Dogged talent

Two Irish wolfhounds are at home - literally - on Arkansas Rep’s stage, acting in Because of Winn Dixie

Actress Julia Nightingale Landfair plays with Cally, the Irish wolfhound that has the title role in Because of Winn Dixie, during a pre-performance rehearsal.
Actress Julia Nightingale Landfair plays with Cally, the Irish wolfhound that has the title role in Because of Winn Dixie, during a pre-performance rehearsal.

As an only child growing up on a farm in Connecticut, Bill Berloni never felt lonely or thought he was missing something by not having siblings for playmates. He had friends - his dog Rexie, a cat and a rabbit - who stayed by his side day in and day out.

“My animals followed me around because they liked me,” he says. He wasn’t aware of it at the time, but he was absorbing the knowledge that became the foundation for his 37-year career as a theatrical animal trainer, which began in 1976 when he rescued and trained mixed-breed Sandy for the original production of the musical Annie.

An animal that likes and trusts you will want to be with you and do whatever you ask of it, Berloni says. It’s a simple premise, but one that’s proven successful in training dogs, cats, pigs and other animals for 24 Broadway plays and musicals, including current shows A Christmas Story and Annie.

And it’s the premise that’s guiding him as he works with two 140-pound Irish wolfhounds who are in the Arkansas Repertory Theatre’s current world premiere production of Because of Winn Dixie.

For the role of Winn Dixie, Berloni had to teach the dogs to do doggy things - sit, stand, lie down, walk, fetch and even steal food from kitchen counter tops - in front of a live audience. “It’s all about training the dogs to act naturally on cue,” he says. But first, wolfhounds Cally and Taran (star and understudy, respectively) had to become members of his family, then learn to accept the cast and crew as extended family. Not only that, but the giant dogs had to consider the theater to be their home.

The dogs, which Berloni acquired when they were 3 years old, live on his farm in Connecticut. That’s their first home.

They’re now equally at home on the stage at the Rep in downtown Little Rock. Berloni acclimated them to the stage by literally making it their home when they arrived in Little Rock. He slept onstage with the dogs for several weeks, he on his airbed and the dogs on theirs. He also conditioned them to the sounds of a live audience by continuously playing a recording of people applauding, laughing, hooting and catcalling.

“Setting up a bed on a stage and sleeping with dogs may seem silly, but it’s my job,”he says. “The dogs have to feel like the theater is their home.” They do. Coming onstage as Berloni explains his training process, Cally immediately lumbers to her bed and is quickly sprawled and dozing. She’s not the least bit concerned with the 30 or so theater fans and dog lovers gathered to hear Berloni speak, other than to lift her head slightly when the group begins laughing. Earlier, in the dog’s basement dressing room, Cally and Taran calmly greet visitors before doing what comes naturally, which at the time was napping.

During each performance, Cally is onstage for almost two hours for the role of Winn Dixie, the dog and lead character around which the story revolves. In the musical, adapted from the awarding-winning book by Kate DiCamillo, the dog is adopted by 10-year-old Opal, who names him for the supermarket where she finds him. Thirteen-year-old Julia Nightingale Landfair of Little Rock portrays Opal, a role that required her to not only memorize lines but develop close bonds with Cally and Taran. She also had to learn how to cue Cally during the show.

Last summer, Berloni began the process of making Landfair a member of the dogs’ family by inviting her and her parents to spend a week with him, wife Dorothy and their menagerie of dogs, horses, cats, chickens, pigs and a macaw at their 90-acre farm in Haddam, Conn.

Landfair’s challenge, Berloni says, was that she has a dog - a tiny Shih Tzu named Lucy. Size wise, Lucy is about as big as a wolfhound’s head. Interacting with the pony-sized wolfhounds was more physical than dealing with Lucy, who in comparison is a ball of fluff.

“I had to tell her to get all over these dogs,” Berloni says of the wolfhounds. “I told her it was like acting with a couch. Well, they’re so big that moving one of these dogs is like moving a couch.”

“I was overwhelmed and scared of them at first,” Landfair says. “Now I’m not. They’re very well-behaved and sweet. Their way of showing affection is by leaning on you. When you’re petting them, they lean on you with all their weight. At first it shocks you, but it’s sweet to have them leaning all the time.”

Landfair says she quickly learned from Berloni the positive reinforcement method of dog training - when a dog gives you the behavior you ask for, you praise and reward him. If he doesn’t respond or responds inappropriately to your cue or command, he doesn’t get the reward. “That’s the only thing that happens. There’s no scolding,” Berloni explains. “Never force a dog to do anything.”

Neither Landfair nor Berloni would reveal specific cues used onstage, saying that giving them away interferes with the audience’s attention to the story and could spoil the magic of the dog’s performance. “If you know the magic, it’s just not as cool,” the girl says. “I’m just going to say there aren’t verbal cues. You have to work really hard to make things look easy. I hope it looks like nothing’s going on when we give them five cues at one time.”

Berloni provided one example of how the actress might cue Cally onstage: As part of a scene, she pushes on the dog’s back and repeatedly tells her to sit, which is her cue to stand. “What she’s actually doing is telling the dog to stay put. Then she can move around the stage and it looks like the dog is listening to her, but in reality the dog is staying because she’s been told to.”

But it’s the offstage relationship, not the cues, that sparks the onstage magic, Landfair and Berloni say. The girl and the wolfhounds have bonded. To keep the bonds strong, she and her parents are staying in the Rep’s housing for the cast and crew during the run of the show. “I have sleepovers with the dogs, eat dinner with them and hang out with them.”

Berloni’s family focused and positive training methods are the theme throughout Broadway Tails, his book about the rescued dogs he’s trained for theatrical performances. All dogs before Taran and Cally were rescues, but Berloni had to look to breeders for the pair because, as he discovered, wolfhounds rarely end up in shelters.

When he was first asked to train Sandy for Annie,then 19-year-old Berloni was an unpaid technical apprentice and had no dog-training experience. He wasn’t sure how to go about it until he recalled his relationship with his childhood pets. Berloni decided that if Sandy considered the theater to be his home and looked upon everyone who worked there as family, then he would be relaxed and able to learn and perform before an audience.

“Sandy became my shadow - wherever I went, he went,” he says. Gradually, Sandy connected with the crew and cast, and became desensitized to the noises and activity around him. He learned to love the theater.

“I create a situation in which the dogs are happy and they do what I want,” Berloni says. “When there’s a wonderful pattern of getting love and praise, then they’re always going to respond.”

Because of Winn Dixie continues at Arkansas Repertory Theatre through Jan. 5. For show times and ticket information, visit therep.org or call (501) 378-0405.

Family, Pages 34 on 12/18/2013

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