If you had to name a famous thespian canine, you'd probably say Lassie. Maybe Rin Tin Tin.
But those were concepts, not individuals. There were four Rin Tin Tins over the years, and obviously the Lassie of the 1943 movie "Lassie Come Home" wasn't the Lassie of the 2005 eponymous movie.
Skippy was different.
Like Harrison Ford playing Indiana Jones and Han Solo, Skippy played characters. You might know him from his most famous role: Asta.
He was a wire fox terrier, born in 1931 He made his first appearance a year later in a circus comedy called "The Half-Naked Truth." But don't look for him in the opening credits. Character actors, whether two- or four-legged, never got much notice.
His breakthrough came in 1934's "The Thin Man," in which he played the smart, personable dog of Nick and Nora Charles, the smart, personable alcoholic crime-solvers. The movie was a hit, and so was the clever dog.
In between "Thin Man" movies, Skippy worked with some guy named Cary Grant in "The Awful Truth" (1937). Grant and Hepburn's classic "Bringing Up Baby" (1938) also featured Skippy as the naughty dog who steals a dinosaur bone. And he was in the 1937 "Topper" movie, as well, which suggests that people had come to expect that a sophisticated comedy would include a fox terrier.
During his Hollywood years, he did have a run-in with a diva: He bit Myrna Loy between scenes on their first "Thin Man" film. That, however, didn't keep her from working with him again. Or vice versa.
