Trixie, Karen Ziemba’s overnight guest, was so excited about visiting the actress’ apartment, she peed herself.
Ziemba was unfazed. Not only were her floors covered with paper — she and her husband are renovating — but she knew Trixie was just doing what came naturally.
After all, what dog can resist the siren call of a freshly papered floor?
But Trixie isn’t just any dog — she’s Ziemba’s co-star in “Bullets Over Broadway,” which just kicked off previews at the St. James Theatre. It’s Woody Allen’s first Broadway musical, and it also marks the stage debut of Trixie, an 8-pound Pomeranian.
If you happened to see Allen’s 1994 film, you may recall a certain “Mr. Woofles,” a tiny girl dog with gigantic neuroses, gender-identity issues among them.
The dog on the screen was a Chihuahua. But when it came to casting Mr. Woofles on Broadway, “Bullets” director Susan Stroman decided that any “pretty little dog” would do.
“I showed her some pictures and she went, ‘Pomeranian!’ ” says Bill Berloni, Broadway’s go-to animal wrangler.
As he did when casting “Annie,” “Legally Blonde” and other shows, he scoured local shelters before finding Trixie, now 3, at a pet rescue in Westchester.
But Pomeranians are basically ornamental lap dogs, Berloni says, and running across a Broadway stage on cue “isn’t something they’re genetically engineered to do.”
Thankfully, Ziemba — the Tony-winning actress who plays Eden Brent, Mr. Woofle’s constant companion — is a longtime dog owner who knows her kibbles.
“The main thing isn’t about teaching a dog to do tricks, but to listen to you,” she says. “They have to want to please you and do the task.”
Even before rehearsals began, Ziemba was putting Trixie and her Pomeranian understudy, Rocco, through their paces, feeding them in their dressing room — a k a “the doggy condo” — and rewarding their stage tricks with treats.
It seems to be working.
“Now when I come into a room, her ears perk up, her eyes widen and her tail wags,” Ziemba says. “It took her a while, but now she’ll kiss me. And she’s not a kissing dog.”
A few weeks ago, she and Trixie took bonding to the next level, with a sleepover at Ziemba’s Upper West Side apartment. Except for that little baptism just over the threshold, it went very well.
“Trixie’s quite a chill dog, for a Pomeranian,” Ziemba says. “Poms can be a bit sniffy and bark a lot, but Trixie doesn’t. Once the lights went out, she slept right between my husband and me, on the pillow.”
But the bonding’s been bittersweet: Ziemba’s still recovering from the death two years ago of 16-year-old Macduff, her beloved Norwich terrier. Her husband, actor Bill Tatum, wants another dog, but she’s been reluctant to open her heart again.
Then Trixie trotted into her life.
“Maybe it’s time,” Ziemba muses. “Just bonding with her makes me think it might be nice to have another dog in my life again.”