Marley & Me: Life and Love With the World's Worst Dog by Grogan John

Author:Grogan, John [Grogan, John]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: John, Animals, Grogan, Nature, Dog Owners, Labrador Retriever, Florida, Contemporary, General, Personal Memoirs, Pets, Labrador Retriever - Florida, Biography & Autobiography, Essays, Human-Animal Relationships, Dogs, Biography, Breeds
ISBN: 9780060817084
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2005-10-06T00:00:00+00:00

The next morning I was still fretting over our dashed dreams of stardom when the phone rang. It was the assistant, telling us to get Marley to the hotel as soon as possible. “You mean you want him back?” I asked.

“Right away,” he said. “Bob wants him in the next scene.”

I arrived thirty minutes later, not quite believing they had invited us back. Gosse was ebullient. He had watched the raw footage from the day before and couldn’t have been happier. “The dog was hysterical!” he gushed. “Just hilarious. Pure madcap genius!” I could feel myself standing taller, chest puffing out.

“We always knew he was a natural,” Jenny said.

Shooting continued around Lake Worth for several more days, and Marley continued to rise to the occasion. We hovered in the wings with the other stage parents and hangers-on, chatting, socializing, and then falling abruptly silent whenever the stagehand yelled, “Ready on set!” When the word “Cut!” rang out, the party continued. Jenny even managed to get Gary Carter and Dave Win-field, the Baseball Hall of Fame all-star who was making a cameo in the movie, to sign baseballs for each of the boys.

Marley was lapping up stardom. The crew, especially the women, fawned over him. The weather was brutally hot, and one assistant was assigned the exclusive duty of following Marley around with a bowl and a bottle of spring water, pouring him drinks at will. Everyone, it seemed, was feeding him snacks off the buffet table. I left him with the crew for a couple of hours while I checked in at work, and when I returned I found him sprawled out like King Tut, paws in the air, accepting a leisurely belly rub from the strikingly gorgeous makeup artist. “He’s such a lover!” she cooed.

Stardom was starting to go to my head, too. I began introducing myself as “Marley the Dog’s handler” and dropping lines such as “For his next movie, we’re hoping for a barking part.” During one break in the shooting, I walked into the hotel lobby to use the pay phone. Marley was off his leash and sniffing around the furniture several feet away. A concierge, apparently mistaking my star for a stray, intercepted him and tried to hustle him out a side door. “Go home!” he scolded. “Shoo!”

“Excuse me?” I said, cupping my hand over the mouthpiece of the phone and leveling the concierge with my most withering stare. “Do you have any idea who you’re talking to?”

We remained on the set for four straight days, and by the time we were told Marley’s scenes were all completed and his services no longer needed, Jenny and I both felt we were part of the Shooting Gallery family. Granted, the only unpaid members of the family, but members nonetheless. “We love you guys!” Jenny blurted out to all within earshot as we herded Marley into the minivan. “Can’t wait to see the final cut!”

But wait we did. One of the producers told us to give them eight months and then call and they’d mail us an advance copy.

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