Ricky Gervais mourns the death of After Life dog Brandy
Vislor Antilly, the dog that played Brandy in Ricky Gervais's sitcom After Life, has died at the age of 13.
She passed away peacefully at her home in Oxfordshire.
In 2018, 'Anti' was cast personally by Ricky Gervais as Brandy, the dog owned by his character Tony Johnson. She stood by him through thick and thin for all three series of the Netflix comedy.
Anti gained worldwide fame via the comedy, causing Gervais to have to repeatedly promise fans on social media that "the dog does not die" in the run-up to every series. She earned the title of "The World's Most Famous Dog" in the process of playing the faithful friend to Tony who helped him deal with the grief of the loss of his partner Lisa.
Ricky Gervais says: "This is such sad news. Anti was a beautiful soul. We hit it off straight away and she helped make After Life my favourite filming experience of all time. I'm so glad that I told her a hundred times a day that she was a very good girl."
Her other comedy credits include ITV's Doc Martin, where she performed stunts with Martin Clunes; Britain's Got More Talent with David Walliams; and 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown.
Anti was born in April 2011 in Herefordshire, at the home of Vislor Dog Training Centre. She became part of a four-legged family that had already appeared on the silver screen - both of Anti's parents, also raised by Vislor trainers Travis and Ashley Foster, appeared together with Bane's henchmen in Christopher Nolan's blockbuster Batman: The Dark Knight Rises in 2012. Anti visited them on set when she was only 10 weeks old and has not looked back since.
She earned her first taste of fame alongside Tom Cruise in Edge Of Tomorrow in 2014, going on to appear with Michael Fassbender in Trespass Against Us and George Clooney in The Midnight Sky, who then went on to cast Anti in his 2023 release The Boys In The Boat. Her work in TV included BBC series The Capture alongside Holliday Grainger and Ron Perlman.
She also appeared on Good Morning Britain, interviewed with her owners Ashley Foster and Beth Heale; The One Show twice; and Lorraine with Gervais as part of the promotional tour for Series 3 of After Life.
Her final stunt on camera was released in July 2024: Series 23, Episode 2 of Midsomer Murders, playing a retired police dog who detains the murderer.