By Joe Wilkes

It’s award season in Hollywood and that means Tinseltown is putting on the dog, and this year, literally. Dog News Daily inaugurated its Golden Collar Awards on Monday, giving away trophies to Hollywood’s most talented canines of 2011.

Uggie, the Jack Russell terrier, who was the most talked-about star in The Artist, the film with the least talking, won the big prize of the night, Best Dog in a Theatrical Film. Uggie beat out Cosmo, who played Arthur in Beginners, Denver as Skeletor in 50/50, Hummer as Dolce in Young Adult, and himself, cross-dressing as female character Queenie in Water for Elephants. He also had to face a last-minute entry, Blackie, the Doberman Pinscher who played the villainous Maximillian in Hugo. Blackie wasn’t originally nominated, but his director, Martin Scorsese, wrote a long op-ed piece in The Los Angeles Times decrying the discrimination against dog actors who play villains. A Facebook petition later, Blackie made the ballot, but it wasn’t enough to stop the juggernaut (or Uggernaut) from The Artist.

Uggie has already appeared on the red carpet at other award shows with his Artist family, notably at the Golden Globes, where he stole the show walking on his hind legs during the filmmakers’ Best Picture acceptance speech. The awards have been especially sweet for Uggie and his trainer, as Uggie has been afflicted with a disease causing him to shake, which is putting a premature end to his acting career. His trainer Omar Von Muller accepted the award with Uggie and thanked the awards committee saying “This is very important for all the trainers in the movie industry, because we have never been recognized before, and people just don’t understand that it takes hundreds, even thousands of hours to train a dog.”

Acting can be a lucrative gig for dogs and their trainers. Dogs typically get paid between $350 to $500 a day and often receive perks such as air-conditioned trailers, premium hotel rooms, and first-class airfare. Unfortunately, unlike their human counterparts, dogs don’t belong to a union like the Screen Actors Guild, so they don’t get residual payments when their work is shown and don’t receive benefits or pensions. So they have to keep working if they want the treats to keep coming. Trainers must usually manage multiple animal actors to make ends meet.

Golden Collars in other categories were also given out. Brigitte, the bulldog who plays Sofia Vergara’s nemesis on Modern Family, took home the Best Dog in a Television Series (beating out the only human nominee, Jason Gann, who plays the pot-smoking, beer-drinking pooch Wilfred in Wilfred). Koko won Best Dog in a Foreign Film as the title character in the Australian Red Dog. Rody won Best Dog in a Direct-to-DVD film (I would have called the award Best Dog in a Dog) as Marley in Marley and Me: The puppy Years. And in happy news for pit bull lovers, Hercules, the pit bull from Pit Boss tied for Best Dog in a Reality Series with Giggy from Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

You can watch the entire awards ceremony by clicking below.

Video streaming by Ustream

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