Ozzy Osbourne was “terrified of dogs” during ‘Bark at the Moon’ cover shoot

You may not have guessed that someone nicknamed the Prince of Darkness would be afraid of anything, but Ozzy Osbourne apparently had one specific fear that reared its head during the cover shoot for his 1983 solo album, Bark at the Moon.

Bark at the Moon photographer Fin Costello tells Classic Rock magazine that Ozzy was “terrified of dogs,” which was particularly tricky due to the werewolf-themed shoot.

“In one of the shots, Ozzy was playing a wolf, on his hands and knees with these rottweilers behind him,” Costello shares. “But what I didn’t realize was that Ozzy was terrified of dogs. Now, when he could see the dogs he could deal with it, but when they were behind him it was completely different!”

At one point at five in the morning, Costello remembers Ozzy “got up and said he couldn’t do it any more.”

“We ended up having this bizarre, early-hours conversation with him dressed like a werewolf, his wife Sharon, who’d just given birth about two days before, a nanny holding the baby in a Moses basket, and with a tea lady wandering around the set giving out drinks,” Costello says. “We eventually finished, but it was all very surreal!”

Ozzy seems to have gotten over his fear of dogs — or, at least, is now OK with smaller ones — as evidenced by his beloved Pomeranian Rocky.