He was penniless until he found dogs; now they’re famous

Richard Olate grew up on the streets of Chile, selling whatever he could get his hands on.

The shoeless boy in tattered clothing sold spices, trinkets – anything to help his family of 22 children, of which he was second-youngest.

Then, when he was 12, he adopted a stray dog off the street and taught it tricks. And in Chile, there are lots of stray dogs – which meant more dogs to play with.

So Olate tinkered with his show, developing an entertainment routine to pitch to circuses and schools through trial and error.

Fast-forward decades later, and Olate is internationally known for his variety show featuring his trained dogs – culminating in a win on “America’s Got Talent” in 2012.

Olate’s 24-year-old son, Nicholas, helps with the show – as the Olate Dogs are in the midst of another national tour.

On Saturday, the Olate Dogs are coming to Wichita’s Orpheum Theatre, for what promises to be a “very out-of-the-normal” performance, according to Nicholas Olate.

“Even with me, if I think of a dog performance, the majority of the time I think either Frisbee-tossing or something like that,” Olate said. “We’re very different in a lot of things. Our dogs do a lot of tricks people have never seen before.”

Those tricks include back flips, conga lines, handstands, dogs riding scooters, dogs jumping rope, a doggie fashion show and a couple of comedy routines.

“There’s a lot of comedy, a lot of wow factors in there,” Olate said. “It’s just a well rounded variety show, but instead of humans performing, it’s dogs performing, really.”

About half of the 16 dogs in the show are rescue dogs, according to Olate – but sometimes the show looks for specific breeds, like the standard poodle, that can be difficult to find at shelters.

The Olate Dogs have a pretty good life on the road – they’re driven around by the Olate family in a custom-built trailer. Inside the trailer, there’s heating and air-conditioning for the dogs, as well as custom doggie showers, Nicholas Olate said.

Before every show, the dogs are let out for hours, so they can take care of any bathroom needs, Olate said.

“They’re still doggies,” he said with a laugh, while noting there hasn’t been an on-stage potty mishap in years.

This story was originally published March 16, 2017 at 9:12 AM with the headline "He was penniless until he found dogs; now they’re famous."