Posted: December 6, 2008, 5 a.m. EST
As one of the stars of the ensemble drama “Gossip Girl,” actress Blake Lively is used to sharing the spotlight – with her dog.
“A lot of people come up to me and they’re like, ‘Oh, my gosh, are you …’ and I think they’re going to ask if I’m from ‘Sisterhood’ [“The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants,” Lively’s best-known film], and they say, ‘with that really cute dog?’” the actress told InStyle magazine.
Lively agreed that Penny, a 3-year-old Maltese-Poodle mix, is a great icebreaker. “Anytime anybody comes up to me, I always get a little shy,” she said. “But I have my cute dog now. She gets all the attention.”
In fact, Penny and Lively got plenty of attention last summer when news outlets published several photographs of Lively walking on a Manhattan street with a suspicious stain on her dress.
“I’m holding Penny, and every magazine prints that Penny peed on me,” Lively told USA Today. “I spilled something on my dress. I didn’t want it to stain, so I stuck my dress under the sink and was running out the door. It wasn’t Penny!”