So, Messi the Dog Is "Clapping" at the Oscars

The breakout star of 'Anatomy of a Fall' was eager to participate!

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Messi the Dog
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Honored with a seat at the Oscars this year was Messi the dog, the breakout star of award season (in my opinion) and one of the stars of Anatomy of a Fall (the objective fact). Messi the dog did not take this privilege lightly, and when it came to honoring the recipients of the biggest award in film, Messi was ready to participate: When the crowd clapped, Messi "clapped" along with them.

If you think about this too hard, it invites a lot of questions (is someone perched at foot level clapping fake paws? Is Messi unnerved by the phantom paws? Am I unnerved by the phantom paws?). So, in line with the celebration of film that we, and Messi, are here to enjoy, I invite you to suspend your disbelief and watch the dog clapping.

Messi the Dog at the Oscars

Messi enjoying his own seat the Oscars.

(Image credit: Getty Images/Courtesy)

Messi even got a shout-out from host Jimmy Kimmel: "I haven’t seen a French actor eat vomit like that since Gérard Depardieu," Kimmel quipped.

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But this isn't Messi's first brush with the circuit. He also attended the Oscars nominee lunch, where he befriended Ryan Gosling, Bradley Cooper, and Billie Eilish; before that, he attended a live reading of the Anatomy of a Fall screenplay and joined a press junket. "It’s probably the maximum that you can accomplish in this field," gushed his trainer, Laura Martin, with whom Messi lives in Paris.

Jenny Hollander
Jenny Hollander
Digital Director

Jenny is the Digital Director at Marie Claire. A graduate of Leeds University, and a native of London, she moved to New York in 2012 to attend the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She was the first intern at Bustle when it launched in 2013 and spent five years building out its news and politics department. In 2018 she joined Marie Claire, where she held the roles of Deputy Digital Editor and Director of Content Strategy before becoming Digital Director. In her spare time, she writes fiction: her first novel EVERYONE WHO CAN FORGIVE ME IS DEAD was published in February 2024 and became a USA Today bestseller. She has also written extensively about developmental coordination disorder, or dyspraxia, which she was diagnosed with when she was nine.