Hollywood's Rin-tin-tin:

[sandgrubber]

Just heard a fascinating and moving radio interview with the author of a book about Rin-Tin-Tin.

Here's the link: http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2011/09/24/140746523/rin-tin-tin-from-battlefield-to-hollywood-a-story-of-friendship

Here's a short extract from the web page. The full interview can be downloaded from the above link

Author Susan Orlean's new book, Rin Tin Tin: The Life And The Legend, traces the history of Duncan and "Rinty," as Duncan called him, exploring both the career of a very famous dog and the relationship he shared with the owner who both adored him as a pet and turned him into a very profitable business. On Weekend Edition Saturday, Orlean talks to Scott Simon about some of what she discovered in researching this unusual partnership between a man and his dog.

It wasn't a coincidence, she says, that Duncan was the one to rescue a pup who had no one; he had spent five years in an orphanage himself as a child. Even when the same mother who had left him there came back to get him, she took him to live with her parents on an isolated property with no other kids around. He did, however, get a dog. So perhaps it's no surprise that later, on the field of battle, surrounded by the death of the war, Duncan once again got a dog.

[He found Rin-Tin-Tin as a pup, coming from a destroyed kennel, wandering on a WWI battlefield].

The original Rin Tin Tin was born in 1918 and died in 1932.

And not just any dog, Orlean argues, but an actor — one who, in the silent era where no one could speak, was on par with human actors. She uses Clash Of The Wolves — the film Scott Simon calls "his Hamlet" — to point out that in addition to being a fine action star and athlete, Rin Tin Tin had a face that was "immensely expressive." The film required Rinty to play scenes in which his character, if it can be called that, believes himself to be leaving his pack to die. "You're really affected by the look on his face and his performance," she says.

[Brennan's Mum]

Thanks for sharing, growing up I used to hear stories about Rin Tin Tin from my Mum who watched the series. I could think of nothing better then a series where the leading character was a German Shepherd

Would be interested to read that book.

ETA- Hope you don't mind, I shared this link with the GSD thread

Edited September 25, 2011 by Brennan's Mum