Oscars: was the first Academy Award for ‘Best Actor’ almost awarded to a dog?
The myths and rumours that swirl around Hollywood only seem to get more secretive and bizarre as we settle into the internet age. But back in the earliest days of cinema, things were different. Just about anything could pass the smell test with a little bit of momentum. Sometimes this became a major problem, like when Joseph McCarthy waged his war against communists and subsequently got some of the most talented artists in film blacklisted from their professions. Other times they were completely ridiculous. For example: have you heard the rumour that the first ‘Best Actor’ Oscar almost went to a dog?
The context behind the claim is as hilarious as it is strange, but the truth behind the story isn’t as unbelievable as it might seem on paper. That’s because, throughout the 1920s, one of the biggest movie stars on the planet was a French-born German Shepherd by the name of Rin Tin Tin.
During the First World War, US Army Corporal Lee Duncan came across a starving German Shepherd and her five puppies in the village of Flirey, France. Duncan brought the dogs back to his unit, the 135th Aero Squadron, and dealt them out to his fellow officers. He decided to keep two of the puppies for himself, naming them after the good luck charms that French children often gave to the soldiers: Nanette and Rintintin.
When he returned to America after the war, Duncan began to train Rin Tin Tin for potential dog shows. By the early 1920s, Rin Tin Tin had broken into show business and had even started to get star billing in his own movies, including 1923’s Where the North Begins and 1924’s The Lighthouse By the Sea. Pairing up with screenwriter Darryl F. Zanuck, Duncan helped make Rin Tin Tin one of the most visible screen presences of the Golden Age of Hollywood, with the canine starring in 27 films across his lifetime. Famous stars like Greta Garbo and Jean Harlow even owned some of the puppies that Rin Tin Tin produced over the years.
As the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences were staging the first-ever Academy Awards, the inaugural winner for ‘Best Actor’ was German performer Emil Jannings. Jannings was honoured for his roles in two films that calendar year, 1927’s The Way of All Flesh and 1928’s The Last Command. However, a rumour started to circulate that Jannings wasn’t the true winner. Instead, it was claimed that Academy members had actually voted Rin Tin Tin as the best actor of the year, but the Academy itself staged a re-vote when it was decided that the Academy Awards would never be taken seriously if a dog won the first acting award. That would have made Rin Tin Tin the first, but not the last, dog nominated for an Oscar.
This sequence of events was reported as fact by author Susan Orlean in the 2011 biography Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend. The rumour became so well-known that Academy head Bruce Davis had to publically refute the story. Davis claimed that the ballots for the first Academy Awards still existed in the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills and that none of the ballots show any votes for Rin Tin Tin. Davis suggested that Zanuck was the one behind the original rumour, who was either dismissive of the Oscars or was jealous that he wasn’t nominated. Zanuck would be nominated as a producer the following year and would eventually win three Oscars for producing ‘Best Picture’ winners How Green Was My Valley, Gentleman’s Agreement, and All About Eve.
Rin Tin Tin passed away in 1932 after a decade of success in Hollywood. Duncan groomed three different dogs – Rin Tin Tin Jr., Rin Tin Tin III, and Rin Tin Tin IV – to take over after the original Rin Tin Tin’s death. Decades later, an owner of one of Rin Tin Tin’s descendants trademarked the name and continued to breed new puppies to carry on the original dog’s legacy. Today, there is currently a Rin Tin Tin XII who makes promotional appearances in place of the original dog.
