoonishly than the realistic humans around him.

In Stranger Things, which of the boys adopts Dart, a slimy creature he finds in his trash can?

Dustin: he names the creature D'Artagnan and feeds it chocolate bars, thrilled by his discovery. He learns that it is a young Demogorgon only when it eats the family cat.

What is the title of The Littlest Hobo's theme song, written by Terry Bush and John Crossen?

Maybe Tomorrow: Terry Bush recalls that the producers hated his demo and had a replacement written in New York before coming back to him. He sang the theme himself, and a British bank advert later revived it.