Pup to play on Broadway came from shelter

NEW YORK — Broadway's newest Little Orphan Annie has found her Sandy. The award-winning animal trainer William Berloni on Thursday unveiled the pooch who is slated to star in the Broadway revival of the Tony Award-winning musical “Annie" — Sunny, a 2-year-old female terrier mix rescued from a city pound in Houston. “The most talented animals are right there under your nose," said Berloni, who makes it a point of using shelter dogs in all his projects. “The message is: Animals in shelters are not damaged, just unfortunate." Sunny was only 24 hours away from being euthanized four months ago when Berloni spotted her photo online while conducting a nationwide search for Sandy. Touched, he forwarded her photo to one of the show's producers, Arielle Tepper Madover, who wrote back, “Save her. I don't care what it costs." “Annie," starring 11-year-old Lilla Crawford in the title role and Katie Finneran as Miss Hannigan, will begin previews on Oct. 3 at the Palace Theatre and will open on Nov. 8. The original Sandy, also a terrier mix, went on to play almost all 2,377 performances of “Annie" and Berloni supplied shelter dogs for all four national tours of the show, as well as the 10th, 20th and 30th anniversary productions. Sunny's understudy, Casey, was rescued from a shelter in Nashville, Tenn. Online: http://www.AnnieTheMusical.com