“I have since viewed footage taken of the day in question, when I wasn’t there, and it paints an entirely different picture,” he wrote. “The written commentary accompanying the edited video mischaracterizes what happened. The dog was not terrified and not thrown in the water—I’ve seen footage of Hercules earlier that day joyfully jumping in the pool. When he was asked to perform the stunt from the other side of the pool, which was not how he had been doing it all day, he balked.
“The mistake was trying to dip the dog in the water to show him it was okay—the water wasn’t his issue, it was the location that was the issue, and the dog happily did the stunt when he was allowed to return to his original spot. I also didn’t like it when Hercules’ head briefly went under water, but there was a scuba diver and a trainer in the pool to protect him,” he continued. “He loves the water, wasn’t in danger, and wasn’t upset.”