Well Heeled

Dibra's dogs

Bash Dibra's fourth appointment on a recent, thoroughly typical day was with a blue-eyed Siberian husky who was undergoing a minor crise in adjusting to his new Manhattan apartment. It was large, but somehow confining after life in a villa in Rome. The husky had been working in Italy on his first feature film, and his owner, who directed the movie, was worried about the hothouse intimacy fostered by working and living together. "We have become," he said gravely, "perhaps, too close."

Earlier Bash had visited: One, a bouffant-coiffed bichon frisee who was learning to conquer separation anxiety— something which her mistress, the author of a book on beating Valium addiction, said she too was working out in her own therapy sessions. Two, a cocker-spaniel puppy whose owner, a former child psychologist and the wife of a corporate lawyer, announced wistfully, "I want him to be really intelligent." Three, a fashionably ugly shar-pei and his fashionably skinny owner, the wife of a Wall Street executive. The dogs jumped up and down like pogo sticks at the sight of Bash, who usually kissed the dogs on the mouth, and their owners on the cheek.

Albanian-born Bashkim Dibra, thirty-five, is an indefatigably friendly, zeppelin-shaped man who, for $75 to $150 a session, will teach you and your dog how to behave toward each other. His two thousand clients (not counting television and movie training stints) include Mia Farrow, Carly Simon, Nancy (Jealousy) Friday, and the denizens of upper Park Avenue, where the carpets are often Aubusson, and housebreaking is taken very seriously.

He has offered telephone counsel ($50) to Michael Douglas (housebreaking difficulties) and to Henry Kissinger's veterinarian (problems with aggression). He has told Falcon Crest star Ana-Alicia what sort of house and car to buy to best accommodate her German shepherds. His own house, in Riverdale, has a pet-supply store, beauty parlor, and animal acting workshop, plus several self-contained apartments, which Bash and his sister Meruet share with their ten dogs, six cats, and various clients' pets boarded for $25 a day. He also has a wolf named Mariah, with whom he is known to share his bed. His attraction to feral creatures began in a Yugoslavian camp, where his family was interned after fleeing Albania and where five-yearold Bash befriended the attack dogs.

Even when clients have dog-walking servants, Bash insists that the actual owners be present for the initial lessons. Although Lee Radziwill once told him, "I don't need training, my dog does," recalcitrant owners can be brought to heel. One twenty-two-yearold refused to cooperate in the lessons her millionaire mother had bought, until Bash learned that Mummy forbade chocolates (complexion). So Bash brought a pocketful of Hershey's Kisses to each session. Finally, both the Park Avenue princess and her white German shepherds were perfectly socialized—at least with each other.

Ben Brantley