Simon Cowell is furtive about many things, but not about his love for the four-legged and furry. A supporter of the RSPCA and Battersea, Cowell has always been more receptive to auditions by hopeful hounds than humans, and we knew who he was rooting for when fluffy Pudsy won Britain’s Got Talent in 2012. UK audiences love animal acts and it’s the same across the pond – but this summer on America’s Got Talent a dog danced to California Dreamin’ and a star was born.
That dog is Rhythm, and he moved in perfect sync with eyes fixed on partner Roni as he leapt, flipped and cross-stepped to the beat. Both audience and judges were on their feet cheering, with Cowell confessing he had fallen in love and Sofía Vergara wanting to buy the dazzling Border Collie.
Simon Cowell meets Rhythm backstage at America’s Got Talent
But Rhythm is not for sale and never will be, as the canine equivalent of Nureyev belongs to Roni Sagi, a dog trainer from Israel who is as devoted to him as he is to her. Roni, 32, from Kfar Saba taught Rhythm everything he knows and believes all dogs have the same dance potential, which she proves with Keta Tov, the online home of her oversubscribed training courses.
Soft voiced, almost dove-like, Roni has a connection with dogs that is self-explanatory and inherited from her musician mother, Galia, who has always homed strays.
Roni as a little girl with a beloved dog rescued by her mother
Roni and her sister Sol were born in Hong Kong, where their father Moshe had a business, but he agreed to commute when Galia wanted to move back to Israel – and then came the dogs. “I was six when I woke up to find the dog I’d always wanted,” says Roni, who named it Levana (white). “My Mom has a very big heart and wasn’t allowed dogs as a child, so when we left Hong Kong and had to give away our dog there was a missing piece of the puzzle.”
Roni ran and played with Levana but, bored by her office job aged 25, she returned to her passion and became a dog trainer and therapist and then discovered dog dancing. “No one taught it in Israel, so I learnt online for two years,” says Roni, who then tried teaching moves to three of her dogs, one of whom, Blondie, died a few months ago. All were good students, but Roni was searching for a special dog. A dog who would be energised by a certain song and move to a tempo.
Born in Poland Rhythm was the dog Roni was searching for (pic: Moses Pini Siluk)
That dog was Rhythm, who was born in Poland in 2022. On the recommendation of a trusted friend, who did a character examination, Roni’s first meeting with the five-month-old pup was at Ben Gurion airport. And he already had a name. “I have a very strong belief in manifesting what you want and the breeder organised the litter by letters and he was ‘R’ – we were always going to have a special connection.”
To be clear, the full name of Roni’s dance partner is Rhythm Makes My Heart Go Wow – “Because I want that to be everyone’s reaction when they see him dance,” says his proud teacher, who played multiple songs before choosing Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody for the America’s Got Talent quarter final.
Eric Cowell, son of the famous AGT boss requested to meet Rhythm (pic: Moses Pini Siluk)
By then, the pair had two billion clicks on social media and Simon’s 10-year-old son Eric – whose mother is Lauren Silverman – had asked to meet Rhythm. “If I can make another kid happy…” chimes Roni. “I don’t think the judges were paying him more attention than the other contestants, but because he can’t answer when they talk to him, they just kept going.”
It was on that night that judge Howie Mandel referenced the deteriorating health of Roni’s father and, after the high scores that took them to the final, Roni asked a friend in Israel to show a recording of the dance to her dad. “I knew his situation was getting worse and he could not react to me, but I wanted him to see we did our best.”
The dance partners captured by Israeli photographer Moses Pini Siluk
During their final dance, to Alessia Cara’s Scars To Your Beautiful, Roni’s sister watched from the wings.“For the first time in my life, I was really nervous,” admits Roni. “We do lots of competitions in other countries, but I never knew if Rhythm would be able to perform on TV with all the chaos and in front of so many. I just trusted him.”
On cue, Rhythm joins our Zoom call. He of the lustrous coat maintained by an athlete’s diet of measured protein and supplements has jumped on to the table and put his head against Roni’s. “When it came to the final result,I was holding Rhythm and crying.I couldn’t understand why I felt so
bad and not feeling amazing to be in the top five.”
Had the Nova festival happened a few years ago when Roni was still partying with her peers, she would have been there dancing. She feels blessed that her friends who were there survived
Singer Richard Goodall won the show, with Roni and Rhythm in second place but, as she left the stage, Roni saw her sister’s face and knew the worst had happened. “I wanted to congratulate Richard, but I was sobbing and people who saw me said, ‘Second place is amazing.’ All I was thinking was my dad is dead. For a moment it felt like everything was being taken away, but it wasn’t about winning or the million-dollar prize as that was never mine. My father was.”
Obviously offers have been pouring in for Rhythm, but the pair come as a package and, for Roni, collaborations are about shared values. “I already think of myself as the luckiest person in the world because I do the thing I love with the creature I love most, so it isn’t about who can pay the most. Anything we do will come from a good place to benefit dogs or humanity in general as it’s not about being famous.”
The trainer and her pupil whose full name is Rhythm Makes My Heart Go Wow
But they are both famous and Roni is chuffed that she is recognised in Israel without her sidekick while he can’t go anywhere without shouts of “oh, my God, it’s Rhythm, whoah!” So much has happened since Roni returned to Israel on 5 October from a European dog show championship. “I was full of ideas about teaching seminars around the world, then two days later, what the hell? Then we were at war.”
Had the Nova festival happened a few years ago when Roni was still partying with her peers, she would have been there dancing. She feels blessed that her friends who were there survived. “Friends of friends and their family were murdered – it’s devastating. But it’s not like, ‘Oh, it happened to them.’ Just because we weren’t physically there doesn’t mean it didn’t happen to us. Israel is so small, it happened to us all.”
Roni & Rhythm got second place but they will always be first for Israel (pic:Moses Pini Siluk)
A week into the war, while hiding in a safe with her friend, a new mother to twins, Roni lost vision in her left eye and for three months could only see black. A known medical reaction to stressful situations, she stopped listening to the news, fearing she would lose sight in both eyes. In the midst of all the sirens and casualties, Roni got the call from America’s Got Talent to confirm her audition in Los Angeles. “I didn’t know what to do, but asked myself the existential question – if I died tomorrow what would my legacy be? I realised I needed to leave behind something beautiful to let people know that sometimes love is enough; that’s what I share with Rhythm and I wanted the world to see to see him dance.”
Roni’s sight is fully restored and she will be bringing Rhythm to Crufts in March to compete in the Freestyle International – a first for Israel in this category. An excited and undaunted Roni says: “Even though times are hard we will make it.” Her trust in her homeland, like her trust in Rhythm, is incontestable. “Before we perform, I kiss him and tell him ‘you can do it’ and if it isn’t perfect it doesn’t matter, we can improve as we go. The most important thing is that he wants to be there with me.”
• For Roni’s dog dancing lessons visit: http://ketatov.com