1:26:47 So I was rewatching the Sideways Cats video and I have know realized that I took this line right from his video and I didn't even realize it. I literally talked about how he's been plagiarized before and here I am plagiarizing him...fuck! Also to everyone asking, the body totem pole is from Hannibal and I'm referring to the musical based on the movie when I mention Legally Blond. I know it's based on a movie.
Tomska plagarised Hbomberguy’s video idea, but its got a pretty good measure of different types of plagarism and how bad they are. Accidentally saying exactly the same thing as someone else is pretty common, you’re all good! And great video btw
They did the musical so dirty with the movie, honestly. The touch at the end of Memory is one of the sweetest, most poigniant moments in the show because the kitten that sings with Grizabella is the youngest. She's the baby. And Victoria is supposed to be a debutante, having just reached the age of finding a mate (the cat who dances with her during her solo) AND she's the pure white cat touching the "dirty old has-been". It is literally breaking a cycle of generational trauma and fear. It has to be the new generation showing the old generation the way. I always headcanon-ed that all the Jellicles have owners because they all have collars except for Grizabella, and it's said that her coat is torn and stained, so I interpreted that as her having mange, which is why some of the cats are more scared than angry at her. They don't want to catch what she has, but touch is how real-life cats mark someone as safe. Also, my poor boy Mr. Mistofeles is supposed to be a showy, flashy, almost arrogant young magician, not... the anxious mess he was in this film. And yeah, like you said, Mungojerrie and Rumpleteaser are mischievous, but not evil, and they're more teasingly flirty than outright seductive.
The choreography is brilliant in how it invokes feline behaviour and body language through the spectacle of dance, which is why people either love or hate Cats. The 2019 movie shits all over this in favour of well, whatever TF Hooper was doing. 😅
In Cats 1998 (and some other stage productions I've seen) , Mungojerrie was also one of the first to join in fighting Macavity when Munkustrap and Alonzo fell. It's like Hooper was blind or something smh
I always assumed that Grizzabella got hit by a car and abandoned. She limps, and she can't clean herself correctly. If she was meant to be one of MacCavitity's lovers, he doubtless left her for dead and she wasn't welcome back to the Jellicles until the end of the stage show.
Tugger singing Misto's song is so good because he's a performer, he's a rockstar, and he's looking at this less confident cat and being like "I will hype this guy UP!" and it works so well! I don't think anyone else singing it would work.
And if he's Munkustrap's younger brother, it makes sense that he would take over leadership (briefly) when his dad is missing and his brother is recovering from the fight with Macavity (I still can't believe they didn't leave that in the movie...). He is a contrarian cat, but Tugger cares about his family and his tribe. Of course he wouldn't let them be lost and afraid, not if he has a say in it!
i once saw a headcanon post that was pretty much trying to find a middleground between the musical and the movie, the idea being that misto is all confident and brilliant when he's performing magic but absolutely terrible at socialising off-stage. something something misto being a nervous wreck during his number in the movie because his hype man/boyfriend wasnt there. which isnt true but i think whoever made that post thought tugger was kidnapped by macavity during misto's song and i think its very funny akfksdngsd
Misto isn’t even that unconfident, he’s just quieter. But that’s why having a hype man works. I’ve never seen them as a couple, per se, but I’ve always loved their power duo dynamic. It’s like a Vegas act in a way
However ORIGINALLY it was.sung by Misto himself. ('81 London version) I think they changed the character here, becauae the choreo is so difficult it need 1.a ballett dancer, who not neccessarily can sing 2. it requires breath control, which is almost impossible to achieve. Also it fits the character of Misto more, than him singing about himself.
@@richardkovacs2006 Makes sense, especially since Misto doesn’t even seem to have a dozen lines in the show. He really is one of the more quiet characters so it makes sense he wouldn’t sing his own song
I actually unironically listen to and prefer the movie’s version of Skimbleshanks The Railway Cat over the original, it’s just that. Damn. GOOD. I don’t even care about the awful effects or the fact that Hooper has no idea how proportioning works. I’m just having too much fun watching Steven clack his way through the number. He just oozes confidence and I watch his performance and I BELIEVE that this train NEEDS Skimble or it can’t function. And given how the music sounds, you can bet they were thrilled to finally be following a performer around who knows what timing is
@@SitaraAleuI love that album version cuts down on the tap interlude enough that it's still an interesting addition but doesn't completely break the flow
@@SitaraAleu Absolutely. Also I think in general his pants and lil cute conductor costume actually saved him from a lot of the uncanny valley of the cgi. The disruption from the monocolor means he seems less weird and i think makes our brains look at him more like the characters from like Rango or something instead of looking like the rest of the horror show.
Another thing about the skin-colored cats: brown cats are INCREDIBLY rare. It's not even that they're trying to show a realistic array of fur patterns, those fur patterns are actively unrealistic to be that prevalent.
Yeah, the brown color in cats is usually chocolate, which is a pretty rare shade - you usually don't see it outside of shows. (It's a little more common in Asia than in Europe and North America, but this is London, so.) There's also the Burmese gene, which turns black into a dark brown (sable), but again, that's not something you run into very often - it's a lot less common than the standard colorpoint gene. So yeah, most people will never even see a solid brown cat in person. A realistic assortment of cats would have a lot of brown tabbies and some gray or orange, lots of cats with white markings, some tux cats, MAYBE a solid black or white here and there, and an assortment of torties/calicos. Not this.... whatever is happening here.
When I found this video I literally said out loud, “Finally, some delicious fucking food.” Many of the early criticism of CATS 2019 came from people who were neutral or hated the show all along. It was revelatory to have a FAN critique the film in how it fundamentally failed its characters. I was in the CATS fandom trenches back in the day, and had to witness this movie with two of my friends who played Bomba and Demeter, respectively. It was awful in ways that haters don’t understand. You touched on the blandness of the cats designs in the film, mostly resulting in bland coloring and little defining features. But I also wanted to add that there was a distinct lack of diversity of breeds of cats. The costume designs in the stage show are so intentional to be reminiscent of actual cats - Tugger is a Maine Coon, Cassandra is an Abyssinian, Grizzabella could be Persian - that the same just, generic cat look for EVERY character was just,,,weird? Like the lyrics say that are Jellicles black and white and of moderate size, but the costuming celebrates more than one type of cat. I understand that might have been a challenge for the CGI, overworked and underpaid as the artists were, but it’s like HMMM. Maybe this show is so visually iconic for a reason!
no fr ive considered animating the whole musical before. i'm pretty amateur but it would still look better than the 2019 cgi also werent there rumors that there was actually going to be a 2d animated cats film??
If your implying 2d animated quadrupedal cats I have questions. The singing could be handled , it would be 2d lion king facial animation. The dancing ? Quadrupedal serious dancing. How ? The Hotness ? How would this idea appeal to anyone who is not a furry ?
Ill be honest, Bustofer Jones, I also interpreted/headcannoned him having relatively rich owners, but also that he's one of those cats that has several different owners/homes that feed him, and also regularly gets table scraps from restaurants and such. Still a shame how the 2019 movie did him dirty. (He also is not my favorite or anything, but like! A fat character from an older piece of media being more respectfully treated than the modern version is.... Something. Hey! Tommy! James! Your bias is showing!)
In the musical, Bustopher Jones is an incredibly successful cat. He's the St. James Street cat, so even though he's (potentially?) a stray, he goes around to all the posh restaurants and gets the kitchen scraps from the cooks every single day. He has a lot of good, fancy food every day without having to work for it (i.e. he's no "commonplace mouser"). To the Jellicles, he's essentially the idle rich. Of course they admire him and his comfortable lifestyle! In the movie? "Ha ha, let's all laugh at James Corden being fat and gross!"
AND he's a gentleman! His "coat of fastidious black" and "impeccable back" mean that he spends hours grooming himself because he cares about his appearance. He wouldn't be caught dead in a trash can.
@@UrpleSquirrel yeah this was my interpretation too, that he was one of those strays that get "adopted" by all the fancy restaurants in the area and gets fed all the fancy leftovers all the time, going from restaurant to restaurant.
I mean he us called "The Cat About Town" And mentions at the end of ghe first verse having 8 or 9 clubs so yeh he's def that cat that goes abd gets fed by everyone- by the rich people. Cat is well loved and fed by everyone in the community
They added an "audience insert" character, but from what I've experienced in Cats, most people dont say "oh, that character is so me" or "Oh, I have a friend who's just like that," like most media does. Rather, it's "my cat does that all the time!" It's supposed to be a characterization of Cat Archetypes, not People Archetypes. A self-insert character makes no sense!
That's exactly it. Every cat owner reading those poems can nod sagely and be like 'Ah, yeah, I've met this one'. Jennyanydots, the comfy plump housecat who naps all day and gets mega zoomies at 3 AM. Rum Tum Tugger, the cat that just will not stop demanding things and then act like that's not what he wanted. Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer, forces of chaos that are only barely disguised as cats. Mistoffelees, the cat who comes and goes like he can teleport, you swear you heard him on the roof five minutes ago but he's right here sleeping, what the hell-
I’m convinced every hollywood movie producer has the same big checklist of things that have to be in a script. They get an intern to read the scripts that get submitted to them for approval and if the intern has not checked every box the script gets rejected. At least on fight scene At least one explosion Romantic interest between leads Audience View point character Happy ending villan with back of match box motivation Etc
I legitimately, not once, even realized that Cassandra was even in the 2019 movie until your video. I *cannot* tell the cats apart in that movie other than maybe 5 or 6. I even confused Victoria with other cats constantly.
That is my biggest problem with modern CGI. In an attempt to look realistic, they've sacrificed all style. It was also my biggest gripe with The Lion King.
It makes so much sense why Tugger would sing about Misto, because Tugger is so confident and charismatic that he has the ability to really rope you in. If Tugger is so excited about this magical cat, then surely he must be a big deal! Let's find out if this magical cat has what it takes!- is what the vibe is, to me, because when Tugger takes to the stage, /all/ the other cats watch him. That's why that number works for me, on top of the chemistry there
I remember thinking that Macavity, Tugger and Munkustrap were all brothers because they made like a ... bad/good gradient, with Macavity the bad boy, Tugger the silly "bad" boy and Munkustrap the responsible guy. I had no basis for this beyond my sense that Tugger and Munkustrap were *definitely* brothers and just slotted Macavity into that. Purely based on my eight billion rewatches of the VHS where I exhaustively slotted everyone into family trees.
If you also happen to ship Tugger+Misto, and you've got nothing against Misto and Victoria being siblings, and you don't mind reading fanfiction, then I really recommend one on AO3 titled "Defences against Terrible Bores" by Maliex (there's also a 2nd and a 3rd part, they're called differently but they're all one story, the whole series is called "There's No Doing Anything About That"). It's fantastically written, actually emotionally fulfilling with both goofy and very serious moments, includes all characters (it's written mostly from the perspectives of Misto, Tugger and Victoria, and a bit of Munkustrap), and heavily contributed to what I actually have as my headcanon
Okay so I own an enormous press kit for the movie, which includes a section that goes over each character in detail (& it’s actually super interesting). This Macavity is on the last of his nine lives and THAT’S why he’s so desperate to be chosen to be reborn. But they didn’t actually say or show it in the movie at ALL 🙃
That would've been incredible to see! Plus, it would add to Grizabella's plight as well. Maybe she's also in the last of her lives. Maybe her motive is about as selfish as Macavity, but she's trying to redeem herself vs he just wants to keep his life of crime.
@@briandaaranda9735I never thought Grizabella was actually aiming to be the one to be reborn. It always seemed that she just didn't want to be an outsider anymore. The idea that she's on her last life and is reborn instead of simply embraced gives a bit of sadness or almost horror to the end of the show. She tried so hard to be accepted back, and when she gets that, she's sent off again to do the whole mess over instead of finally getting to rest as a part of the family she so desperately wanted.
I was never a fan of Cats, but I am a fan of Les Miserables, and now knowing that the guy who did the terrible Les Miz movie also did Cats makes a lot of sense for why fans of Cats hated the film, lol. Stop giving this man access to well-known, well-liked, and well-respected musicals!
I don’t think that they’ll give him another musical. He only won Oscars for Le Miz, and the failures of Cats and Dear Evan Hansen will probably put the nail on the coffin of the idea of musicals as oscar bait.
I don't think Tom Hooper would ever get an opportunity to direct a big budget musical movie again. The failure of "Cats" hurt his career so much, it would need a miracle for him to bounce back.
That and the bombings of unrelated West Side Story, Cyrano, and all those lackluster Disney movies. I'd say most of the musical movie genre is being kept on life support by those terrible remakes, and its only a matter of time before the "I want a movie to babysit my kid" club go somewhere else. If my history of Hollywood serves me any good, normally when these big budget musicals bomb, they put the whole genre on hiatus for decades. I fear we are getting close to those times again. So although he may be active, musicals themselves may be sparse for a while.
Every time I’m in a local play or musical, the actors get creative and come up with some crazy backstory for their characters, even if they’re canon fodder. And I feel like CATS made that into an art form.
You gotta have your motive down pat! Otherwise, your performance feels flat and unrealistic. You have to assume that eyes will be on you, even if it's just your family who came out to see you.
Ye, I watched CATS at my local theater because I was curious about the trailer of 2019 CATS. Iwas absolutely mesmerized by how so good the music is, how the performers did props and dancing, just everything was a spectacle!!! And then I was heavily disappointed when I watched the CATS 2019 again...they did it so dirty...
I had to play ‘the manager’ in a kids theatre club production of ELF the musical (no joke) and the character is originally a man but im AFAB and i didn’t change the lines about him having a wife. Still proud that I made history as the first lesbian character on stage in that club.
One thing I love about the '98 musical is Tugger and Jemima's relationship. He seems to dote on her like a younger sister and it's just so wholesome. There's all these little interactions between characters that you won't catch on the first watch, or even the fifth. I get something new every time I watch it.
That's the fun of 98 and just most productions of Cats. Noticing all the little background details. Also, totally agree on Jem and Tugg. Though I personally headcanon them as uncle and niece.
The bit where he strokes her chin is just so adorable; it made me wish I was in a production just so I could play around as a cat with other people dressed as cats. Like, it's such a great opportunity to show affection between characters, because cats are cuddly and affectionate - if you feel awkward (as an actor) about doing that, Cats isn't the musical for you, sorry.
honestly, Rebel Wilson DOES have range. there’s a scene in The Hustle where, if i recall correctly, her character laments how she’s viewed because of her weight, and it’s genuinely heart-wrenching. she can play a dramatic character with depth, but she almost never gets the chance, ironically for the same reason as her character in that movie. i have to imagine the role of jennyanydots was changed because the writers thought “oh, well, if it’s rebel wilson, we should make her funny! and we’ll make fun of fat people while we’re at it!” i genuinely think that if rebel had been given the role of a strict but doting motherly character, she would’ve clutched it. but they didn’t really give her that, did they?
it seems (to me) that its relatively straightforward that tugger likes or is otherwise fascinated with mistophelees because the latter finds him “a terrible bore” and doesn’t heap attention onto him, and as has been said, tugger doesnt like what he can easily get and enjoys the chase of trying to win or earn mistophelees favor
The only good thing about Cats 2019 is that I saw the Sideways Cats Video and got interested enough to watch Cats 1998 (then proceeded to watch it 15 times in 2 days)
Same! I went from a fan of musicals who had never bothered with Cats to a diehard supporter. It's such a great show! I regret all those years spent not watching it. 😅
Bro misto is by far my FAVORITE character and when I saw the movie and saw that not only he sung it by himself, he also was the most shy cat AND THEY DIDNT EVEN CAST A DANCER. I literally cried
I KNOW RIGHT. I left that theatre baffled. Especially because Jacob Brent’s interpretation is such a fan favourite. Like, Bustopher Jones and Jennyanydots were the most butchered but Mister Mistofelees (and pouncival) is my favourite so it hurt so much more 😔😔
@@Gracehasyoutubeand I hate how many fat jokes they made about jenny and bustopher like in the musical being fat is praised because it means that they get fed well and they all want that so it’s so stupid to watch all the fat jokes they make🤦♀️
@@-snowballbunny-5316 they read the first line of the song only and ran with it 😭😭 His only personality was “omg Victoria 😍😍” and “I’m so shy teehee 🙈👉👈”
@@-snowballbunny-5316 also Jennyanydots isn’t even described as a fat cat. She loses her large coat after like 5 minutes. Like she has amazing agility for being one of the oldest cats. I know she’s lazy but like, I have a dog who sleeps all day and she is tiny. Also, Jenny literally fangirls after saying that bustopher jones is a 25 pounder. The cats love him for that. He’s the refined uncle they all want to be. It’s crazy that a book that was written in the 1930s and a musical created in the 1980s has a more positive outlook on being fat than 2019
The Jellicles: Our leader has been kidnapped, and the majority of us are badly injured. RTT: Yeah, but have I ever told you all how cool my boyfriend is?
I have this theory that the backstory between Demeter and Grizabella might be that Grizabella lashed out at her before. Maybe when she was getting old enough that she was having trouble being the Glamour Cat, but before she was rejected by the clan, she got jealous of another queen getting the attention and admiration *she* used to get. Especially if Grizabella was also used (and abused/abandoned) by Macavity, Demeter might have seemed like the cat who was "replacing" her. It's just my theory, and specifically for the 1998 version, but it would fit why the older cats seem so defensive of kittens when Grizabella is around ("what if she lashes out again?" they worry) and why Demeter in particular seems to have so many mixed feelings about her ("If Macavity treated her the way he treated me, I do feel bad for her, but that's still the cat that hurt me badly.") Also Bombalurina looking the MOST scornful, since she's definitely the female cat who's closest to Demeter, no matter whether the production interprets them as sisters, girlfriends, besties, etc. Also, if the movie version *needed* to have a het romance subplot, Demeter and Munkustrap were Right There. Just sayin', Tom.
What a great movie to watch instead of this where our characters were Demeter and Grizabella instead of Victoria Like a talented enough writer can pull a tapestry of backstory from basically any character. This is not what happened here.
As a cat person who always had 1-3 cats at home plus a couple friendly street cats I loved the musical for how much personality every cat has, even the background ones! You can pick one character to follow and be like that sure is a cat! The movie did them all so dirty, Tom Hooper give me my pack back
Same. I can watch the musical on a loop. I'm so torn about the movie because on one hand, who doesn't love a train wreck?, but it also could have been so much better.
I'm really glad you made this video, I haven't seen many videos of people actually mentioning how they completely obliterated the characters. The characters in the musical have great dynamics and interactions with each other, and Tom just threw that out the window. It's like he completely misread all these characters it's genuinely shocking how wrong he got them. He did Misto sooo dirty. (Also why the hell is Rum Tum Tugger dressed like a pimp??!?!??!)
@@briandaaranda9735just because somerton’s a creepy hack doesn’t mean all queer history is boring and a waste. No, things were not better for queer people in the 80s, and the fluctuations in overt queerness succeeding in popular art without ever being directly acknowledged, while queerness offscreen and off stage is still demonized and persecuted. This is an incredibly interesting and dense topic. Just because queer art and art made by queer people is, if it’s accepted at all, sanitized and cannibalized by a patriarchal, comphet culture. It’s incredibly interesting Like yeah haha cute it was the 80s when the colors. Okay?
@@Lucifersfursona Oh, I think I didn't get my tone across properly. Sorry about that. Let me clarify: I love the musical Cats, and I myself am queer. This was meant as more of a gentle teasing? I would 100% watch this video essay if it was made.
I never cared for cats growing up, so when my cats-obsessed friend got me to watch the recording of the musical, and told me about how Mr Mistofolees and RTT were clearly gay i was taken aback. But after watching it, i actually kinda got it, RTT literally sings Mr’s song doesn’t he?
@@AnEmu404 That he does! And it's a stark contrast to how the rest of the cats sing about each other: think Munkustrap singing about Jennyanydots is more like a kid singing about his grandma or an older aunt, with respect and family love but that's about it. And it's clear everyone admires Bustofer Jones, but again, in a more "I want to be that!" rather than a "I want a piece of that!" way. Meanwhile, another song that has characters who were canonically and romantically (or at least physically) involved with each other is when Demeter and Bombalurina sing about Macavity.
I was just re-watching the video on cats by Sideways. This video is so good. It’s so hard to find content talking about the original Cats musical. This is one of my fave videos. Omg. I didn’t realize you were the one that made the TMNT videos! I subbed for that but this video is so good. I literally am obsessed with this channel
its strange how bland they all look in the movie, like all of them are the same dusty light brown which makes them look like naked people more than cats
They really just look a LOT like naked people. The only things they've got are cat ears, tails, and some halfassed spots and stripes. The stage costumes don't just have floofy bits to suggest an actual coat of fur, but also legwarmers to thicken their limbs to look a little less human and more paw-like. It's little touches like that that make them actually CAT-like. The film is using nothing but CGI and it barely tries to make them cats. They don't even have cat noses!
as an adult who used to be a child autistically obsessed over this musical, THANK YOU. so much of the criticism this movie got genuinely refused to accept there was anything about the individual cats that people could actually like lol. great video and I'm barely 25 minutes in!!!!
I love that Sideways has left a cultural legacy I'm the Cats 2019 review space. Like I don't think I've seen a Cats 2019 video that doesn't mention it. It even gets a shoutout in a Drawfee video (which is a comedy art channel that has nothing to do with film review)
My headcanon for grisabella, based on a theory that one of the others is her child, though don't remember the name, is that she abandoned her kitten in the name of glamour and fame. It would line up with the lyrics, and biting sarcasm about her "glamorous" life, as well as justify the hate of everyone..she didn't just go with mcavity, she betrayed someone in the name of herself.
Honestly Grizzabella abandoning her kids makes SOME sense of you really think at how angry Munkustrap and Tugger look, even if the other cats act the same there’s a specific kind of disdain those two have for her, so it’s a theory that HAS backing
And it'd make more sense when Old Deut wants her back in. He can't touch her first because he needs to get others to accept her. And it'd be harder to get his sons to accept her back if they know she's abandoned them, and I can see a kid looking at their parent with those looks if they knew that parent abandoned them.
Victoria getting abandoned hurts because she's a kitten. Not to mention, with how many cats have collars, you can tell this is a mix of both stray and pets. The play says that they all gather once a full moon appears, and that's once a year. This is their family get-together. And for me, Victoria with her pristine white coat is a pet. Edit: Mungojerry and Rumpleteazer as well because they talk about a family and they knocked down a vase in a library. And they also have collars Rumple even having a fancy pearl necklace
I loved the video! Bustopher Jones has always been one of my favourite cats and my headcanon based on the last part of his song is that while he's posh, he knows that he's very privileged and that there are better cats to be chosen for the Heaviside Layer ("I'm still in me prime, I shall last out me time"), and the reason for his absence in the musical after his number is due to that, and/or the fact he has eight or nine clubs to attend to.
Lovely video! Like Sideways focused his analysis so well on the musical part, your analysis of the actual characters and their relationship with each other, and the MAJOR role it has to appeal to the audience was so very good. Lovely video I’ll definitely rewatch💛💛💛
Pretty sure in canon, Rum Tum Tugger and Mistoffelees are house mates, belonging to the same human family. You ca ntell by the lyrics that Rum Tum Tugger sings, saying "I've known the family to call him in from the garden for hours." The family. Not "his family," but the family. Rum Tum Tugger was there to witmess their shared owners call Mistoffelees in.
The Hadestown fandom is rabid about bootlegs because actors are all encouraged to put their own stamp on their characters, from the leads to the trombonist (there's one touring swing who has a different name and backstory for every position in the chorus he plays). The amount of variety you get with this approach leads to a lot of curiosity about anyone who so much as touches the show.
Just as an aside re: making Cats the new Room, I’m on a Rocky Horror Shadow Cast and we tried to do a screening of Cats and Hooper personally shut it down because “he doesn’t want his movie to turn into some midnight screening nonsense”
I hate what they did by having the cats sing about _themselves_ instead of _eachother._ There's a huge difference between Jellylorum singing about Jennyanydots that "she's deeply concerned with the ways of the mice", and Jenny singing that about herself. The former is her friends hyping her up as this kind and caring person. The latter sounds like a politician's statement (especially with how they decided to slow down on that verse). Ohh and don't get me started on making Misto sing about himself instead of having Tugger do it--!
this is incredible. It's so refreshing to have a perspective on the show from an actual fan of the musical instead of all the film guys who just went and saw that it was a shitty movie, not bothering to find out any of the legit plot or characterization It was supposed to have. I would gladly listen to multiple hours of you just imparting all the cats knowledge you have into my brain
the Cats movie not being gay is just the biggest insult to the fandom. I am not a huge Cats fan, but we all love Cats because its weird and gay and not the least bit ashamed of being that. The movie however is trying SO hard to be "normal" and "make sense", effectively destroying everything that makes Cats Cats. Also none of the characters are recognizable, in being "realistic" all the cats just blend together. Loved the video!
I would always obsess over a different cat every week due to the costuming in the stage version, watched the movie and was SOOO disappointed. Macavitys design was so good in the stage play why tf did they do that to him in the movie
As someone who is not a part of the cats fandom but did watch the '98 stage show, it shocks me to learn that there is so much about these characters that I missed.
I really enjoyed this! While I'm not a fan of Cats, I found myself repeatedly defending it after the movie came out. Even though it's not my kind of thing, it's a solid piece of theatre, with good reason as to why it ran on broadway (and the west end) for so long, and I'm sick of the same old 'haha, cats is dumb' pile-on this musical gets because of the movie. It was really great to hear what was wrong with it from someone who actually LIKES the musical
I never got Demetet and Bomb, but after your explanation I totally get it. And Tugger and Misto are obvious but never explicit. The ambiguity is honestly just part of the queerness of the show. The relationships are fun and a little messy but this is so clearly a chosen family that care for each other. By removing so many character interactions from the movie, it removes the queer ambiguity of the whole thing and that's really sad because in 2019 people are a lot more accepting of explicit queer storylines
As an asexual I probably missed a load of that stuff and so don’t have as many ships as others (although I do agree with Misto and Tugger). But even then there is so much ambiguity that there’s never much drama over disagreements between seeing characters as siblings or a couple. That being said, imo Mungo and Rumple are siblings, as are Victoria and Misto
i don't think I will ever stop being mad at this movie tbh especially after learning we could've had an animated 2d cats with a story set in WW2 London but it was scrapped 😭 such a missed opportunity. and a thing that made me the most mad about this film is like. Jason Derulo is the PERFECT cast for Rum Tum Tugger and it still sucks 😭 like how do you fuck up JASON DERULO as rum tum tugger it's unbelievable
I'm gonna bring up the CGI (but not exactly)... but only because I believe the artist, LavenderTowne drew up a real pretty idea for the costuming. Her video is titled: FIXING THE CATS MOVIE [it's not the cgi it's the design] She uses an idea where they wear masks instead, similar to masquerades. It'd be a very different take than the original cats, but for a movie remake, it could be neat.
i am so thankful you spoke about the inherent queerness in cats. while i like rum and misto (the little look misto gives rum in the 1998 musical just when he’s about to bring old deutoronomy back lives in my head rent free) i think Demeter and Bombalurina are so underrated when their relationship has so much potential. two exes of the same abusive POS finding comfort and love in each other, bonding over their shared experiences and becoming overprotective? AND they’re sapphics? give me ten of those! btw, which rendition is this from? i kinda need it now or i’ll die 1:13:33
The fics I could (and am) writing about Demelurina-! Tuggoffelees will probably always be my fav Cats pairing but the girls just have so much potential!
@@rabnerd28 the girls need more attention imo, i hope this year we get more content of them. and thank you!! the curtain call now will help me through the day 😭🙏
One of the most basic things they screwed up was just scale. The cats are constantly growing and shrinking with respect to their environment. How does someone make such basic mistakes. I adore prop making and set dressing. When I get a chance to decorate for a local show I will sit there agonizing over details the audience cannot see like which books a character would have on their desk. The amount of basic incompetence on screen is staggering. Details can be overlooked on stage, but on screen you have to expect people will zoom in on any detail. And I don't blame the cast and crew for the most part, near everything seems to come down to Hoopers decisions.
I just realized with everything going on the filmmakers accidentally made Taylor Swift into Macavity She's the only one who fits the lyrics description
To me the beauty of cats is that so much of the world is flexible, and therefore as a creator you can create and build on the base very easily. the movie ended up just keeping the characters and world as blank-slate as possible which offered nothing unique (the few character and story choices they DID make were the most basic low hanging fruit ideas too, like the fat cats being slobs and 'the loser gets the girl' storyline). LOVED watching this i agree with basically all of your takes as a fan from before the movie :D
The way you described Demeter and Bombalurina's relationship (which I totally agree with) is like that one episode of Courage the Cowardly Dog with the Bunny and Cat (girl)friends lol Also, THANK YOU for saying they totally ruin the community the cats have. Hearing people who have only seen the movie describe the cats as selfish and mean are missing out on LITERALLY every other production. Like these cats love each other and come together, it makes me so mad.
11:56 Skimbleshanks’s mustache disappears. RIP CGI department you went through hell it’s ok you deserve cookies there was no saving this movie. Also even when Skimbleshanks is not dancing and he’s sitting HE IS STILL TAPPING HIS FOOT TO KEEP EVERYONE IN TEMPO
As mad as I am about this movie, the way you talked about Tugger and Mistoffelees absolutely made my day! I tried to mention their complex relationship in the stage show to a friend of mine recently and only got hit with "why are people shipping cats?", so I'm glad I'm not as alone in this as I feared
Aside from this being a fantastic video (really fun editing and writing, thank you for the obvious work you put in because the result was excellent), it is SO cathartic to hear you mention Sideways' Cats video and specify that you miss his work because i do as well! It hurts that genuinely talented people get driven away from sharing their creations because some people are just shitty/lack empathy. They left youtube for totally different reasons but both Sideways and Lindsay Ellis ultimately are no longer here because of poor behavior from other people making the space inhospitable, and that leaves me feeling bitter. Didn't mean to get so dark there at the end, but regardless, thank you again for such a fun video, as a mere casual/incedental Cats enjoyer I learned so much about characters and production history. 😊 (Completely unrelated, but I remember seeing a segment on Reading Rainbow as a little kiddo (maybe 7 or 8 years) about theater makeup and the subject was showing an actresses' transformation into Grisabella, into a cat. And I vividly remember being in awe at the beauty of the painted markings, the creativity of the costuming, and the subtlety of the physical acting. And that's not even factoring in getting to hear that big note in Memory for the first time. At that young age it was magical to see how someone somewhere had figured out such a thorough way to make you believe a person was a different creature entirely. And now that I'm jaded and exhausted by adulthood and late-stage capitalism, I see the utter lack of creative energy put into the character and "costume" designs in this film and I almost feel like we deserve this punishment in some way. Lmao.)
this is my favorite cats video essay. i’ve watched a ton of them but this is the one which feels most knowledgeable and passionate about cats itself. a lot of video essays have some amount of pointing and laughing or not taking cats seriously. which is valid somewhat, it’s a silly musical, but cats has a lot more going on than the surface level weirdness. and it’s so nice to have a video that meets it on its level, cuts past all that, and talks about all the nice little details of the musical
Hi! Absolutely loved the video, you brought up a lot of points that I really feel others have missed, and it's making me feel very validated. What I also think the movie missed out on was the fact that the original poems are not only playing on cat stereotypes, but also mixes in more well known human stereotypes from the first half of the 1900's! Like how Macavity is based on Moriarty, Bustopher is an Edwardian gentleman etc. It feels like they missed out on so many inspirations they could have used to make the characters interesting and fun to watch! But I am also disappointed in the fact that we never really get to see that many background interactions - you pointed out several of them during your video, and they bring so much life to the whole musical! That's part of why I love the musical - everyone has a specific character when on set, and focusing more on the cats as a group would've given everything so much more depth and heart.
it is so fucking insane that they wrote a whole song that’s like “wow grizabella you’re actually being really ungrateful” it is like so actually crazy such a serious profound misunderstanding that she acts like that and no one ever smacks her down.
like excuse me??? this old woman stumbling thru the streets who’s been shunned from her ppl??? and you’re telling her “at least you had that before” helloooooooo
Personal experience with seeing a touring production a couple of years ago. Until then, I’d only seen the ‘98 video production, and I hadn’t watched that for over ten years, so I remembered only bits and pieces. I missed many of the implied relationships and such then. Saw the live performance and immediately clocked that Rum Tum Tugger was hardcore into Mephistopheles. The difference of seeing the performance and only listening to the album was made crystal clear then.
Watching the clips when you spoke about Demeter and Grizabella made me read into it that she sees herself in Grizabella. They were both in a relationship with Macavity and then discarded, and Demeter could have easily been in Grizabella’s place (rejected and cast out). So she is kind of scared of Grizabella because of that idea that the Jellicles as her new family could turn on her too (but that is then resolved when they accept Griz back in)
As a hardcore 1998 Cats fan this is the Cats review video I've been waiting for! Like you said, the characters are so well-defined in the stage version and the relationships between them are so clear. The perfect example of show, don't tell. And what was done to my girls Demeter and Bombalurina in the movie is a crime! Tomothy, I will never forgive you.
Okey, so I might kinda disagree with being so sure about what is canon and what is not - I feel like things being left for interpretation plays a big role in cats comunity. But I do am glad that finally there's a video that shows the depth of the original story and how much they shallowed it down in the movie. Hope this video will get lots of views so people who watched movie will know what cats were in original
THANK YOU for making this! I feel like you literally took all the thoughts from my brain and made it into a video. I’ve watched so many cats reviews and critiques and they hardly go into the actual cats’ characters and relationships to each other, and how they were butchered. There’s so much personality and story in the little moments that happen during the numbers, especially off to the side or in the background. I feel like Tom watched the show once with it playing in background while he was on his phone and then wrote the movie based on that. So happy I now have another cats video to rewatch all the time along with Sideways’ video 😊
(Now I can finally write my essay because I’ve finished the video) OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR MAKING THIS VIDEO It’s so refreshing to see someone make a video on Cats that actually cares and is a fan of the musical. It’s either film guys who don’t understand or fans of musical theatre that still feel like they don’t actually get it. I finally feel satisfied that a discussion around cats is about the characters and not just the cgi. I feel like if I were to make a video, this is what would come out of my mouth. I think it does not just show why the 2019 version is bad (I could go on forever) but why the musical is so good. Everyone makes fun of the “no story” and calls out “furries” without realising what actually makes it work. 1. Songs- I love Andrew Lloyd Webber. His songs are phenomenal and also slightly crazy. I hate that the musicals boils down to …oh fun songs… more fun songs… ✨MEMORY✨… , when honestly memory isn’t even in my top 5 songs. Each song is so masterfully crafted to show the character’s personality through the instrumental alone. The poetic lyrics teeter between funny and creepy and the 80s synths are just so good. The show is basically an opera/ballet and would not survive without the high quality of songs. 2. Dance - the reason why it’s ok that the plot is so flimsy. The songs and vague explanations that munkustrap makes do not convey even half of the story that the dance and movement does. Gillian Lynn’s choreography is so iconic and I think that is why the movie falls flat. Yeah they “hired professional dancers mostly” (I’m still baffled that MISTER MISTOFELEES was played by a guy that could not dance) but the dance seems more as a facilitator like a regular musical. The musical tells the story through the moves that imprint in your minds and are the focal part of the show. It’s why Skimble shanks (2019) worked - they actually did something iconic and memorable. The musical is a 1980s conglomerate of commercial jazz, tap, ballet and modern dancing and that’s what makes it so distinct. The ballet mimics the body language of cats, instead of having them just crawl around on the floor. It’s a musical that MUST be told through movement and is bolstered through the limitations of theatre. 3. Personality - it’s what this video describes so well. It’s why we still care about the wrongdoings of the 2019 movie. It’s why the costumes in the musical feel so lively. It’s why the community under the UA-cam videos of the 1998 vers discuss every detail and point out every new discovery. It’s why we have head cannons. It’s why we care about a bunch of humanoid cats that lyrics are written like 2D villains in musical theatre theory. It’s why I can say that pouncival, a cat with next to no lines and who looks like every other kitten, is my favourite cat. I think the song and dance make it the spectacle musical, but it’s the cats and the mystery behind their characters that make them stick. I love musicals that follow a person through their life and explains their motivations and faults (e.g falsettos), but it’s another thing to have a musical so unexplained and out there, that it somehow forces you to care. The movie not only suffers from emphasising the wrong personality but also by having next to none. It’s just a bunch of cats we don’t care about because of their short screen times and little redeeming qualities. They really just love themselves a lot and want to die lol. The movie is so surface level that this is the flaws that people think that the musical has. Oh god.. if anyone actually read that, thanks for giving me a place to rant after 5 years
Love seeing video essays on cats so thank you. Bombalarina and demeter were done so dirty in the movie. Those 2 are my favorite (and I personally ship em). Like both have really good characterization and I love demeter's backstory and Bombalarina has such a good voice in the 98 film. Like I can talk about them so much but I must stop. Very good video, I haven't seen anyone get this deep for this many characters
Thank you for voicing all the opinions that have been screaming in my brain since I saw the Cats movie on Christmas Day by myself as a treat. I wrote out a script about each cat and how they fucked them up and how I felt about each portrayal and literally skimbleshanks and munkustrap were the only ones I could accept and didn't get completely torn to shreds. But you've taken my feelings and backed them up with so much lore that I didn't even know, with knowledge of Broadway shows passed and fan head cannon. This is better than anything I could have made and completely embodies my Cats fangirl soul - thank you for your hard work and dedication to the jellicle family
Rum Tum Tugger singing Mr Mistoffelees' song is literally that "If I had a lame-ass boyfriend I would hype him up so much I'd make him wait outside and be like ok here comes the specialest boy ever if you don't cheer & clap for him imma burn this whole building down" tumblr post.
In terms of ships, I do operate under the idea that the answer is always yes. Minus those who could be siblings, I think all the ships are canon. No such thing as monogamy in my Cats! I have always shipped Munk and Misto, but I also love Tugger and Misto. I think Munk and Demeter have some ing and Tugger and bomba have something. They are all just vibing and being gay and happy with each other.
Honestly yeah, cats in real life aren't really monogamous, so I feel anyone can be with anyone. Honestly, for all I care all the cats can be bi. There's no reason to think the opposite. I'm personally on board with Bomba, Demeter and Munk being a thruple where Demeter is just with both of them,
The 2019 movie was as if Tomothy sent some poor PA to watch the stage show, and they fell asleep in places, panicked and made some shit up to look professional, and Tomothy was just like "Yeah that'll do"
You blew my mind with some of your ideas that could have made the movie more engaging! Bustopher Jones, unlike you, is one of my favorite characters and musical numbers and it always bothered me how they ruined him in the movie! Bustopher likes good food and would never be caught dead eating from the trash!! I liked you idea of actually showing him going to these places he sings about. I hadn't heard many people talk about him outside of James Corden bad and fat jokes so I'm glad you brought up other aspects of his character.
Had this video on while making pasta in the kitchen and kept bursting out in started laughter. It's so cool seeing passionate people going OFF about the stuff they love. Excellent analyses and perfect comedic timing.
this is a great video essay! i love seeing a a critique from a more fandom sort of perspective! you brought up so many points about characterisation i hadnt even gotten to thinking about because cats 2019 just blinds me with so many basic misteps i dont even see more sometimes. and you've def inspired me to watch more productions of cats, i wanna see more interpretations! definitely a fav fideo essay and im going to force everyone i know who's watched sideways video to also watch this 👍
Im only up to your talking about Macavity, but since i have to take a break before continuing to watch i wanted to adress something you mentioned: there is, in fact, a book of backstories for the cats, and i know this because the mother of my childhood best friend is a professional dancer and was cast as Victoria for a big international production of Cats (that im not going to mention to not dox myself). What happens apparently is that when youre cast you get a booklet with your cat's backstory - yes, even the ensamble cats - to help with characterization. A thing she told me they did was keep the big aspects in - like Demeter having a sexual history with Macavity - but that productions were given some leeway to play around with details or to fill in some things here and there so that the gist of it will never change but each production still feels unique. For example, Munkustrap and Tugger are always siblings but whether they are Old Deut's sons is up for the production, or sometimes even the cast, to decide. You keep alluding to it so im sure youre going to mention it, but for example in the production Im familiar with because my friend's mom shared all the juicy Cats tea with us, of course Tugger and Mistofeeles are best friends (roomates, even) but a detail I always loved was that Tugger is not actually aware that Magical Mister Mistofeeles and Mistofeeles are in fact the same cat. Theres a Clark Kent/Superman situation going on and the dancers used it as fuel for their characterization; where it contributed to Mistofeeles teasing and rolling his eyes at Tugger because boy is blind and keeps fanboying at him about his alter ego who isnt even subtle. Cats!!! Edit: I'm back and I'm now convinced there is SOMETHING in those character booklets because why else would virtually every single performer for Tugger and Mistofeeles I've ever seen or heard of ship it in some capacity if there wasn't???
honestly this is the scathing critique I was craving, when the cats movie came out and I was going to rowdy screenings it was so hard to articulate the reasons why it was bad but like, 3 layers deeper than "movie ugly" that requires a lot of buy in and passion for the original they neutered both macavity and mistoffolees's songs (pun intended) and I'm still not over it!! also I have enough hospice animal trauma that memories should make me cry every time and the movie one didnt, not a measurable quantity but still not great
FINALLY someone talks about Demeter!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was SHOCKED and HORRIFIED when I found out what the movie did to her. JUSTICE FOR MY GIRL!!!! There's SO much implied with her in the stage show and they did NOTHING with her????? They made Macavity a more important part of the plot and they CUT DEMETER?????? You want to make Cats have a more detailed and complex plot? MAKE IT ABOUT DEMETER, BOMBALURINA, GRIZABELLA, MACAVITY, AND THE HISTORY BETWEEN THEM????? (note that I don't want this for Cats, I like the show as is, but if you **had** to give it a plot that's what I would do) WHYWHYWHY WOULD YOU MAKE BOMBA EVIL?????? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT FOR HER????? AUGH. THEY DID THE GIRLIES SO DIRTY. I can't even start with Misto... the poor boy deserves better as well.....
one other thing I could see for why Tomathy thought Misto and Victoria would make a good couple was for the most shallow reason ever, when standing next to each other they aesthetically kinda resemble a bride and a groom
As a fan of the original musical this is the video I've been waiting for! I think that people who haven't seen cats think it's just a wacky show but every 1998 movie fan knows that you can rewatch it millions of times and still notice new things in the background. There are a lot of hidden acting choices that give life to the characters and make the story engaging and fun. Also I've seen a couple of people actually liking Tugger in the movie and I can see why compared to others but as you've explained... something is missing and he's a different character. Also he's straight. And I have to say I loved the movie Skimbleshanks too and as a fan of that particular Mad Hatter I'm pleasantly suprised that they are both played by the same person.
I think a big part of not being able to identify the Chorus Cats in the film is down to Hooper's insistence on "realism". In the stage show, the cats have more varied colors and patterns, to the point of not being likely to find in a real cat. In the movie, it seems like all the Chorus Cats are made generic tabbies. Only Misto and Buster are black and white, instead of a few cats with various black and white markings. Only Mungo and Teezer seem to be calico cats, instead of... well, a LOT of Chorus Cats having calico like colors.
I was 5 years old when the 1998's video was released. And honestly, today I don't remember if I saw it first or the Polish version in the theatre, but together with "Fiddler on the Roof", Cats made the main reason why I fell in love in musical genre so much (and later with ballet, opera, operetta, etc.) And I remember myself CRYING in the cinema watching Tom's "Les Mis" because I couldn't believe a director can miss the point so much. And then when I heard he would be directing "Cats" I was like "OH HELL NOPE". Thank you for your amazing work, it was pleasure to watch
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! I feel like even videos that did not just follow the trend to react to Cats made by people completely unfamiliar with the musical weren't by people coming from the actual fandom and completely missed out the biggest appeal to a lot of fans: The characters and their dynamics and how much wiggle room you have in interpreting them and how rewarding repeat watches are to spot little background details or interaction, or seeking out new porductions to see their interpration of the characters and their dynamics, in a a lot of ways the ansamble being a tribe/family and all their relationships is what's holding together the musical not the plot and it's completely missing from the movie, and to me that's what makes it a horrible adaptation and a deeply un-fun watch. As a theatre enjoyer I love seeing different porductions/casts permorming the same play, I love how even when no lyrics or plot has been changed just the acting choices can make it a drascticly different story/character, in Phantom Raouls can be sweet baby angels or in the case of the 25th anniversary a bit of an irritable asshole lol, Carmen operas can be about this vile seductress or about a creepy obsessive dude not letting go of his ex and it's all in the performance, I love theatre for this! and a last note but you sold me on Bomba/Demeter, I didn't see it before but my eyes have been opened. also what a cool observation about why Rumple anf Mungo sing their own song, also something I never thought about but it makes so much sense! along with the other observations about which cat sings which songs! all around this video is such a treat to my cats fan heart, thank you for your hard work!!
I think one of the biggest changes the movie makes from the stage show- that then causes a lot of these character issues- is that they don’t have the entire cast present for the whole movie. Having celebrities who can’t handle duets and aren’t able to be around for all of filming hurt this movie SO much. It’s why they had everyone singing about themselves too, which also hurts characterization. In the stage show, (almost) the entire cast is on stage the entire time- even during other people’s numbers where they don’t sing, they’re in the background somewhere doing something, and this is how you get those moments of characterization, where they react to numbers and interact with other cats. But in the movie, the big stars come in, sing one or two numbers, make a few quips, and disappear- you don’t get the sense that these cats are all interacting together like a family, you don’t see how they react to other minor events really. So you’re losing their sense of place within the big cats family, and all those little moments of ‘lore’ that the stage musical fandom has picked up on and expanded. It really just makes it feel soulless.
I agree with everything in this video. I'm not the biggest cats fan, but I was always drawn to the way that the different cats would interact with each other. It's like a case study in ensemble characterization, and it's beautiful because it knows what it is, even if it isn't the greatest musical of all time. Only thing I'd like to call out is that as a big musical theater fan, looking for bootlegs from various dates and things like that absolutely are a thing. It's especially prominent when bootlegs are scarce and/or when they're of a production that changed significantly (i.e. you showed clips of cinderella vs bad cinderella, and I definitely want a boot of bad cinderella because I know there were significant changes and I want to see them for myself) But it's a market. People will look for which productions have their favorite actor, how portrayals differ, etc. I went through a huge phase of the phantom of the opera final lair and finding all the different ways people will play that scene. There are full compilations of a number of scenes in a number of shows comparing portrayals. But I can fully understand why in cats, a show which is arguably more about the characterization than most other musicals, that would be such a key part of the fandom. If I love seeing the different ways the phantom is played, what about the ways the characters like victoria are played when they have such minor roles and so little to go on, and yet they're so important? There's a lot that's great about cats, and the characterization is at the top of the list by far
I've always said about RTT is he's an audience aid. He exists to show you the cats you should **automatically** respect. Because he's originally shown to be this cat who KNOWS he's cool and has such a high regard of himself, and he sings about himself to *show* that high regard. So when he sings about Old Deut and Misto, it immediately signals to the audience "These two are important. Even RTT respects them, so you should as well." Which is a needed aid for them both, with Old Deut coming in late, and Mistoffelees being quiet/more background up until his own song. His character is 100% in those two songs, and he exists to show the audience the big red sign saying "RESPECT THESE TWO!!! RESPECT THESE TWO!!!" Yes, to a degree, you'd get the "RESPECT OLD DEUT" just from Munkustrap singing, but if it was a Munkustrap solo in the original filmed version, it wouldn't set Old Deut apart from Jenny Any Dots really, since he sings with reverence about her too. It's RTT also singing with reverence about Old Deut that signals his status/deserving of respect. RTT is a beacon of which cats to respect inherently. To take that away from him, is character assassination.
@@Gracehasyoutube YES. The fact that he absolutely ignores her or outright glares the whole time speaks VOLUMES about how all the cats generally view Grizabella. It's so important to keep RTT's respect for who he respects or you cheapen his character, Grizabella's emotional plight, and so so so many other things.
I love long videos ripping into the glorious disaster that was Cats (2019), and did not think there would be another one. This was great, and I learned things about the show I had not known. 😊
This video came to me when I was just beginning a breakup with someone I really loved and I had never seen Cats 1998 or the 2019 one or anything! Because of this incredible explanation, I decided to watch the 1998 film and was so overjoyed by the beautiful music and deep backstory created by fans it made everything a lot easier to deal with ❤️
I'm so glad to see someone who actually likes the musical talking about Cats (2019). I feel like all the videos that came out in early 2020 were from people who never would've liked a *good* Cats movie (and Lindsay Ellis). I could've accepted some different characterizations if they were... good? Like you, I value the original portrayals of the characters (or at least the ones I'm most familiar with: the '98 movie), but I could've lived with it if their reinterpretations in 2019 weren't all boring choices that detract from the story instead of creating one. I'm fascinated to hear you call Munkustrap the older brother because I always thought Rum Tum Tugger was the older brother. That probably has more to do with my relationship with my sister than anything in the 'stage show or the 98 movie. I never got the implication that Grizabella was tied to Macavity. Is Grizabella not a sex worker? That's always what I thought was meant by "Glamor Cat," right? Like, calling her that feels sarcastic, but it must mean something in the context of her past. "Touch me/It's so easy to leave me." On the one hand, maybe it doesn't make sense for the alley cats that are dry humping the whole show to shame a sex worker, but to me because that was always the obvious interpretation of the text, I assumed these anthros must have a line they won't cross.
I know I'm late to the party, but I have to thank you for this video. I never went to see the CGI movie, I've only ever watched all the bad review vids about it, none of which ever delved into characterisation. Having watched your analysis now I'm kinda back to my old CATS obsession I had ten or so years ago after seeing the musical and then reading EVERYTHING about all the different cats. I guess now I'm gonna binge-watch CATS stuff on YT again ... Thank you for bringing it all back to me.
You made me fall in love with musical! (I watched it and liked it but I am not as attentive plus english isn't my first language so all in all, cool dancing and songs, not much of understanding xD) I would love to see you talk more about musical if you want to =3
I feel like if the movie was the story of Munkustrap coming into his own as a leader and Demeter fleeing Macavity, it might have been an improvement. Stop making Victoria do public speaking, she just wants to dance!
I really hated how most reviews of Cats were people actively saying either that they hadn’t seen the show or didn’t like it. I grew up loving the show, I wore out that vhs as a kid. And I hate the movie so much for how it ruins what makes it as good as it is. And they cut the weird dog part which I just wanted to see them do in the weird cgi style.
The Battle of the Pekes and the Pollicles is my favorite. I don't like "Growltiger's Last Stand" and it's the one that most productions use nowadays, but I feel like it's completely out of place in the show. They could've done so many things with this movie and they did the worst ones in the worst way.
@@briandaaranda9735 I thought that most US/UK productions nowadays removed Growltiger's Last Stand because it was considered to include racist portrayals of Asians? And they moved Pekes & Pollicles from Act I to Act II to replace it. I think I read about it somewhere. The funny thing is in the ASIAN tours they keep both Pekes & Pollicles and Growltiger in their original order, so you can see the original, unabridged version of the whole show, and nobody's ever cried racist (at least not in Taiwan, which is where I'm from)
I’m so glad there are people shitting in this movie *for the right reasons* . Most of the general audience crap on this movie for being ugly, which is true. But that’s a rather small issue in a movie that has MANY significantly bigger problems. This movie isn’t just ugly, it’s also an incredibly awful adaptation and completely butchers everything that made the stage musical work so well. Also, I love the 2016 Broadway Revival choreography and I will die on that hill.
Whenever i talk to someone about this movie i ALWAYS mention that their biggest crime is turning the Rumpleteazer and Mungojerrie cool ass stage musical song into a Spoken Word Poem and it just KILLS the vibe
1:26:47 So I was rewatching the Sideways Cats video and I have know realized that I took this line right from his video and I didn't even realize it. I literally talked about how he's been plagiarized before and here I am plagiarizing him...fuck!
Also to everyone asking, the body totem pole is from Hannibal and I'm referring to the musical based on the movie when I mention Legally Blond. I know it's based on a movie.
Ironic... You could save others from plagiarism, but not yourself.
In all seriousness, though, I consider it a coincidence if anything.
I love rewatching his videos, they're so good and never get old for me
Subconscious plagiarism is very understandable, especially when you own up to it. Even more so since you told people to go watch his video ☺️
hbomber is coming for you!!
Tomska plagarised Hbomberguy’s video idea, but its got a pretty good measure of different types of plagarism and how bad they are. Accidentally saying exactly the same thing as someone else is pretty common, you’re all good! And great video btw
They did the musical so dirty with the movie, honestly. The touch at the end of Memory is one of the sweetest, most poigniant moments in the show because the kitten that sings with Grizabella is the youngest. She's the baby. And Victoria is supposed to be a debutante, having just reached the age of finding a mate (the cat who dances with her during her solo) AND she's the pure white cat touching the "dirty old has-been". It is literally breaking a cycle of generational trauma and fear. It has to be the new generation showing the old generation the way.
I always headcanon-ed that all the Jellicles have owners because they all have collars except for Grizabella, and it's said that her coat is torn and stained, so I interpreted that as her having mange, which is why some of the cats are more scared than angry at her. They don't want to catch what she has, but touch is how real-life cats mark someone as safe.
Also, my poor boy Mr. Mistofeles is supposed to be a showy, flashy, almost arrogant young magician, not... the anxious mess he was in this film. And yeah, like you said, Mungojerrie and Rumpleteaser are mischievous, but not evil, and they're more teasingly flirty than outright seductive.
The choreography is brilliant in how it invokes feline behaviour and body language through the spectacle of dance, which is why people either love or hate Cats. The 2019 movie shits all over this in favour of well, whatever TF Hooper was doing. 😅
In Cats 1998 (and some other stage productions I've seen) , Mungojerrie was also one of the first to join in fighting Macavity when Munkustrap and Alonzo fell. It's like Hooper was blind or something smh
I always assumed that Grizzabella got hit by a car and abandoned. She limps, and she can't clean herself correctly.
If she was meant to be one of MacCavitity's lovers, he doubtless left her for dead and she wasn't welcome back to the Jellicles until the end of the stage show.
But the way Jenifer Lawrence hit those notes😮💨 I literally almost cried, that song was the one redeeming moment of the film for me
@@davidfl4 for sure! The only part where I had emotion
Tugger singing Misto's song is so good because he's a performer, he's a rockstar, and he's looking at this less confident cat and being like "I will hype this guy UP!" and it works so well! I don't think anyone else singing it would work.
And if he's Munkustrap's younger brother, it makes sense that he would take over leadership (briefly) when his dad is missing and his brother is recovering from the fight with Macavity (I still can't believe they didn't leave that in the movie...). He is a contrarian cat, but Tugger cares about his family and his tribe. Of course he wouldn't let them be lost and afraid, not if he has a say in it!
i once saw a headcanon post that was pretty much trying to find a middleground between the musical and the movie, the idea being that misto is all confident and brilliant when he's performing magic but absolutely terrible at socialising off-stage. something something misto being a nervous wreck during his number in the movie because his hype man/boyfriend wasnt there. which isnt true but i think whoever made that post thought tugger was kidnapped by macavity during misto's song and i think its very funny akfksdngsd
Misto isn’t even that unconfident, he’s just quieter. But that’s why having a hype man works. I’ve never seen them as a couple, per se, but I’ve always loved their power duo dynamic. It’s like a Vegas act in a way
However ORIGINALLY it was.sung by Misto himself. ('81 London version) I think they changed the character here, becauae the choreo is so difficult it need 1.a ballett dancer, who not neccessarily can sing 2. it requires breath control, which is almost impossible to achieve.
Also it fits the character of Misto more, than him singing about himself.
@@richardkovacs2006 Makes sense, especially since Misto doesn’t even seem to have a dozen lines in the show. He really is one of the more quiet characters so it makes sense he wouldn’t sing his own song
it was actually Steven McRae's idea to add tap dancing to the Skimbleshanks number. I guess Skimble really wont let anything go wrong.
Funny that, all of the better numbers are performed by dancers or professional singers. 😅
I actually unironically listen to and prefer the movie’s version of Skimbleshanks The Railway Cat over the original, it’s just that. Damn. GOOD. I don’t even care about the awful effects or the fact that Hooper has no idea how proportioning works. I’m just having too much fun watching Steven clack his way through the number. He just oozes confidence and I watch his performance and I BELIEVE that this train NEEDS Skimble or it can’t function. And given how the music sounds, you can bet they were thrilled to finally be following a performer around who knows what timing is
@@SitaraAleuI love that album version cuts down on the tap interlude enough that it's still an interesting addition but doesn't completely break the flow
@@Solavi Yessss! 😁😁😁
@@SitaraAleu Absolutely. Also I think in general his pants and lil cute conductor costume actually saved him from a lot of the uncanny valley of the cgi. The disruption from the monocolor means he seems less weird and i think makes our brains look at him more like the characters from like Rango or something instead of looking like the rest of the horror show.
Another thing about the skin-colored cats: brown cats are INCREDIBLY rare. It's not even that they're trying to show a realistic array of fur patterns, those fur patterns are actively unrealistic to be that prevalent.
There's a reason Cassandra is the only brown cat in the show
Yeah, the brown color in cats is usually chocolate, which is a pretty rare shade - you usually don't see it outside of shows. (It's a little more common in Asia than in Europe and North America, but this is London, so.) There's also the Burmese gene, which turns black into a dark brown (sable), but again, that's not something you run into very often - it's a lot less common than the standard colorpoint gene. So yeah, most people will never even see a solid brown cat in person.
A realistic assortment of cats would have a lot of brown tabbies and some gray or orange, lots of cats with white markings, some tux cats, MAYBE a solid black or white here and there, and an assortment of torties/calicos. Not this.... whatever is happening here.
When I found this video I literally said out loud, “Finally, some delicious fucking food.” Many of the early criticism of CATS 2019 came from people who were neutral or hated the show all along. It was revelatory to have a FAN critique the film in how it fundamentally failed its characters. I was in the CATS fandom trenches back in the day, and had to witness this movie with two of my friends who played Bomba and Demeter, respectively. It was awful in ways that haters don’t understand.
You touched on the blandness of the cats designs in the film, mostly resulting in bland coloring and little defining features. But I also wanted to add that there was a distinct lack of diversity of breeds of cats. The costume designs in the stage show are so intentional to be reminiscent of actual cats - Tugger is a Maine Coon, Cassandra is an Abyssinian, Grizzabella could be Persian - that the same just, generic cat look for EVERY character was just,,,weird? Like the lyrics say that are Jellicles black and white and of moderate size, but the costuming celebrates more than one type of cat. I understand that might have been a challenge for the CGI, overworked and underpaid as the artists were, but it’s like HMMM. Maybe this show is so visually iconic for a reason!
That's what I can't understand; where did all the cat breeds go?
The Musical deserved so much better.
💯 You said this so well and I know exactly what you mean! This video scratched a serious itch for me too.
I think a multi animator project set to the musical done by a bunch of warrior cats fans would be a much more enjoyable movie
absolutely. like, it would be better than even an official movie would be
no fr ive considered animating the whole musical before. i'm pretty amateur but it would still look better than the 2019 cgi
also werent there rumors that there was actually going to be a 2d animated cats film??
@@coyotixOh man! I'd love to see at least one song animated! I've always thought it would be so cool to see CATS animated.
@@SugarSpice07 ever seen the mungojerrie and rumpleteazer animation by yamz animatics? it's perfect!
If your implying 2d animated quadrupedal cats I have questions. The singing could be handled , it would be 2d lion king facial animation. The dancing ? Quadrupedal serious dancing. How ? The Hotness ? How would this idea appeal to anyone who is not a furry ?
Ill be honest, Bustofer Jones, I also interpreted/headcannoned him having relatively rich owners, but also that he's one of those cats that has several different owners/homes that feed him, and also regularly gets table scraps from restaurants and such.
Still a shame how the 2019 movie did him dirty. (He also is not my favorite or anything, but like! A fat character from an older piece of media being more respectfully treated than the modern version is.... Something. Hey! Tommy! James! Your bias is showing!)
In the musical, Bustopher Jones is an incredibly successful cat. He's the St. James Street cat, so even though he's (potentially?) a stray, he goes around to all the posh restaurants and gets the kitchen scraps from the cooks every single day. He has a lot of good, fancy food every day without having to work for it (i.e. he's no "commonplace mouser").
To the Jellicles, he's essentially the idle rich. Of course they admire him and his comfortable lifestyle!
In the movie? "Ha ha, let's all laugh at James Corden being fat and gross!"
AND he's a gentleman! His "coat of fastidious black" and "impeccable back" mean that he spends hours grooming himself because he cares about his appearance. He wouldn't be caught dead in a trash can.
@@UrpleSquirrel yeah this was my interpretation too, that he was one of those strays that get "adopted" by all the fancy restaurants in the area and gets fed all the fancy leftovers all the time, going from restaurant to restaurant.
I mean he us called "The Cat About Town"
And mentions at the end of ghe first verse having 8 or 9 clubs so yeh he's def that cat that goes abd gets fed by everyone- by the rich people. Cat is well loved and fed by everyone in the community
Such a great point!!
They added an "audience insert" character, but from what I've experienced in Cats, most people dont say "oh, that character is so me" or "Oh, I have a friend who's just like that," like most media does. Rather, it's "my cat does that all the time!" It's supposed to be a characterization of Cat Archetypes, not People Archetypes. A self-insert character makes no sense!
That's exactly it. Every cat owner reading those poems can nod sagely and be like 'Ah, yeah, I've met this one'. Jennyanydots, the comfy plump housecat who naps all day and gets mega zoomies at 3 AM. Rum Tum Tugger, the cat that just will not stop demanding things and then act like that's not what he wanted. Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer, forces of chaos that are only barely disguised as cats. Mistoffelees, the cat who comes and goes like he can teleport, you swear you heard him on the roof five minutes ago but he's right here sleeping, what the hell-
I’m convinced every hollywood movie producer has the same big checklist of things that have to be in a script. They get an intern to read the scripts that get submitted to them for approval and if the intern has not checked every box the script gets rejected.
At least on fight scene
At least one explosion
Romantic interest between leads
Audience View point character
Happy ending
villan with back of match box motivation
Etc
I legitimately, not once, even realized that Cassandra was even in the 2019 movie until your video. I *cannot* tell the cats apart in that movie other than maybe 5 or 6. I even confused Victoria with other cats constantly.
That is my biggest problem with modern CGI. In an attempt to look realistic, they've sacrificed all style. It was also my biggest gripe with The Lion King.
The tones in this movie are all depressing neutrals... Beige bordedom to the max, very "Skims"
It makes so much sense why Tugger would sing about Misto, because Tugger is so confident and charismatic that he has the ability to really rope you in. If Tugger is so excited about this magical cat, then surely he must be a big deal! Let's find out if this magical cat has what it takes!- is what the vibe is, to me, because when Tugger takes to the stage, /all/ the other cats watch him.
That's why that number works for me, on top of the chemistry there
...the social dynamics of Grizabella being RTT and Munk's mom who abandoned them gives so much to chew on and im gonna rewatch 1998 with that lens
I always thought she was their mother as well.
I remember thinking that Macavity, Tugger and Munkustrap were all brothers because they made like a ... bad/good gradient, with Macavity the bad boy, Tugger the silly "bad" boy and Munkustrap the responsible guy. I had no basis for this beyond my sense that Tugger and Munkustrap were *definitely* brothers and just slotted Macavity into that. Purely based on my eight billion rewatches of the VHS where I exhaustively slotted everyone into family trees.
I had a feeling that they were all three brothers as well, glad to know I wasn't the only one.
Hm, I could see it. That would explain why Munk seems to take Macavity's activities way more personally than the other cats.
Your not the only one at the time
If you also happen to ship Tugger+Misto, and you've got nothing against Misto and Victoria being siblings, and you don't mind reading fanfiction, then I really recommend one on AO3 titled "Defences against Terrible Bores" by Maliex (there's also a 2nd and a 3rd part, they're called differently but they're all one story, the whole series is called "There's No Doing Anything About That"). It's fantastically written, actually emotionally fulfilling with both goofy and very serious moments, includes all characters (it's written mostly from the perspectives of Misto, Tugger and Victoria, and a bit of Munkustrap), and heavily contributed to what I actually have as my headcanon
@@shiningfennec2360 Thank you, I am absolutely going to give that a try!!
Okay so I own an enormous press kit for the movie, which includes a section that goes over each character in detail (& it’s actually super interesting). This Macavity is on the last of his nine lives and THAT’S why he’s so desperate to be chosen to be reborn. But they didn’t actually say or show it in the movie at ALL 🙃
There was actual thought and they didn't give any effort to have in conveyed in the film! Also, how did you get that cuz I want that now.
That would've been incredible to see! Plus, it would add to Grizabella's plight as well. Maybe she's also in the last of her lives. Maybe her motive is about as selfish as Macavity, but she's trying to redeem herself vs he just wants to keep his life of crime.
@@briandaaranda9735I never thought Grizabella was actually aiming to be the one to be reborn. It always seemed that she just didn't want to be an outsider anymore. The idea that she's on her last life and is reborn instead of simply embraced gives a bit of sadness or almost horror to the end of the show. She tried so hard to be accepted back, and when she gets that, she's sent off again to do the whole mess over instead of finally getting to rest as a part of the family she so desperately wanted.
@@Theroha You make a good point! I feel like Grizabella gave me that vibe in the 90s version of the movie for sure. This movie, not so much.
Hi I’m late but do you have any photos of any of that posted somewhere? This is my comfort musical and I’d love to read some of that ^^
I was never a fan of Cats, but I am a fan of Les Miserables, and now knowing that the guy who did the terrible Les Miz movie also did Cats makes a lot of sense for why fans of Cats hated the film, lol. Stop giving this man access to well-known, well-liked, and well-respected musicals!
I don’t think that they’ll give him another musical. He only won Oscars for Le Miz, and the failures of Cats and Dear Evan Hansen will probably put the nail on the coffin of the idea of musicals as oscar bait.
omg that les mis movie was awful😭 it hurts me badly as a fan that its a lot of peoples’ only knowledge of/exposure to the musical.
I don't think Tom Hooper would ever get an opportunity to direct a big budget musical movie again. The failure of "Cats" hurt his career so much, it would need a miracle for him to bounce back.
That and the bombings of unrelated West Side Story, Cyrano, and all those lackluster Disney movies. I'd say most of the musical movie genre is being kept on life support by those terrible remakes, and its only a matter of time before the "I want a movie to babysit my kid" club go somewhere else. If my history of Hollywood serves me any good, normally when these big budget musicals bomb, they put the whole genre on hiatus for decades. I fear we are getting close to those times again.
So although he may be active, musicals themselves may be sparse for a while.
This movie hurts more than the face-palm I did explaining that Victoria was a kitten to my sibling who has seen the musical more than I have.
Every time I’m in a local play or musical, the actors get creative and come up with some crazy backstory for their characters, even if they’re canon fodder. And I feel like CATS made that into an art form.
Bruh I was in a guys and Dolls production with some insane backstories.
You gotta have your motive down pat! Otherwise, your performance feels flat and unrealistic. You have to assume that eyes will be on you, even if it's just your family who came out to see you.
Ye, I watched CATS at my local theater because I was curious about the trailer of 2019 CATS. Iwas absolutely mesmerized by how so good the music is, how the performers did props and dancing, just everything was a spectacle!!! And then I was heavily disappointed when I watched the CATS 2019 again...they did it so dirty...
I had to play ‘the manager’ in a kids theatre club production of ELF the musical (no joke) and the character is originally a man but im AFAB and i didn’t change the lines about him having a wife.
Still proud that I made history as the first lesbian character on stage in that club.
One thing I love about the '98 musical is Tugger and Jemima's relationship. He seems to dote on her like a younger sister and it's just so wholesome.
There's all these little interactions between characters that you won't catch on the first watch, or even the fifth. I get something new every time I watch it.
That's the fun of 98 and just most productions of Cats. Noticing all the little background details.
Also, totally agree on Jem and Tugg. Though I personally headcanon them as uncle and niece.
The bit where he strokes her chin is just so adorable; it made me wish I was in a production just so I could play around as a cat with other people dressed as cats. Like, it's such a great opportunity to show affection between characters, because cats are cuddly and affectionate - if you feel awkward (as an actor) about doing that, Cats isn't the musical for you, sorry.
honestly, Rebel Wilson DOES have range. there’s a scene in The Hustle where, if i recall correctly, her character laments how she’s viewed because of her weight, and it’s genuinely heart-wrenching. she can play a dramatic character with depth, but she almost never gets the chance, ironically for the same reason as her character in that movie. i have to imagine the role of jennyanydots was changed because the writers thought “oh, well, if it’s rebel wilson, we should make her funny! and we’ll make fun of fat people while we’re at it!”
i genuinely think that if rebel had been given the role of a strict but doting motherly character, she would’ve clutched it. but they didn’t really give her that, did they?
it seems (to me) that its relatively straightforward that tugger likes or is otherwise fascinated with mistophelees because the latter finds him “a terrible bore” and doesn’t heap attention onto him, and as has been said, tugger doesnt like what he can easily get and enjoys the chase of trying to win or earn mistophelees favor
The only good thing about Cats 2019 is that I saw the Sideways Cats Video and got interested enough to watch Cats 1998 (then proceeded to watch it 15 times in 2 days)
Same! I went from a fan of musicals who had never bothered with Cats to a diehard supporter. It's such a great show! I regret all those years spent not watching it. 😅
Same thing happened to me!! Got SUPER into it. I even got lucky enough to see a touring production a few years ago.
had to double check that I didn't write this comment lol do we have the same life???
Same!
Bro misto is by far my FAVORITE character and when I saw the movie and saw that not only he sung it by himself, he also was the most shy cat AND THEY DIDNT EVEN CAST A DANCER. I literally cried
I KNOW RIGHT. I left that theatre baffled. Especially because Jacob Brent’s interpretation is such a fan favourite. Like, Bustopher Jones and Jennyanydots were the most butchered but Mister Mistofelees (and pouncival) is my favourite so it hurt so much more 😔😔
@@Gracehasyoutube ikr I hate how fucking shy they made him it’s painful to watch😔
@@Gracehasyoutubeand I hate how many fat jokes they made about jenny and bustopher like in the musical being fat is praised because it means that they get fed well and they all want that so it’s so stupid to watch all the fat jokes they make🤦♀️
@@-snowballbunny-5316 they read the first line of the song only and ran with it 😭😭
His only personality was “omg Victoria 😍😍” and “I’m so shy teehee 🙈👉👈”
@@-snowballbunny-5316 also Jennyanydots isn’t even described as a fat cat. She loses her large coat after like 5 minutes. Like she has amazing agility for being one of the oldest cats. I know she’s lazy but like, I have a dog who sleeps all day and she is tiny.
Also, Jenny literally fangirls after saying that bustopher jones is a 25 pounder. The cats love him for that. He’s the refined uncle they all want to be.
It’s crazy that a book that was written in the 1930s and a musical created in the 1980s has a more positive outlook on being fat than 2019
The Jellicles: Our leader has been kidnapped, and the majority of us are badly injured.
RTT: Yeah, but have I ever told you all how cool my boyfriend is?
I have this theory that the backstory between Demeter and Grizabella might be that Grizabella lashed out at her before. Maybe when she was getting old enough that she was having trouble being the Glamour Cat, but before she was rejected by the clan, she got jealous of another queen getting the attention and admiration *she* used to get. Especially if Grizabella was also used (and abused/abandoned) by Macavity, Demeter might have seemed like the cat who was "replacing" her.
It's just my theory, and specifically for the 1998 version, but it would fit why the older cats seem so defensive of kittens when Grizabella is around ("what if she lashes out again?" they worry) and why Demeter in particular seems to have so many mixed feelings about her ("If Macavity treated her the way he treated me, I do feel bad for her, but that's still the cat that hurt me badly.") Also Bombalurina looking the MOST scornful, since she's definitely the female cat who's closest to Demeter, no matter whether the production interprets them as sisters, girlfriends, besties, etc.
Also, if the movie version *needed* to have a het romance subplot, Demeter and Munkustrap were Right There. Just sayin', Tom.
What a great movie to watch instead of this where our characters were Demeter and Grizabella instead of Victoria
Like a talented enough writer can pull a tapestry of backstory from basically any character. This is not what happened here.
As a cat person who always had 1-3 cats at home plus a couple friendly street cats I loved the musical for how much personality every cat has, even the background ones! You can pick one character to follow and be like that sure is a cat! The movie did them all so dirty, Tom Hooper give me my pack back
Same. I can watch the musical on a loop. I'm so torn about the movie because on one hand, who doesn't love a train wreck?, but it also could have been so much better.
I'm really glad you made this video, I haven't seen many videos of people actually mentioning how they completely obliterated the characters. The characters in the musical have great dynamics and interactions with each other, and Tom just threw that out the window. It's like he completely misread all these characters it's genuinely shocking how wrong he got them. He did Misto sooo dirty. (Also why the hell is Rum Tum Tugger dressed like a pimp??!?!??!)
You know, there SHOULD be a video essay about the inherent queerness in the Stage Show of Cats. That would be great.
Shortest video essay ever, lol. "It was Broadway in the 80s. What else did you expect?"
@@briandaaranda9735just because somerton’s a creepy hack doesn’t mean all queer history is boring and a waste. No, things were not better for queer people in the 80s, and the fluctuations in overt queerness succeeding in popular art without ever being directly acknowledged, while queerness offscreen and off stage is still demonized and persecuted. This is an incredibly interesting and dense topic. Just because queer art and art made by queer people is, if it’s accepted at all, sanitized and cannibalized by a patriarchal, comphet culture. It’s incredibly interesting
Like yeah haha cute it was the 80s when the colors. Okay?
@@Lucifersfursona Oh, I think I didn't get my tone across properly. Sorry about that. Let me clarify: I love the musical Cats, and I myself am queer. This was meant as more of a gentle teasing? I would 100% watch this video essay if it was made.
I never cared for cats growing up, so when my cats-obsessed friend got me to watch the recording of the musical, and told me about how Mr Mistofolees and RTT were clearly gay i was taken aback. But after watching it, i actually kinda got it, RTT literally sings Mr’s song doesn’t he?
@@AnEmu404 That he does! And it's a stark contrast to how the rest of the cats sing about each other: think Munkustrap singing about Jennyanydots is more like a kid singing about his grandma or an older aunt, with respect and family love but that's about it. And it's clear everyone admires Bustofer Jones, but again, in a more "I want to be that!" rather than a "I want a piece of that!" way.
Meanwhile, another song that has characters who were canonically and romantically (or at least physically) involved with each other is when Demeter and Bombalurina sing about Macavity.
I was just re-watching the video on cats by Sideways. This video is so good. It’s so hard to find content talking about the original Cats musical. This is one of my fave videos. Omg. I didn’t realize you were the one that made the TMNT videos! I subbed for that but this video is so good. I literally am obsessed with this channel
Whatever happened to Sideways anyway?
@@ButtercupJr He got plagiarized by a bunch of people with bigger followings and more power. It really killed his motivation to keep making videos.
@@rabnerd28that is actually depressing, he is one of my favourite creators. Actual musical analyst are so few and far between
its strange how bland they all look in the movie, like all of them are the same dusty light brown which makes them look like naked people more than cats
They really just look a LOT like naked people. The only things they've got are cat ears, tails, and some halfassed spots and stripes. The stage costumes don't just have floofy bits to suggest an actual coat of fur, but also legwarmers to thicken their limbs to look a little less human and more paw-like. It's little touches like that that make them actually CAT-like. The film is using nothing but CGI and it barely tries to make them cats. They don't even have cat noses!
as an adult who used to be a child autistically obsessed over this musical, THANK YOU. so much of the criticism this movie got genuinely refused to accept there was anything about the individual cats that people could actually like lol. great video and I'm barely 25 minutes in!!!!
I'm an adult STILL artistically obsessed with it😂
I love that Sideways has left a cultural legacy I'm the Cats 2019 review space. Like I don't think I've seen a Cats 2019 video that doesn't mention it. It even gets a shoutout in a Drawfee video (which is a comedy art channel that has nothing to do with film review)
This comment section is not safe from Drawfee discourse
Drawfee mention teehee
My headcanon for grisabella, based on a theory that one of the others is her child, though don't remember the name, is that she abandoned her kitten in the name of glamour and fame.
It would line up with the lyrics, and biting sarcasm about her "glamorous" life, as well as justify the hate of everyone..she didn't just go with mcavity, she betrayed someone in the name of herself.
Honestly Grizzabella abandoning her kids makes SOME sense of you really think at how angry Munkustrap and Tugger look, even if the other cats act the same there’s a specific kind of disdain those two have for her, so it’s a theory that HAS backing
And it'd make more sense when Old Deut wants her back in. He can't touch her first because he needs to get others to accept her. And it'd be harder to get his sons to accept her back if they know she's abandoned them, and I can see a kid looking at their parent with those looks if they knew that parent abandoned them.
Victoria getting abandoned hurts because she's a kitten. Not to mention, with how many cats have collars, you can tell this is a mix of both stray and pets. The play says that they all gather once a full moon appears, and that's once a year. This is their family get-together. And for me, Victoria with her pristine white coat is a pet.
Edit: Mungojerry and Rumpleteazer as well because they talk about a family and they knocked down a vase in a library. And they also have collars Rumple even having a fancy pearl necklace
I loved the video! Bustopher Jones has always been one of my favourite cats and my headcanon based on the last part of his song is that while he's posh, he knows that he's very privileged and that there are better cats to be chosen for the Heaviside Layer ("I'm still in me prime, I shall last out me time"), and the reason for his absence in the musical after his number is due to that, and/or the fact he has eight or nine clubs to attend to.
Lovely video! Like Sideways focused his analysis so well on the musical part, your analysis of the actual characters and their relationship with each other, and the MAJOR role it has to appeal to the audience was so very good. Lovely video I’ll definitely rewatch💛💛💛
Pretty sure in canon, Rum Tum Tugger and Mistoffelees are house mates, belonging to the same human family. You ca ntell by the lyrics that Rum Tum Tugger sings, saying "I've known the family to call him in from the garden for hours." The family. Not "his family," but the family. Rum Tum Tugger was there to witmess their shared owners call Mistoffelees in.
The Hadestown fandom is rabid about bootlegs because actors are all encouraged to put their own stamp on their characters, from the leads to the trombonist (there's one touring swing who has a different name and backstory for every position in the chorus he plays). The amount of variety you get with this approach leads to a lot of curiosity about anyone who so much as touches the show.
Just as an aside re: making Cats the new Room, I’m on a Rocky Horror Shadow Cast and we tried to do a screening of Cats and Hooper personally shut it down because “he doesn’t want his movie to turn into some midnight screening nonsense”
I hate what they did by having the cats sing about _themselves_ instead of _eachother._
There's a huge difference between Jellylorum singing about Jennyanydots that "she's deeply concerned with the ways of the mice", and Jenny singing that about herself. The former is her friends hyping her up as this kind and caring person. The latter sounds like a politician's statement (especially with how they decided to slow down on that verse).
Ohh and don't get me started on making Misto sing about himself instead of having Tugger do it--!
this is incredible. It's so refreshing to have a perspective on the show from an actual fan of the musical instead of all the film guys who just went and saw that it was a shitty movie, not bothering to find out any of the legit plot or characterization It was supposed to have.
I would gladly listen to multiple hours of you just imparting all the cats knowledge you have into my brain
Even half of the reviews from theatre fans end up dumping all over the original musical too 😭
the Cats movie not being gay is just the biggest insult to the fandom. I am not a huge Cats fan, but we all love Cats because its weird and gay and not the least bit ashamed of being that. The movie however is trying SO hard to be "normal" and "make sense", effectively destroying everything that makes Cats Cats. Also none of the characters are recognizable, in being "realistic" all the cats just blend together.
Loved the video!
I would always obsess over a different cat every week due to the costuming in the stage version, watched the movie and was SOOO disappointed. Macavitys design was so good in the stage play why tf did they do that to him in the movie
As someone who is not a part of the cats fandom but did watch the '98 stage show, it shocks me to learn that there is so much about these characters that I missed.
It's stuff you pick up on rewatch I won't lie
I really enjoyed this! While I'm not a fan of Cats, I found myself repeatedly defending it after the movie came out. Even though it's not my kind of thing, it's a solid piece of theatre, with good reason as to why it ran on broadway (and the west end) for so long, and I'm sick of the same old 'haha, cats is dumb' pile-on this musical gets because of the movie. It was really great to hear what was wrong with it from someone who actually LIKES the musical
There is something so queer about the stage play. Its hypersexual and tiuchy feely and flashy and campy in a way the film cats just, arent
I never got Demetet and Bomb, but after your explanation I totally get it. And Tugger and Misto are obvious but never explicit. The ambiguity is honestly just part of the queerness of the show. The relationships are fun and a little messy but this is so clearly a chosen family that care for each other. By removing so many character interactions from the movie, it removes the queer ambiguity of the whole thing and that's really sad because in 2019 people are a lot more accepting of explicit queer storylines
As an asexual I probably missed a load of that stuff and so don’t have as many ships as others (although I do agree with Misto and Tugger). But even then there is so much ambiguity that there’s never much drama over disagreements between seeing characters as siblings or a couple.
That being said, imo Mungo and Rumple are siblings, as are Victoria and Misto
@@wrenmassey6876Yeah. The ambiguity and chosen family aspect also make them more believable and realistic as cats.
i don't think I will ever stop being mad at this movie tbh especially after learning we could've had an animated 2d cats with a story set in WW2 London but it was scrapped 😭 such a missed opportunity. and a thing that made me the most mad about this film is like. Jason Derulo is the PERFECT cast for Rum Tum Tugger and it still sucks 😭 like how do you fuck up JASON DERULO as rum tum tugger it's unbelievable
I'm gonna bring up the CGI (but not exactly)... but only because I believe the artist, LavenderTowne drew up a real pretty idea for the costuming. Her video is titled: FIXING THE CATS MOVIE [it's not the cgi it's the design]
She uses an idea where they wear masks instead, similar to masquerades. It'd be a very different take than the original cats, but for a movie remake, it could be neat.
this video is my roman empire for real… we could’ve been okay
i am so thankful you spoke about the inherent queerness in cats. while i like rum and misto (the little look misto gives rum in the 1998 musical just when he’s about to bring old deutoronomy back lives in my head rent free) i think Demeter and Bombalurina are so underrated when their relationship has so much potential. two exes of the same abusive POS finding comfort and love in each other, bonding over their shared experiences and becoming overprotective? AND they’re sapphics? give me ten of those!
btw, which rendition is this from? i kinda need it now or i’ll die 1:13:33
The fics I could (and am) writing about Demelurina-! Tuggoffelees will probably always be my fav Cats pairing but the girls just have so much potential!
Don't have the full show, but it's from this specific curtain call from the most recent asia tour ua-cam.com/video/vbFR75W9Kgo/v-deo.html
@@rabnerd28 the girls need more attention imo, i hope this year we get more content of them. and thank you!! the curtain call now will help me through the day 😭🙏
One of the most basic things they screwed up was just scale. The cats are constantly growing and shrinking with respect to their environment. How does someone make such basic mistakes. I adore prop making and set dressing. When I get a chance to decorate for a local show I will sit there agonizing over details the audience cannot see like which books a character would have on their desk. The amount of basic incompetence on screen is staggering. Details can be overlooked on stage, but on screen you have to expect people will zoom in on any detail. And I don't blame the cast and crew for the most part, near everything seems to come down to Hoopers decisions.
I just realized with everything going on the filmmakers accidentally made Taylor Swift into Macavity
She's the only one who fits the lyrics description
Hmm.. would it have been better or worse if she took the role as macavity instead of solo "Bootleg would be an insult to actual bootleg" Bomba
To me the beauty of cats is that so much of the world is flexible, and therefore as a creator you can create and build on the base very easily. the movie ended up just keeping the characters and world as blank-slate as possible which offered nothing unique (the few character and story choices they DID make were the most basic low hanging fruit ideas too, like the fat cats being slobs and 'the loser gets the girl' storyline). LOVED watching this i agree with basically all of your takes as a fan from before the movie :D
The way you described Demeter and Bombalurina's relationship (which I totally agree with) is like that one episode of Courage the Cowardly Dog with the Bunny and Cat (girl)friends lol
Also, THANK YOU for saying they totally ruin the community the cats have. Hearing people who have only seen the movie describe the cats as selfish and mean are missing out on LITERALLY every other production. Like these cats love each other and come together, it makes me so mad.
11:56 Skimbleshanks’s mustache disappears. RIP CGI department you went through hell it’s ok you deserve cookies there was no saving this movie.
Also even when Skimbleshanks is not dancing and he’s sitting HE IS STILL TAPPING HIS FOOT TO KEEP EVERYONE IN TEMPO
The second you started saying "WHERE IS IT" I was hoping for a super cut of the tandem cartwheel. Thank you for not disappointing ❤️
As mad as I am about this movie, the way you talked about Tugger and Mistoffelees absolutely made my day! I tried to mention their complex relationship in the stage show to a friend of mine recently and only got hit with "why are people shipping cats?", so I'm glad I'm not as alone in this as I feared
Tugoffelees is the biggest ship in the Cats Fandom, so you are definitely in good company my friend😉
Aside from this being a fantastic video (really fun editing and writing, thank you for the obvious work you put in because the result was excellent), it is SO cathartic to hear you mention Sideways' Cats video and specify that you miss his work because i do as well! It hurts that genuinely talented people get driven away from sharing their creations because some people are just shitty/lack empathy. They left youtube for totally different reasons but both Sideways and Lindsay Ellis ultimately are no longer here because of poor behavior from other people making the space inhospitable, and that leaves me feeling bitter.
Didn't mean to get so dark there at the end, but regardless, thank you again for such a fun video, as a mere casual/incedental Cats enjoyer I learned so much about characters and production history. 😊
(Completely unrelated, but I remember seeing a segment on Reading Rainbow as a little kiddo (maybe 7 or 8 years) about theater makeup and the subject was showing an actresses' transformation into Grisabella, into a cat. And I vividly remember being in awe at the beauty of the painted markings, the creativity of the costuming, and the subtlety of the physical acting. And that's not even factoring in getting to hear that big note in Memory for the first time. At that young age it was magical to see how someone somewhere had figured out such a thorough way to make you believe a person was a different creature entirely. And now that I'm jaded and exhausted by adulthood and late-stage capitalism, I see the utter lack of creative energy put into the character and "costume" designs in this film and I almost feel like we deserve this punishment in some way. Lmao.)
this is my favorite cats video essay. i’ve watched a ton of them but this is the one which feels most knowledgeable and passionate about cats itself. a lot of video essays have some amount of pointing and laughing or not taking cats seriously. which is valid somewhat, it’s a silly musical, but cats has a lot more going on than the surface level weirdness. and it’s so nice to have a video that meets it on its level, cuts past all that, and talks about all the nice little details of the musical
Hi! Absolutely loved the video, you brought up a lot of points that I really feel others have missed, and it's making me feel very validated. What I also think the movie missed out on was the fact that the original poems are not only playing on cat stereotypes, but also mixes in more well known human stereotypes from the first half of the 1900's! Like how Macavity is based on Moriarty, Bustopher is an Edwardian gentleman etc. It feels like they missed out on so many inspirations they could have used to make the characters interesting and fun to watch! But I am also disappointed in the fact that we never really get to see that many background interactions - you pointed out several of them during your video, and they bring so much life to the whole musical! That's part of why I love the musical - everyone has a specific character when on set, and focusing more on the cats as a group would've given everything so much more depth and heart.
it is so fucking insane that they wrote a whole song that’s like “wow grizabella you’re actually being really ungrateful” it is like so actually crazy such a serious profound misunderstanding that she acts like that and no one ever smacks her down.
like excuse me??? this old woman stumbling thru the streets who’s been shunned from her ppl??? and you’re telling her “at least you had that before” helloooooooo
Personal experience with seeing a touring production a couple of years ago. Until then, I’d only seen the ‘98 video production, and I hadn’t watched that for over ten years, so I remembered only bits and pieces. I missed many of the implied relationships and such then. Saw the live performance and immediately clocked that Rum Tum Tugger was hardcore into Mephistopheles. The difference of seeing the performance and only listening to the album was made crystal clear then.
Watching the clips when you spoke about Demeter and Grizabella made me read into it that she sees herself in Grizabella. They were both in a relationship with Macavity and then discarded, and Demeter could have easily been in Grizabella’s place (rejected and cast out). So she is kind of scared of Grizabella because of that idea that the Jellicles as her new family could turn on her too (but that is then resolved when they accept Griz back in)
As an EXTREME adorer of the original VHS version (I wore my tape out), I don't care how late this is, I'm going to enjoy this so much.
As a hardcore 1998 Cats fan this is the Cats review video I've been waiting for! Like you said, the characters are so well-defined in the stage version and the relationships between them are so clear. The perfect example of show, don't tell. And what was done to my girls Demeter and Bombalurina in the movie is a crime! Tomothy, I will never forgive you.
Okey, so I might kinda disagree with being so sure about what is canon and what is not - I feel like things being left for interpretation plays a big role in cats comunity. But I do am glad that finally there's a video that shows the depth of the original story and how much they shallowed it down in the movie. Hope this video will get lots of views so people who watched movie will know what cats were in original
THANK YOU for making this! I feel like you literally took all the thoughts from my brain and made it into a video. I’ve watched so many cats reviews and critiques and they hardly go into the actual cats’ characters and relationships to each other, and how they were butchered. There’s so much personality and story in the little moments that happen during the numbers, especially off to the side or in the background. I feel like Tom watched the show once with it playing in background while he was on his phone and then wrote the movie based on that. So happy I now have another cats video to rewatch all the time along with Sideways’ video 😊
(Now I can finally write my essay because I’ve finished the video)
OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR MAKING THIS VIDEO
It’s so refreshing to see someone make a video on Cats that actually cares and is a fan of the musical. It’s either film guys who don’t understand or fans of musical theatre that still feel like they don’t actually get it. I finally feel satisfied that a discussion around cats is about the characters and not just the cgi. I feel like if I were to make a video, this is what would come out of my mouth.
I think it does not just show why the 2019 version is bad (I could go on forever) but why the musical is so good. Everyone makes fun of the “no story” and calls out “furries” without realising what actually makes it work.
1. Songs- I love Andrew Lloyd Webber. His songs are phenomenal and also slightly crazy. I hate that the musicals boils down to …oh fun songs… more fun songs… ✨MEMORY✨… , when honestly memory isn’t even in my top 5 songs. Each song is so masterfully crafted to show the character’s personality through the instrumental alone. The poetic lyrics teeter between funny and creepy and the 80s synths are just so good. The show is basically an opera/ballet and would not survive without the high quality of songs.
2. Dance - the reason why it’s ok that the plot is so flimsy. The songs and vague explanations that munkustrap makes do not convey even half of the story that the dance and movement does.
Gillian Lynn’s choreography is so iconic and I think that is why the movie falls flat. Yeah they “hired professional dancers mostly” (I’m still baffled that MISTER MISTOFELEES was played by a guy that could not dance) but the dance seems more as a facilitator like a regular musical. The musical tells the story through the moves that imprint in your minds and are the focal part of the show. It’s why Skimble shanks (2019) worked - they actually did something iconic and memorable. The musical is a 1980s conglomerate of commercial jazz, tap, ballet and modern dancing and that’s what makes it so distinct. The ballet mimics the body language of cats, instead of having them just crawl around on the floor. It’s a musical that MUST be told through movement and is bolstered through the limitations of theatre.
3. Personality - it’s what this video describes so well. It’s why we still care about the wrongdoings of the 2019 movie. It’s why the costumes in the musical feel so lively. It’s why the community under the UA-cam videos of the 1998 vers discuss every detail and point out every new discovery. It’s why we have head cannons. It’s why we care about a bunch of humanoid cats that lyrics are written like 2D villains in musical theatre theory. It’s why I can say that pouncival, a cat with next to no lines and who looks like every other kitten, is my favourite cat. I think the song and dance make it the spectacle musical, but it’s the cats and the mystery behind their characters that make them stick. I love musicals that follow a person through their life and explains their motivations and faults (e.g falsettos), but it’s another thing to have a musical so unexplained and out there, that it somehow forces you to care.
The movie not only suffers from emphasising the wrong personality but also by having next to none. It’s just a bunch of cats we don’t care about because of their short screen times and little redeeming qualities. They really just love themselves a lot and want to die lol. The movie is so surface level that this is the flaws that people think that the musical has.
Oh god.. if anyone actually read that, thanks for giving me a place to rant after 5 years
Love seeing video essays on cats so thank you. Bombalarina and demeter were done so dirty in the movie. Those 2 are my favorite (and I personally ship em). Like both have really good characterization and I love demeter's backstory and Bombalarina has such a good voice in the 98 film. Like I can talk about them so much but I must stop.
Very good video, I haven't seen anyone get this deep for this many characters
Thank you for voicing all the opinions that have been screaming in my brain since I saw the Cats movie on Christmas Day by myself as a treat. I wrote out a script about each cat and how they fucked them up and how I felt about each portrayal and literally skimbleshanks and munkustrap were the only ones I could accept and didn't get completely torn to shreds. But you've taken my feelings and backed them up with so much lore that I didn't even know, with knowledge of Broadway shows passed and fan head cannon. This is better than anything I could have made and completely embodies my Cats fangirl soul - thank you for your hard work and dedication to the jellicle family
Rum Tum Tugger singing Mr Mistoffelees' song is literally that "If I had a lame-ass boyfriend I would hype him up so much I'd make him wait outside and be like ok here comes the specialest boy ever if you don't cheer & clap for him imma burn this whole building down" tumblr post.
In terms of ships, I do operate under the idea that the answer is always yes. Minus those who could be siblings, I think all the ships are canon. No such thing as monogamy in my Cats! I have always shipped Munk and Misto, but I also love Tugger and Misto. I think Munk and Demeter have some ing and Tugger and bomba have something. They are all just vibing and being gay and happy with each other.
Honestly yeah, cats in real life aren't really monogamous, so I feel anyone can be with anyone. Honestly, for all I care all the cats can be bi. There's no reason to think the opposite. I'm personally on board with Bomba, Demeter and Munk being a thruple where Demeter is just with both of them,
@@turnipcrazy yes!!! I mean old Deuteronomy canonically had many wives! I wanna draw a tree of the character’s polyamory😂
Cats cats 🤝 the sims
everybody’s pan
and kissing and
hanging out
@@Lucifersfursona Everybody's just minding they own business and just doing shit. Truly an aspiration
No lesbian cats though? Smh
The 2019 movie was as if Tomothy sent some poor PA to watch the stage show, and they fell asleep in places, panicked and made some shit up to look professional, and Tomothy was just like "Yeah that'll do"
Thanks for tickling my Sideways spot, I could listen to anyone talk about Cats for hours.
You blew my mind with some of your ideas that could have made the movie more engaging! Bustopher Jones, unlike you, is one of my favorite characters and musical numbers and it always bothered me how they ruined him in the movie! Bustopher likes good food and would never be caught dead eating from the trash!! I liked you idea of actually showing him going to these places he sings about. I hadn't heard many people talk about him outside of James Corden bad and fat jokes so I'm glad you brought up other aspects of his character.
Had this video on while making pasta in the kitchen and kept bursting out in started laughter. It's so cool seeing passionate people going OFF about the stuff they love. Excellent analyses and perfect comedic timing.
this is a great video essay! i love seeing a a critique from a more fandom sort of perspective! you brought up so many points about characterisation i hadnt even gotten to thinking about because cats 2019 just blinds me with so many basic misteps i dont even see more sometimes. and you've def inspired me to watch more productions of cats, i wanna see more interpretations!
definitely a fav fideo essay and im going to force everyone i know who's watched sideways video to also watch this 👍
Im only up to your talking about Macavity, but since i have to take a break before continuing to watch i wanted to adress something you mentioned: there is, in fact, a book of backstories for the cats, and i know this because the mother of my childhood best friend is a professional dancer and was cast as Victoria for a big international production of Cats (that im not going to mention to not dox myself).
What happens apparently is that when youre cast you get a booklet with your cat's backstory - yes, even the ensamble cats - to help with characterization. A thing she told me they did was keep the big aspects in - like Demeter having a sexual history with Macavity - but that productions were given some leeway to play around with details or to fill in some things here and there so that the gist of it will never change but each production still feels unique. For example, Munkustrap and Tugger are always siblings but whether they are Old Deut's sons is up for the production, or sometimes even the cast, to decide.
You keep alluding to it so im sure youre going to mention it, but for example in the production Im familiar with because my friend's mom shared all the juicy Cats tea with us, of course Tugger and Mistofeeles are best friends (roomates, even) but a detail I always loved was that Tugger is not actually aware that Magical Mister Mistofeeles and Mistofeeles are in fact the same cat. Theres a Clark Kent/Superman situation going on and the dancers used it as fuel for their characterization; where it contributed to Mistofeeles teasing and rolling his eyes at Tugger because boy is blind and keeps fanboying at him about his alter ego who isnt even subtle.
Cats!!!
Edit: I'm back and I'm now convinced there is SOMETHING in those character booklets because why else would virtually every single performer for Tugger and Mistofeeles I've ever seen or heard of ship it in some capacity if there wasn't???
honestly this is the scathing critique I was craving, when the cats movie came out and I was going to rowdy screenings it was so hard to articulate the reasons why it was bad but like, 3 layers deeper than "movie ugly" that requires a lot of buy in and passion for the original
they neutered both macavity and mistoffolees's songs (pun intended) and I'm still not over it!! also I have enough hospice animal trauma that memories should make me cry every time and the movie one didnt, not a measurable quantity but still not great
FINALLY someone talks about Demeter!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was SHOCKED and HORRIFIED when I found out what the movie did to her. JUSTICE FOR MY GIRL!!!! There's SO much implied with her in the stage show and they did NOTHING with her?????
They made Macavity a more important part of the plot and they CUT DEMETER?????? You want to make Cats have a more detailed and complex plot? MAKE IT ABOUT DEMETER, BOMBALURINA, GRIZABELLA, MACAVITY, AND THE HISTORY BETWEEN THEM????? (note that I don't want this for Cats, I like the show as is, but if you **had** to give it a plot that's what I would do)
WHYWHYWHY WOULD YOU MAKE BOMBA EVIL?????? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT FOR HER????? AUGH. THEY DID THE GIRLIES SO DIRTY.
I can't even start with Misto... the poor boy deserves better as well.....
Tugger & Mistoffelees' obvious chemistry being pointed out makes me SO happy /g
one other thing I could see for why Tomathy thought Misto and Victoria would make a good couple was for the most shallow reason ever, when standing next to each other they aesthetically kinda resemble a bride and a groom
Oh my gods, now I can't unsee it 😬😬
“The movie has been out for longer than Dean Winchester’s been dead from tetanus” earned a fast sub
As a fan of the original musical this is the video I've been waiting for! I think that people who haven't seen cats think it's just a wacky show but every 1998 movie fan knows that you can rewatch it millions of times and still notice new things in the background. There are a lot of hidden acting choices that give life to the characters and make the story engaging and fun. Also I've seen a couple of people actually liking Tugger in the movie and I can see why compared to others but as you've explained... something is missing and he's a different character. Also he's straight.
And I have to say I loved the movie Skimbleshanks too and as a fan of that particular Mad Hatter I'm pleasantly suprised that they are both played by the same person.
I think a big part of not being able to identify the Chorus Cats in the film is down to Hooper's insistence on "realism". In the stage show, the cats have more varied colors and patterns, to the point of not being likely to find in a real cat. In the movie, it seems like all the Chorus Cats are made generic tabbies. Only Misto and Buster are black and white, instead of a few cats with various black and white markings. Only Mungo and Teezer seem to be calico cats, instead of... well, a LOT of Chorus Cats having calico like colors.
I was 5 years old when the 1998's video was released. And honestly, today I don't remember if I saw it first or the Polish version in the theatre, but together with "Fiddler on the Roof", Cats made the main reason why I fell in love in musical genre so much (and later with ballet, opera, operetta, etc.) And I remember myself CRYING in the cinema watching Tom's "Les Mis" because I couldn't believe a director can miss the point so much. And then when I heard he would be directing "Cats" I was like "OH HELL NOPE".
Thank you for your amazing work, it was pleasure to watch
if i were in charge of this movie i'd make tuggoffeles canon
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! I feel like even videos that did not just follow the trend to react to Cats made by people completely unfamiliar with the musical weren't by people coming from the actual fandom and completely missed out the biggest appeal to a lot of fans: The characters and their dynamics and how much wiggle room you have in interpreting them and how rewarding repeat watches are to spot little background details or interaction, or seeking out new porductions to see their interpration of the characters and their dynamics, in a a lot of ways the ansamble being a tribe/family and all their relationships is what's holding together the musical not the plot and it's completely missing from the movie, and to me that's what makes it a horrible adaptation and a deeply un-fun watch.
As a theatre enjoyer I love seeing different porductions/casts permorming the same play, I love how even when no lyrics or plot has been changed just the acting choices can make it a drascticly different story/character, in Phantom Raouls can be sweet baby angels or in the case of the 25th anniversary a bit of an irritable asshole lol, Carmen operas can be about this vile seductress or about a creepy obsessive dude not letting go of his ex and it's all in the performance, I love theatre for this!
and a last note but you sold me on Bomba/Demeter, I didn't see it before but my eyes have been opened. also what a cool observation about why Rumple anf Mungo sing their own song, also something I never thought about but it makes so much sense! along with the other observations about which cat sings which songs! all around this video is such a treat to my cats fan heart, thank you for your hard work!!
I think one of the biggest changes the movie makes from the stage show- that then causes a lot of these character issues- is that they don’t have the entire cast present for the whole movie. Having celebrities who can’t handle duets and aren’t able to be around for all of filming hurt this movie SO much. It’s why they had everyone singing about themselves too, which also hurts characterization.
In the stage show, (almost) the entire cast is on stage the entire time- even during other people’s numbers where they don’t sing, they’re in the background somewhere doing something, and this is how you get those moments of characterization, where they react to numbers and interact with other cats. But in the movie, the big stars come in, sing one or two numbers, make a few quips, and disappear- you don’t get the sense that these cats are all interacting together like a family, you don’t see how they react to other minor events really. So you’re losing their sense of place within the big cats family, and all those little moments of ‘lore’ that the stage musical fandom has picked up on and expanded. It really just makes it feel soulless.
"She's kind of a manipulative sociopath cat."
I think Swift might be projecting a bit there.
I agree with everything in this video. I'm not the biggest cats fan, but I was always drawn to the way that the different cats would interact with each other. It's like a case study in ensemble characterization, and it's beautiful because it knows what it is, even if it isn't the greatest musical of all time. Only thing I'd like to call out is that as a big musical theater fan, looking for bootlegs from various dates and things like that absolutely are a thing. It's especially prominent when bootlegs are scarce and/or when they're of a production that changed significantly (i.e. you showed clips of cinderella vs bad cinderella, and I definitely want a boot of bad cinderella because I know there were significant changes and I want to see them for myself)
But it's a market. People will look for which productions have their favorite actor, how portrayals differ, etc. I went through a huge phase of the phantom of the opera final lair and finding all the different ways people will play that scene. There are full compilations of a number of scenes in a number of shows comparing portrayals. But I can fully understand why in cats, a show which is arguably more about the characterization than most other musicals, that would be such a key part of the fandom. If I love seeing the different ways the phantom is played, what about the ways the characters like victoria are played when they have such minor roles and so little to go on, and yet they're so important? There's a lot that's great about cats, and the characterization is at the top of the list by far
I still can’t believe they had Macavity show up at the scene of the crime to sing a song about how he is never seen at the scene of the crime
I've always said about RTT is he's an audience aid. He exists to show you the cats you should **automatically** respect. Because he's originally shown to be this cat who KNOWS he's cool and has such a high regard of himself, and he sings about himself to *show* that high regard. So when he sings about Old Deut and Misto, it immediately signals to the audience "These two are important. Even RTT respects them, so you should as well." Which is a needed aid for them both, with Old Deut coming in late, and Mistoffelees being quiet/more background up until his own song.
His character is 100% in those two songs, and he exists to show the audience the big red sign saying "RESPECT THESE TWO!!! RESPECT THESE TWO!!!" Yes, to a degree, you'd get the "RESPECT OLD DEUT" just from Munkustrap singing, but if it was a Munkustrap solo in the original filmed version, it wouldn't set Old Deut apart from Jenny Any Dots really, since he sings with reverence about her too. It's RTT also singing with reverence about Old Deut that signals his status/deserving of respect.
RTT is a beacon of which cats to respect inherently. To take that away from him, is character assassination.
It also speaks largely about his absolute hatred for grizzabella
@@Gracehasyoutube YES. The fact that he absolutely ignores her or outright glares the whole time speaks VOLUMES about how all the cats generally view Grizabella. It's so important to keep RTT's respect for who he respects or you cheapen his character, Grizabella's emotional plight, and so so so many other things.
I love long videos ripping into the glorious disaster that was Cats (2019), and did not think there would be another one. This was great, and I learned things about the show I had not known. 😊
This video came to me when I was just beginning a breakup with someone I really loved and I had never seen Cats 1998 or the 2019 one or anything! Because of this incredible explanation, I decided to watch the 1998 film and was so overjoyed by the beautiful music and deep backstory created by fans it made everything a lot easier to deal with ❤️
I'm so glad to see someone who actually likes the musical talking about Cats (2019). I feel like all the videos that came out in early 2020 were from people who never would've liked a *good* Cats movie (and Lindsay Ellis). I could've accepted some different characterizations if they were... good? Like you, I value the original portrayals of the characters (or at least the ones I'm most familiar with: the '98 movie), but I could've lived with it if their reinterpretations in 2019 weren't all boring choices that detract from the story instead of creating one.
I'm fascinated to hear you call Munkustrap the older brother because I always thought Rum Tum Tugger was the older brother. That probably has more to do with my relationship with my sister than anything in the 'stage show or the 98 movie.
I never got the implication that Grizabella was tied to Macavity. Is Grizabella not a sex worker? That's always what I thought was meant by "Glamor Cat," right? Like, calling her that feels sarcastic, but it must mean something in the context of her past. "Touch me/It's so easy to leave me." On the one hand, maybe it doesn't make sense for the alley cats that are dry humping the whole show to shame a sex worker, but to me because that was always the obvious interpretation of the text, I assumed these anthros must have a line they won't cross.
I know I'm late to the party, but I have to thank you for this video. I never went to see the CGI movie, I've only ever watched all the bad review vids about it, none of which ever delved into characterisation. Having watched your analysis now I'm kinda back to my old CATS obsession I had ten or so years ago after seeing the musical and then reading EVERYTHING about all the different cats. I guess now I'm gonna binge-watch CATS stuff on YT again ... Thank you for bringing it all back to me.
You made me fall in love with musical! (I watched it and liked it but I am not as attentive plus english isn't my first language so all in all, cool dancing and songs, not much of understanding xD) I would love to see you talk more about musical if you want to =3
I feel like if the movie was the story of Munkustrap coming into his own as a leader and Demeter fleeing Macavity, it might have been an improvement. Stop making Victoria do public speaking, she just wants to dance!
I really hated how most reviews of Cats were people actively saying either that they hadn’t seen the show or didn’t like it. I grew up loving the show, I wore out that vhs as a kid. And I hate the movie so much for how it ruins what makes it as good as it is. And they cut the weird dog part which I just wanted to see them do in the weird cgi style.
The Battle of the Pekes and the Pollicles is my favorite. I don't like "Growltiger's Last Stand" and it's the one that most productions use nowadays, but I feel like it's completely out of place in the show.
They could've done so many things with this movie and they did the worst ones in the worst way.
@@briandaaranda9735 I thought that most US/UK productions nowadays removed Growltiger's Last Stand because it was considered to include racist portrayals of Asians? And they moved Pekes & Pollicles from Act I to Act II to replace it. I think I read about it somewhere. The funny thing is in the ASIAN tours they keep both Pekes & Pollicles and Growltiger in their original order, so you can see the original, unabridged version of the whole show, and nobody's ever cried racist (at least not in Taiwan, which is where I'm from)
I’m so glad there are people shitting in this movie *for the right reasons* . Most of the general audience crap on this movie for being ugly, which is true. But that’s a rather small issue in a movie that has MANY significantly bigger problems. This movie isn’t just ugly, it’s also an incredibly awful adaptation and completely butchers everything that made the stage musical work so well.
Also, I love the 2016 Broadway Revival choreography and I will die on that hill.
THANK YOU FOR MENTIONING THE DOUBLE CARTWHEEL I'm still so mad about it 😭
Whenever i talk to someone about this movie i ALWAYS mention that their biggest crime is turning the Rumpleteazer and Mungojerrie cool ass stage musical song into a Spoken Word Poem and it just KILLS the vibe