Beethoven

Beethoven started as a John Hughes script. When Hughes parted ways with Universal Pictures he left it behind, and he let the studio make it on one condition: he would be credited under a pseudonym, "Edmond Dantès." It became an open secret in the industry that Hughes was behind the name. Amy Holden Jones shared the writing credit. Shooting began in Los Angeles on May 1, 1991, under director Steve Rash, who left over creative differences and was replaced by Brian Levant. The dogs were owned and trained by Eleanor Keaton, Buster Keaton's wife. The title role went to a canine actor named Chris, who had 12 doubles.

Charles Grodin plays George Newton, a control-freak workaholic who runs a car air freshener company and does not want a dog. His wife, Alice (Bonnie Hunt), and their kids Ryce, Ted and Emily outvote him, and the puppy gets his name when Emily plays Beethoven's Fifth Symphony on the piano and he barks along. The villains are a pair of dognappers (Oliver Platt and Stanley Tucci) working for Dr. Herman Varnick (Dean Jones), a veterinarian who wants large-skulled dogs to test ammunition on. The swindling venture capitalists at George's ruined barbecue are David Duchovny and Patricia Heaton, and a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt appears as one of Ted's classmates.

Critics were split. Rotten Tomatoes' consensus calls Beethoven "a good boy who deserves a better movie," but CinemaScore audiences graded it an A, and the Hartford Courant said Chris made Beethoven "a Benji for the '90s." The American Veterinary Medical Association objected to the evil-vet plot and sent letters of protest to executive producer Ivan Reitman and the MPAA. The film opened April 3, 1992, in third place, climbed to No. 2 in its fourth week, and grossed $57.1 million in North America and $147.2 million worldwide. Beethoven's 2nd followed in theaters in 1993 and an animated series in 1994, then a long run of direct-to-video sequels starting in 2000. Hughes wasn't involved in any of them.