The Life of Terry: Hollywood's Favourite Dog
Terry - Better Known as Toto - Canine star of Bright Eyes, Wizard of Oz and The Women
Apr 16, 2009
Show even the most casual film fan a picture of any Cairn Terrier, and they will instantly recognise Toto, Dorothy's faithful canine sidekick in MGM's 1939 musical classic, The Wizard of Oz. Yet Terry, the canine star who portrayed Judy Garland's on-screen companion, appeared in thirteen feature films over an eight year period, becoming one of the most recognisable canine stars of classical Hollywood.
Life of Terry
Born in the 1933 and seemingly untrainable, Terry was abandoned by her original owners only to be rescued soon afterwards by Carl Spitz, widely regarded as a pioneer in dog training in America. Establishing the Hollywood Dog Training School in 1927, Spitz developed a system of silent hand signals that would prove integral to canine performances at the dawn of sound cinema. From the school, Spitz tutored a series of canine stars for the bourgeoning screen industry, as well as training dogs for service in the police and armed forces.
Early Films
According to Aljean Harmetz, who published a comprehensive book on the making of The Wizard of Oz, the trauma of Terry's early life meant that it took Spitz three weeks just to coax her out from beneath a bed to begin training. But under Spitz's guiding hand, Terry soon landed her first role on the silver screen, debuting alongside Ida Lupino and Richard Arlen in Paramount Pictures' gentle 1934 romance, Ready for Love.
This was followed by a role in one of the hits of 1934, the Shirley Temple classic Bright Eyes, which featured the first on-screen performance of Temple's signature song, On The Good Ship Lollipop. In Bright Eyes, Temple's young character faces a series of tragedies that leave her as an orphan in an unwelcoming home. Her godfather, James 'Loop' Merritt (James Dunn) attempts to win custody, whilst Temple finds solace in Rags, Loop's canine companion, played by Terry.
A Star on the Rise
After a minor role in The Dark Angel (1935), Spitz persistence began to pay off and Terry gained the part of Rainbow, Spencer Tracy's most faithful companion during his attempts to escape mob rule in Fritz Lang's first Hollywood outing, Fury (1936).
In 1937, Spitz secured Terry the first in a series of minor, uncredited roles. A bit part in Cecil B. DeMille's swashbuckling adventure The Buccaneer (1938), was swiftly followed by Monogram Pictures' largely forgettable Barefoot Boy and the horse-riding drama Stablemates, starring Mickey Rooney.
We're Off to See the Wizard...
In 1938, Spitz landed a role for Terry that would change her life, securing the part of Toto in MGM's production of L. Frank Baum's classic children's tale, The Wizard of Oz. In preparation for the role, Terry spent two weeks living with Judy Garland, who was reportedly so enamoured with the Cairn Terrier that she proposed an adoption arrangement with Carl Spitz, who refused.
For her part as Toto, Terry earned Spitz $125 a week, a pay rate higher than many of the films human stars. Yet life on the set of The Wizard of Oz, was not as magical as one might expect; Terry was supposedly afraid of the powerful wind machines used on set, and suffered a sprained foot when an actor playing one of the Witch's guards accidentally stepped on her during filming.
Becoming Toto
Having attended the film's premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theater, Terry settled into life as a Hollywood celebrity. The runaway success of The Wizard of Oz was such that Carl Spitz took the decision to officially change Terry's name to Toto, capitalizing on the films success, but also honouring a role for which Terry will always be remembered.
After Oz
Later in 1939, at the height of The Wizard of Oz's popularity, Terry had a bit part in George Cukor's MGM high-society classic The Women, starring Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Rosalind Russell, as well as another small role in the Loew's/MGM morality tale Bad Little Angel.
A Warner Bros. title followed in 1940, with Terry playing a small, uncredited role in Calling Philo Vance, perhaps the best of a series of films about the gentlemen sleuth. And in 1942, Terry undertook her final two feature film roles, appearing in Tim Whelan's patchy screwball farce for United Artists, Twin Beds, before a final role in the Jack Benny/Ann Sheridan comedy, George Washington Slept Here.
Hollywood's Favourite Dog
Carl Spitz retired Terry from cinema in 1942, and she became a beloved family pet, making appearances at numerous events, state fairs and animal shows until her death in 1944. She was buried in the grounds of Spitz's kennels, which were destroyed many years later during the extension of California's Ventura Freeway. Before the area was razed entirely, writer/director and Wizard of Oz acolyte Willard Carroll unearthed a leather-bound scrapbook containing Spitz's personal archive of Terry's life and work, which was published in 2001 as I, Toto: The Autobiography of Terry, the Dog Who Was Toto.
Over the course of thirteen feature films, Terry became one of Hollywood's most popular canine stars, but it is her iconic role as Toto in The Wizard of Oz that ensures that she will continue to be loved by film fans around the world for years to come.
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