The best TV costars! While human actors often get top billing in beloved TV comedies and dramas, it’s often their four-legged companions who steal the spotlight.
Comet, the lovable golden retriever on Full House, become one of the most iconic TV pets though he is far from the only animal companion the sitcom cast worked with on set.
“I’m sure being on Full House and being around so many animals [contributed to my love for them],” Candace Cameron Bure, who played eldest daughter D.J. Tanner on the series, told Today in December 2018. “More than just dogs, we had, like, a chimpanzee on the show and a donkey and a ferret and so much more!”
While the Tanner daughters — D.J., Stephanie and Michelle, played by Bure, Jodie Sweetin and Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, respectively — loved their precious pooch, the Fuller House revival saw the old pup replaced with a new dog from the same bloodline. D.J. — a vet in the Netflix iteration — helped Comet Jr. deliver a litter of puppies in the February 2016 pilot, to which her second son, Max (Elias Harger), practically begged the family to adopt one of the canines. The family eventually took home Cosmo. However, nearly four years later, the dog who played Cosmo passed away after surgical complications.
“Our sweet boy Cosmo is now running around in doggy heaven,” the Christmas Contest actress wrote via Instagram in December 2019. “I imagine he’s playing with Comet 😉 right now. Cosmo has been in Fuller House since the start and we are heartbroken that he passed away during surgery complications. You’ll be so missed love bug ❤️.”
While the Full House and Fuller House crew have since mourned the loss of their beloved TV companion, many other show stars have been equally fond of their own animal costars. Bridgerton enlisted a rambunctious corgi named Austin to portray Kate Sharma’s pooch, Newton.
“I’m really good with dogs, so he responded to me well,” Simone Ashley, who played Kate on the steamy regency hit, told Entertainment Weekly in February 2022. “He was a little bit sass and goes off and does his own thing, but I like to think when we were together, he listened to me. Whenever we would do a line run and Newton was there, he would just get in the middle of the circle and roll on his back and be like, ‘Hey, what’s up?’ That was quite cute.”
She added: “One of the buildings we filmed at, there was pebbles on the driveway. I’d have him on the leash and he’d just be eating the stones and pooping out stones in between takes.”
While the Sex Education alum found a special bond with the pup while filming season 2 of the Netflix drama, her TV husband, Jonathan Bailey, did not feel the same.
“Austin played Newton and it’s a sterling, stunning performance, but do you know what? We didn’t get on,” the West End performer, who notably played Viscount Anthony Bridgerton, joked to the magazine. “He just loved the sausage and there’s nothing wrong with loving the sausage, but it was more the way we had to hold little crumbs of sausage in my hand to try and get him to jump in my lap. … It’s amazing that I got to work with him because he’s obviously going places, but we didn’t really click.”
Scroll below to see more of TV’s most beloved pets through the years: