#what the fuck is a jellicle

[per-the-jellicle-magician]

Guys, guess what I got in the mail yesterday!

I finally got my hands on Cats Warsaw CD album!!! I got really lucky and not only it didn't cost me an arm and a leg, but it's also in great condition. The case got a few little scratches and plastic is a little dull (which, it's 20 years old so makes sense) but the CD itself is literally like new!!! No scratches no nothing!!!! I have no idea if it actually works cuz I have nothing to play it on, but like kinda whatever, I'm just really really happy to have it

I already knew what the booklet looked like cuz it is on the internet, but I love that I can actually hold it and get close to the photos and stuff. Already lead me to jump from "I think it's him" to "I'm pretty sure it's him" with one of the actors in one photo XD

#i so fucking happy i have it #also i paid for it what normally would be my dance class money so i think it's really fitting seeing i'm not doing the class this summer XD #also kudos to the guy i got it from for packaging it well enough it could probably survive an apocalypse XD #cats the musical #cats warsaw #cats the musical merch #cats warsaw merch #jellicle cats

[number-one-hog-hater]

THE JELLICLE DEFENCE

Grizzabella CANNOT be the jellicle cat in Cats (2020) and here's why.

In the Original musical the contenders for becoming the jellicle cat the contestants are serenaded by the others because they are selfless or smthn (can't remember not rewatching the movie)

HOWEVER!!!

for some reason the movie makes it so that they are singing about themselves (weird change) but the writers also decided to make it so they are REQUIRED to sing about themselves in order to be able to even be an option. Which you can see in the Screenshots.

While this normally would not really change Anything in the plot just switch some things around the ONLY CAT whose songs are not altered so they sing about themselves in Grizabella. Seriously. You may say to yourself "But, Gron, we see her sing Memory and Beautiful Ghosts?" and yes while she does sing those songs neither pass the requirement of who she is Or what she does. Which bring us to her third song "Grizzabella the Glamour Cat" which is where we first see her, in that sequence yes Grizzabella STARTS the song but is Cut Off by 2 of the other cats mocking her for her previous stature in the community. Grizzabella stops singing and Never sings her name or What she does.

The writers seriously ADDED a line to Specify that it is a requirement (which as a reminder in NOT in the og musical) and then proceed to not follow their own rules for the Single cat that 100% needed to pass it.

(mentioned this in an ask and @nailgunstigmata made the mistake of asking elaboration)

#its me gron #if anyone can analyze this and make me seem like a fool plz do #ive been on my hands and knees begging to be wrong cause its so silly #or for it to just be some kind of deep writer thing of not abiding the rules to reach heaven or smthn #cause what the fuck. #i noticed this when i watched cats everyday for a week after i got a dvd blueray and digita copy of the movie #its haunted me for 2 years now #The Jellicle Defence #im prolly missing stuff rn but i have to get up for work in three hours and im making bad decisions rn

[cillyscribbles]

munkuposting (metastrap?) for the jellinclined (i am so sorry)

you tell me i'm insane but i know my truth and my truth is that munkustrap wants to help her. he wants to reach out and help her up like he just helped jennyanydots during her song. he leans down and it's not just so he can look at her better. it's not just cause there's no point to his defensive stance here except for her to see, for him to communicate she's unwanted, and he knows it. shit dude the guy can't look her in the eyes for longer than 5 seconds.

like come on. munkustrap's running after old deuteronomy and the rest of the older/less agile cats so much in this goddamn film he might as well be Munkustrap the Mobility Aid Cat. man knows what he wants in life and that's going on as many walks with senior citizens hanging off his arm as physically possible and neither god nor the heaviside layer will stand in his way.

his responsibility's a whole different thing, though. look at the lad puffing up when grizabella shows up. that's a guard he uses against perceived threats like macavity and it's well and warranted then, but what in the name of ye olde cat gods is the old lady gonna do? garbage stink them all to death? it's performative as hell on purpose. both of them know she's not gonna jump him and he doesn't need to protect himself or his fellow cats from her physically.

in the macavity scares, odd as it might look on a person, The MunkuStance™ is a genuine threat. he's up above everyone else or he's one of the few cats on the stage, he's spreading himself out to look bigger, he HISSES lmao.

look at the lad. hissssss lmao i love him.

not only is he saying i won't hesitate bitch he's also establishing himself as The Guy You Fight. if you're an outsider looking in, you're probably not gonna notice Mr Mistoffelees Scampering Through The Pipes Again, but you sure as hell are gonna see the Snarling Tabby Fresh From Hell hopping around in the middle of the stage with his legs 16 kilometers apart at all times. and okay, doing that for the entire musical sure is a Choice, but it's a Character Choice, and mr michael gruber the man you are. the star that you are. i want to send him flowers and chocolate and a card. i would greatly like to do that.

with grizabella though? jesus christ she's about as threatening as a patchy sock. it's not even his first instinct to go Tall Big Puffy when he's trailing after her because there's genuinely nothing to defend against there.

he just sort of slowly stands into it as though he's forgotten he was supposed to be Protecting for a second. the stance, the threat, all that's only there to set a dynamic. it's there to say you're not one of us, we don't like you, please go away, but he's half-assing it so much it loses all its i won't hesitate bitch and turns into i have never hesitated so hard in my entire life. he still establishes himself as The Guy You Fight, but it's obvious grizabella isn't about to fight anyone, so now he's just The Guy She's Staring In Incredulous Longing At, and he can't even hold her gaze for long enough to pretend it's not getting to him because at his core he's not a bad person and he knows that all this is kind of a Dick Move.

this is what makes munkustrap so dummy god tier as a character to me. he may wish he could help grizabella. hell he may even want her back, if not as openly as old deuteronomy does. when all the cats scuttle away and turn their backs to grizabella before memory reprise, munkustrap never even fucking bothers ?? like he's straight up just watching her, and then later watching old deuteronomy watch her like with the most somber wee eyebrows up so can we finally do something about this expression i've ever seen on a performer lmao.

but that means nothing without the approval of the entire tribe! absolutely nothing! because munkustrap, in that regard, is exactly like old deuteronomy: what he wants comes second to what the jellicles want. it's harder to see in him because old deuteronomy is mostly up on the tire being cat jesus and munkustrap mingles with the rest of the ensemble way more, but it's really obvious when you look. they defer to his leadership, but he defers to their collective decisions.

he moves mistoffelees away from grizabella (just like the rest of the older cats) because mistoffelees doesn't know any better and grizabella is untouchable, but then he stalls and waits when demeter reaches out to her. like, i'm pretty sure he would've just let her touch grizabella right then and there. had demeter been a little less aware of the fact that this was the first 30 minutes of the musical, i'm pretty sure she would've just taken grizabella back in right then and there and memory wouldn't have even been necessary. munkustrap sure wasn't about to do shit about it.

he's actively leaning back to give her space!! (i know logistically that it's mr michael giving an opening for ms aeva to execute her Conflicted Scuttle Away but munkustrap is still leaning back however you put it so i'm right automatically. haw yee)

i'm fascinated by it specifically because this way it's almost as though munkustrap is an extension of the jellicle collective, if that makes sense. obviously he's the narrator so we can't give him a complex emotional storyline if we want to keep the aryas in single digits, but in turn this means that now he's a character who chooses to forgo his own feelings in favour of those of his community, and that's just, man, that's just. man. ca(s)t of all time for real. a guardian and a weapon and a storyteller and a teacher and not one of those for his own sake. Man.

tl;dr, old deuteronomy can be hella proud of his kid, and i can eventually stop crying. also here are the gifs of him finally getting to comfort grizabella a little. experience emotions with me.

unfortunately i have similar (if slightly less rambling) thoughts on tugger and why he's constantly being such a massive cunt to grizabella lmao. if you guys are unfortunate enough i may subject myself to the giffing and writing of that post too. toodlepip ✌️

#jellicle cats #cats 1998 #cats the musical #munkustrap #grizabella #cilly.txt #because lets be honest this isnt much in terms of art or writing lmao #woe. long post be upon ye #but tumblr usually shortens these one these days anyway

[naamahdarling]

Do you have a favorite musical?

If so, what are your favorite lyrics from it, and why?

ALW's CATS.

Is it a surreal mess? Yes! But I love it before everything else.

The lyrics are silly but very clever. Most are at least partly by TS Eliot, drawn from a wonderfully nonsensical book of poems.

I think my favorite song is the Invitation to the Jellicle Ball, neck and neck with Mr Mistoffelees.

My favorite cat is Mistoffelees by a lot, followed by the Rum Tum Tugger. They are in love.

But the part that makes me feel the most in my heart is Grizabella. The only cat I relate to is Grizabella.

Memory is the big number that everyone knows and I do absolutely love it, it's one of my favorite songs and probably the best in the musical as it was before CATS 2019 introduced a new song, but I feel that out of context it simply doesn't have punch. It gets trotted out to showcase a singer's skill, as a bit of a tearjerker if you're a sentimental person. It is so much more than that.

I didn't understand Grizabella properly until I was well and truly an adult and had taken in multiple cats off the street, and lived near a colony, and watched my own cats become frail, which are all painful things in many ways; AND until I had begun to really feel the weight of my marginalization as a disabled person and an ill person, which means confronting almost daily the fact that I am unlikely to come to the sort of end I would like.

Hold on because I'm going to be unhinged about this cat for a minute.

Grizabella is an aged stray, once welcomed, now abandoned and unloved, considered ugly even by others like her (who are shown to supposedly accept differences and value, or at least respect, most everyone...but not her).

She lives in a haunted, lonely state unacknowledged by anyone except to be driven away. She can no longer care for herself, she is filthy and matted and scarred and probably in a lot of pain, she is starving, and she has nothing but her memories of better times, and every single dawn is both a gift and a miserable curse. She gets to remember. She has to remember.

If you watch, Grizabella is onstage a LOT, she's just off in the background, usually poorly lit, where she tries to mirror the dances happening on the main part of the stage, dances she knows because that was once her, there in the spotlight, shining. But now she's in too much pain to dance and her body isn't working right anymore. I have no doubt Grizabella is dying. The question is whether she will get to do that well, comforted and with dignity, or do it badly and alone.

I cannot HANDLE Grizabella.

If you have even the tiniest inkling of love for cats, if you believe every cat's life is worth something, her story should destroy you.

The legendary Jennifer Hudson's performance in the movie brought a really angry and confrontational turn to her, and it was flat out amazing. A rebuke of a performance. It really hurts to watch but it's what the role has always needed. She isn't just weak and sad, she clings to the tatters of her dignity and is angry that the others don't see her as a whole person. Just a miserable shadow to be avoided. A cautionary tale. We are never told what terrible thing she did to deserve her fall, and given that most of the Jellicles are young, I don't know that any of them really remember.

I will physically fight anyone who says she should not have been selected to ascend to a new life. She was the only choice. Even Gus. Even him. He can have his turn next year. Grizabella does not have another year in her.

And I'm going to make some folks mad but I love the 2019 movie (it's bad) and the new song, Beautiful Ghosts, is amazing, and I DO prefer Taylor Swift's version as the movie version is a little more timid (fitting the role and musical way better) but TS fucking BELTS IT and I get chills every time.

The lyrics are incredible and the song is gorgeous, gorgeous. And strung together with Grizabella's song, it finishes the musical in a way that it was a bit unfinished before. It uses an actual full song to connect Grizabella to the Ball and the Choice more directly than any choreography ever did or could:

Victoria, the White Cat and viewpoint character, still almost a kitten, has been dumped in the street and into a terrifying and beautiful new life.

After being swept up into its wonder, she sees Grizabella, utterly rejected, hissed at, made fun of, despised, and aches with the injustice of it -- Victoria was snatched right up by the other cats the instant her paws hit the ground, but nobody will take in Grizabella. Not even her own kind.

Victoria sees how strangely similar they are and feels a kinship that has no pity in it at all, but wonder and respect.

So Victoria sings this new song expressing the first admiration Grizabella has heard in god alone knows how long, reminding her she has had an amazing life worth envy and renown, and she pulls this horrible decrepit old mess of a cat into the Jellicle Ball, where she is FINALLY relieved of her pain.

Like? I'm crying right now?

It isn't a serious musical, but Grizabella's story runs through it like a cold current, something real and terrible, surrounded by absolute ridiculousness. Her numbers are deadly serious, never played for laughs. And ultimately it is her story that turns out to be the most important one, the truest one, and it is dark, and it is hopeful but only in only the most painful and grief-stricken way. She isn't brought back into a comfortable life with other cats to be happy and surrounded by love. She essentially...dies and goes to cat heaven. She embodies hope itself to the others, and her ascension represents a deeply humbling lesson in humility and grace. Her suffering and her ascent represent the possible future of every one of them, and now they have to confront that, and their treatment of her. She was rewarded, and for all their beauty and charm they were not.

Anyway I'm not normal about it.

The lyrics from Beautiful Ghosts that I love are:

Perilous night, their voices calling. A flicker of light, before the dawning. Out here the wild ones are taming the fear within me. Scared to call them my friends and be broken again. Is this hope just a mystical dream?

and

And so maybe my home Isn't what I had known, what I thought it would be. But I feel so alive With these phantoms of night, and I know that this life isn't safe but it's wild and it's free!

Like, come on. It's a lovely song and it took my breath away in the theater.

Ugh this musical touched me as a feral cat girl of 10 and it touches me again as a sad catguy in their 40s. Truly a very stupid work of weirdly meaningful art and one for the ages.

There are much better musicals, but none of them are part of me.

#cats the musical #grizabella

[gentlemewn]

idgaf what you all say about CATS, I fucking love this musical sm 💥💥💥🫵🏼 here little fanart if my favorite Jellicle cat ☆（ゝω・）v

#the cats musical #cats musical #cats musical fanart #cats fanart #munkustrap #mr mistoffelees #fanart #plz I can't stop finalizing about this god forsaken musical 😭😭😭 #low-key can sing all songs by heart #no cap #I hate the movie tho #but I'll give it credit for making me love CATS #but fuck that movie #hate it sm #quirky art #not wilde #soxsodi

[clovenhoofedjester]

jellicle lineups; part 1/4

hi catsblur ! today i am presenting to you the fruits of my labor. my own little versions of the jellicle cats; obviously based on the replica designs With Fun Little Twists ! such as, they are not naked. ramble below the cut, both on designs and some personal thoughts on the characters

these designs are very much first-draft, subject to change, blah blah. you will very likely be seeing me drawing them differently if i post more of them. i just. urrbhhh. i had 2 draw them....

and the clothes ! even though they're very feline i draw them a bit too human-y for the nakedness to not look consistently weird. i will be drawing them closer to the stage designs in some instances but for rn. clothes. it was a fun exercise in character design too

the kittens are all young adults, think 18-20 ! as much as i love headcanons like demeter being sillabubs mother, it shrimply will not work out timeline-wise. so headcanons like that will be delegated to like... siblings and stuff

victoria | 🍧 💌 🩰

i started out with victoria's design not only because of her being the Main Kitten, but because she has such a concise and clear aesthetic to me. she actually started out with a simple pastel brown dance practice fit before i decided that i wanted to make the outfits ornate(ish) and ended up with a proper ballerina getup

i also quite like when victoria is not just solid white with some grey (love ones that are more yellow or brown) so i colored her fur with some blue and pink-ish tones not only to add more depth but to resemble the trans flag LOL

and i wanted to try something different with making her a bit more lavender than baby pink. i also based her overall look on obc victoria, portrayed by cynthia onrubia :^]

to move on to character interpretation, i think victoria is partially deaf and mute. she primarily communicates through dance. as one of the oldest kittens she'd be 19 in human years

plato | 💐 🕯 🍬

plato's design doesnt stray too far from his standard replica design but i tried to add my own flair . i tried to keep the creepy porcelain doll aesthetic going w their face added some more depth like some other designs with different colors and bold face stripes

i also really like the outfit i chose for them. the flower in their hair and on their shirt is a peony which is a popular wedding flower :") because im a sucker for platoria and very much subscribe to the idea that the ball we see is their funny cat wedding in a way

the outfit is based on standard ballerino costumes but i tried to stray from it with the silky half-skirt thing and pointe shoes. lets go queer cats lets go

i think plato is also very quiet and that's why he and victoria were so drawn to each other. i also quite like the idea that he was a bit of a troubled stray before he found the jellicles. they would be 20 in human years

electra |⚡🥭 🔔

boy i STRUGGLED with electra's clothes i struggled so hard. i think i'm happy with what i ended up with though—i originally gave her the babydoll dress that sillabub has (inspired by artsed electra) but figured that i wanted at least one of the girls to be more tomboyish/butchy. thank you to that one production which apparently had electra be one of the raffish crew and get in on some of the boys' choreography

im very happy with what i did with her fur colors as well. silly little tortoiseshell :] its based on a nonrep but i have no idea which one. enjoy her freckles too

i think electra deserves to be a little spunky. [whispers] i also think shes bombalurinas little sister. she'd be 18 in human years

etcetera | 🎠 🍯 🏅

i needed at least one cat with a circus aesthetic. say hello to my magnum opus: jacked tumbler acrobat etcetera. it was only a matter of time until someone said fuck it and let one of the girls perform lifts and stuff. this is mostly because ive always really liked how shes usually the cat to do the flying trapeze bit and wanted to push it further

i also struggled SO EXTREMELY HARD with making her colors look nice and makeup distinctive but i figured it out in the end—thank you obc cettie for the mismatched eyeshadow and such. i also wanted to give a cat a short bob type of head fur/hairstyle and she fit the bill

nothing much about specific character notes other than like... i want to make her related to some of the cats but cannot for the life of me figure out who 2 assign. also she'd be around 19 in human years, a couple months younger than vic

sillabub | 🌻 🧋 🎼

i think of all of these little fellas sillabub is my favorite. several elements are balanced in her design—the standard jemima with a darker/reddish palette, the more softer and lighter sillabub design, the red eye patch from il sistina jemima, and the overall aesthetic of obc jemima with the big hair and wide, deepset eyes

i've seen her typical design critiqued by some people and wanted to incorporate those critiques by making her look less similar to demeter/bombalurina, adding more red to her body fur, and making her makeup more distinct and less... wooo girl give us nothing. and i included the squiggly on her collarbone

i also really REALLY love her overall aesthetic of sweet kindhearted girl NAMED AFTER A DEMON WITH SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG COLORING AND GIGANTIC SPIKED COLLAR !!!! so i decided to push it by making the collar definitely too big for her, giving her a slightly "edgy" outfit and making her hair resemble devil horns

as for character stuff, i think she has magical powers though i haven't developed exactly What they are yet. beyond her sweet exterior they trouble her. [whispers] i also think shes demeters little sister. she would be 18 in human years, a few months younger than electra and tumblebrutus

pouncival | 🌱 🩹 🍵

i struggled with pouncival's clothing design like i did electra's because i didn't go into drawing him with a particular gimmick in mind. but i think i'm happy with the casual formal look. it makes him look like such a kind young man even if he's a little shit

i did have a lot of fun trying to make his makeup distinctive from tumblebrutus'—so many fellas with brown eyepatches ! so his colors are more dark and striking. i also tried to make him look less like Typical Cis Man by giving him a bit of black lipstick

enjoy his freckles too

but like. i think hes literally such a little cis guy. nothing else for me to add for my specific interpretation of him it's all laid out. this guy fucking loves rocket league, fishing and chess. he'd be 19 in human years

tumblebrutus | 🎡 🥊 🍦

SWEET TUMBLEBRUTUS. i think drawing him here gave me a soft spot for him. with his outfit mirroring cettie's i didn't much struggle with that. his colors are also based on obc tumblebrutus

when i was first conceptualizing my own versions of the cats i wanted at least one of them asides from grizabella to have wavy fur. and idk what it is, maybe it's the lack of content for him, but i was really drawn to the idea of curly tumblebrutus!

i wanted their design to be distinctive from pouncival's so i made their colors softer, kinda watercolor-y. OH AND THEIR FUR IS ALSO MEANT TO BE A LITTLE TRANS FLAG COLORED

as for character, i think he is also a bit troubled, as a son of grizabella's. you heard me, people. i'm probably the first person ever to headcanon that. he'd be 18 in human years

AND THAT'S ABOUT IT ! thank you for reading this far, have a great day and stay tuned for more designs in the days to come !

#cats the musical #cats 1998 #character design #chibi #sfw furry #victoria #plato #electra #etcetera #sillabub #pouncival #tried glazing this; didn't love the artifacting effect so it remains unglazed #i suppose i am laying down and dying at the hands of tech bros #tagging 98 because theyre all based on it as a baseline #my art

[bonefall]

I think the most pertinent, fundamental question to ask at this point is: How canon do we want to make the 1981 musical Cats by Andrew Lloyd Webber to Better Bones? Since you've done so fantastically well at fleshing out alternate but no-less-viable systems of belief, that door has been left wiiiide open. Stripped of the zany dance numbers and stage actors in copious makeup, you can't deny that the underlying Jellicle cat religion / Heavyside Layer wouldn't be out of place. Don't lie to us. Don't you dare.

We don't know when the musical takes place, but as for where, the Jellicle Cats and their religion are centralized in a junkyard somewhere in London. Depending on how far their area of influence extends, there could be a few cats in a sect or two of BloodClan who practice the faith of a land to the south, or otherwise believe in the existence of the Heavyside Layer. Or say, the junkyard is done away with in the late 90's and a diaspora of Jellicle Cats spreads across the land. Their descendants hope one day to make the pilgrimage for one last ball, and are invariably seen as Rather Offputting by everyone. (In-story it'd all amount to rare sequiturs from a nameless extra or two which increase in probability the further one heads south.)

Hey bonefall hey, do you think Skyclan has a word for this? It'd be a corruption of the English "dear little [cats], of which "Jellicle" is a romanization. How would you say Jellicle with Clanmew pronunciation?

You can't run from this forever.

Stripped of the zany musical numbers and stage actors in copious makeup??? What are you, Tom Hooper?!

If you're going to put the Jellicles in the BB Universe, you fucking BETTER be taking inspiration from the cancelled 1997 Steven Spielberg animated musical adaptation which places the cats in postwar London sometime circa 1945 and implied that the cats had heavily cultural emphasis on song, dance, and performance

Which btw would place Grizabella's Jellicle Ball pretty firmly in the Code Era of my adaptation (built around the canonical tidbit that Turtle Tail was hit by a Ford Model T meaning the Dawn Era was pre-war).

It would be before the main Warrior cast is born (Except Holly due to infamous Time Travel Shenanigans)-- but Jellicles, after all, were there when the Sphinx was built, so it's safe to assume they'd still be around in the future as a cultural group.

Really the biggest barrier is that they live in bloodbourne London. Too far southeast to communicate with Clan cats or even BloodClan, who are northwest. Park Cats are from further south, but no further south than Gloucestershire at most.

So, serious answer, they can absolutely be canon in this universe, or at the very least they can be slotted in easily. I built a brand new religion system exactly to accommodate the existence of multiple cultural groups and honor the afterlives of each.

In fact, Jellicles fit perfectly into it.

They have a heaven (Heavyside Layer) but no hell, exactly the way that a "vanilla" type religion can form on its own. Really there's just one question-- what's their leader power?

Old Deuteronomy...

Is said to have lived many lives in succession (possible continual reincarnation?)

May choose the next cat to ascend to the Heavyside Layer (immediate patronification?)

But at the same time, there are some cats who seem to display magical powers, akin to the Sister's power distribution system. Mr. Mistoffelees is one, able to perform simple magical tricks. As far as I remember, there are two.

Conjuration (Ability to change the location of an object in space)

Levitation

These both seem like versions of the same power, really. It makes sense, too, that culturally they would value agility to the point of veneration. It ties into dancing, avoiding cars and dogs, stealing things.

In any case though-- you begin to lose these sorts of abilities the further you go from a group, without some kind of token. The Sisters are the example I've written so far; Tree needs some kind of item in order to see ghosts when he's not near the rest of the Sisters. The Jellicles are also a pretty proud group, I can't see them making these "tokens" for any old wanderer.

So maybe there's just a few of them, and Macavity has one stolen?

hmmmm... Maybe those reincarnations have to do with who's supposed to Hold The Token, and Old Doot has basically been one of them for eons. Maybe Mistoffelees was the most recent reincarnation from the Jellicle Ball?

Anyway TL;DR yeah Jellicle cats can exist in Better Bones, they're just too far away to interact with Clan cats.

Clanmew pronunciation of Jellicle = "Shewakl"

#BONES HAVING WEIRD INTERESTS STRIKES AGAIN #bone babble #jellicle cats #better bones au

[shaeeldera]

Fuck this guy who doesn’t even know what a Jellicle cat is.

next thing you’ll be tellin’ me he doesn’t even know what Goncharov is

#Cats #cats musical #Goncharov #Shae and Blue do nonsense

[ambyandony]

i also love the Rum Tum Tugger - Mr Mistoffelees dynamic yes i do ship them they have a good dynamic and good chemistry

"jellicle cats come out tonight" u first mistoffelees

one of my favourite parts is how in the last bit of The Rum Tum Tugger when the girls are squealing over tugger, if you look in the background u can see Mistoffelees on the pipe on the left side and if you watch his reactions it's just so KLNCFLNVNS there's so much tension at first he's shaking his head disapprovingly but then if you look at the second bit he's making little hand-wavy motions (kinda like how the girls are) like he's trying so hard to control himself. and then at the last note tugger holds you can see him sort of take a deep breath and look bewildered

hes like "tch.." and then he's like "oh..." and then he's like: Oh.

(THE ITALICISED OH)

and then you get this

its giving "…am i interruptin somethin 🤨 " "UHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

literally the funniest screencap of the whole musical i think especially bc not only does mistoff make this startled expression as if he's been caught doing something he's not supposed to be doing (despite literally just vibing (he has anxiety)) he also completely freezes up and the other cat (not sure who) just lets go of his hand and continues on like nothing happened KLDVNFKLDNVDKLNVKLSFNL

ALSO SOMETHING THAT MAKES THE MISTOFFELEES TUGGER DYNAMIC SO SO GOOD TO ME IS HOW MISTOFFELEES LIKE. he embarrasses himself at the start of the old gumbie cat and is visibly distressed and the kittens make fun of him for it. but he opens the trunk with his magic anyways and then like hides behind it

and hes directly said to at least appear shy and i definitely get a meek read on him. this boy is the shyest drama queen this side of the heaviside layer. he loves to perform and then any time he's not performing he's self-conscious and nervous,,,

and rum tum tugger sings an ENTIRE HYPE SONG FOR HIM

the "please listen to me... and dont scoff" at the start i might mention, 'dont scoff at my boyfriend he is very sensitive and i will kill you dead'

also in Magical Mr. Mistoffelees, rum tum tugger says "i've known the family to call him in from the garden for hours / when he was asleep in the hall " so like are they living in the same house with the same family or does tugger just frequently break in because the latter is my personal belief and way funnier

he makes this motion like cmon baby during the line and mistoffelees is like . hang on why were you at my house for hours ?

(mistoffelees vc) "why, just the other day, i had to help rum tum tugger out of a bedroom drawer, but im not terribly sure why he was in the house to begin with" rum tum tugger (famously prone to getting stuck in drawers): 😎

tugger is basically flirting with mistoffelees the entire song NEVERMIND the lyrics but the way he moves towards him and the way he articulates when interacting with mistoff,,,

gives him a little look like 'are you sure you're confident in my abilities' 'OBVIOUSLY????'

look dad thats my boyfriend. yeah he appearified you out of nowhere. yeah he does that a lot.

also on the subject of Magical Mr Mistoffelees its SO funny the way Mistoff acts he seems very surprised by his own capabilities / unsure of his own power so of course he just starts blowing shit up

Rum Tum Tugger: hey everyone have you heard of Mister Mistoffelees. hes fucking incredible. super talented. smart. bit cute Mr. Mistoffelees: so anyways, i started blasting

i also love Tugger getting really close to Misto and then backing off, I imagine because he snaps out of it last second and remembers that misto has been going around blowing shit up for the past 3 minutes so maybe he should give him a little space "i know he can do incredible shit. im not really sure what all he could do, however i am aware that he could set me on fire or blow my dick off, which is something id like to avoid, yknow i kinda value having that so ill just uh, stand over here for a bit"

anyways, i think theyre very cute

#ALSO MISTOFFELEES LITTLE “PRESTO” GETS ME EVERY SINGLE TIME HES SO CUTE? #cats the musical #cats the musical posting #mr mistoffelees #rum tum tugger #tuggoffelees #im completely normal about this musical #amby yells

[moldygreenblue]

i think one of the funniest thing about cats musical lore is one piece of lore from old possum's book of practical cats (which makes more sense when the og book of poems was about dogs and cats, before it got change to just about cats), mention only in the preface:

the man in white spats.

in t.s. eliot's poem 'pollicle dogs and jellicle cats' (which alw did a demo for and said tune of the demo became the basis for jellicle songs for jellicle cats) the first stanza has an unknown man talking about someone he met at the princess louise one day during lunch, the fore mention man in white spats.

the man in white spats knows of pollicle dogs and jellicle cats. and the man in white spats' siblings (a sister and brother) know of their existence as well. and they're like...fans of them. big time fans.

and the unknown man very much like the man over there, doesn't know what is a pollicle dog and jellicle cat. and the man in white spats is shook and thinks the unknown man is lucky to have run into him and the man in white spats starts explaining things.

(and the man in white spats starts to go explaining of pollicle dogs. this has me wondering if t.s. elliot poem's 'the marching song of the pollice dogs' which 'the awefull battle of the pekes and the pollicles' take verses from, was the poem after 'pollicle dogs and jellicle cats' in the og planned book of dogs and cats. does that mean pollicle dogs and jellicle cats was the og first poem of the planned book?)

anyway. i'm just thinking how funny it is that if you take the poem lore as a supplementary for the musical, the jellicle cats (and pollicle dogs) are fine with the man in white spats + his siblings knowing.

which means that they're quite fine with the man over there be watching the ball that night. if anything, they're glad that there's another human in the know. but that doesn't mean they not going to fuck around with him if given the chance.

#cats musical #cats the musical #old possum's book of practical cats #idk why i'm in a cats musical binge making post but it's sure fun

[oldbaton]

tbh my favorite thing about cats (the musical itself not the movie) is it is genuinely discourse proof. because.... well. its cats. what is there to say?

it's cats.

and we have so many great so bad its good musicals. theatre is littered with them. but cats is the singular musical i can think of that when you point out one of the million absurdities of it, it looks you straight in the face and says "and what about it?". Nothing else does that. And what's weird is so much of it is brilliant. The songs are a delight. The dancing is iconic. The inventiveness of the physical production is impressive all years later. The costumes are burned into the lexicon of theatre costuming. The use of synth is a riot. And it uses a sort of uncanny valley thing to create this off kilter universe that no other musical has been able to truly accomplish.

but also. it's cats. they shoot her through the roof. through the fucking roof. on a UFO. (well that depends on the production. in london its a staircase to heaven. in the new revivals she fucking FLIES). they're a weird tribe. there's a subplot about the tribal leader getting stolen and its resolved in 3 seconds. speaking of... what the fuck is going on with macavity? they barely answered the question "whats a jellicle cat"! what is going on with these mysterious powers? Why is she named jellylorum. WHY DID ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER WRITE THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE?

that said.... and what about it. it has this full throttle embrace of the absurd that to really try to dump on it is actually quite difficult.

because what did you expect? its cats.

[pillowprincessvarric]

Rum-tum-tugger is the musical character ever because his first song is just "that Rum-Tum-Tugger he's a fussy bitch! He's irritating! He's the fussy irritating cat who fucks like a machine and we all love him for it. What a horndog." and his second number is just him telling everyone that if they don't cheer and clap for his special little guy he'll burn this Jellicle ball to the ground.

#also because the guy who plays him in the 1998 version is. well. i shant say #cats tag

[terpsichoracle]

“Please, listen to me - and don’t scoff.”

I take issue with the way RTT is described in the various wiki entries I’ve seen for him, because they like to point out that the older cats merely tolerate him or are impatient with his activities.

A) no

B) really? No

C) evidence pls

but what he says at the start of Misto’s song is kind of telling, and I think it says something about who he is.

RTT has a reputation - he’s a cat that does what he wants, when he wants, which is - every cat tbh but he wants to feel special! he jumped in on the very very end of Jennyanydots’ number which is still rude, but he a) didn’t interrupt the song itself or the story and b) no one seems surprised or upset, they just go oh! it’s RTT being RTT. and he isn’t particularly kind to Grizabella; he’s kind of sarcastic in his interaction with her, but it’s not like he’s the only one to be dismissive of her.

During the Awefull Battle of the Pekes and the Pollicles, he jumps in with the bagpipes at the end and Munkustrap is exasperated - but arguably less so than when Mungojerry and Rumpleteazer get their barks out of order or when the Great Rumpus Cat enters on the wrong side of the stage. This isn’t an RTT thing - this is an everyone around Munkustrap being a goof while he’s trying to hold it together thing lol.

RTT sings Old Deuteronomy with Munkustrap - they BOTH obvs have a tremendous amount of respect for Old Deut, but RTT is the one who specifically says the village is proud of him in his decline. And when Old Deut shows up, he gets fucking psyched - RTT is a cool kid but he also gets excited about stuff! He is also the last one to officially greet Old Deut; it’s framed in a way where they kind of stare each other down, which is especially notable because RTT is standing on the pipe to be tall (I also like standing on things to be tall). But Old Deut is obviously relaxed and smiling, and RTT’s got the biggest fucking grin when he bows. It gives me cheeky “you’re not the boss of me” vibes, but he is very much accepting of the fact that Old Deut’s in charge, and I don’t think he cares much either.

RTT is also consistently pictured near Old Deut, when he’s not on stage or skulking in the shadows; shaking hands with him, or resting a hand on his shoulder, or just kind of vibing near him. He’s the one who suggests a way to get Old Deut back, to boot, so - I just don’t really get the idea that he’s got a tremulous relationship with the others. He cares SO MUCH, SO SO MUCH. He’s just also REALLY COOL.

What this tells me is that RTT does have mutually respectful relationships with a lot of the older cats; he’s also especially close to Old Deut. The kittens love him because of who he appears to be, and he’s just as goofy as the other older cats but in his own distinct way. It also tells me that he does know when to be serious and he also knows how to make that clear to his peers.

I’m still ruminating on the ‘don’t scoff’ thing, but for the most part, am inclined to believe it’s about what he’s going to suggest. imo, the cats know Misto has magic; he uses it for Munkustrap and Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat, Cat of the Railway Train. It’s never been crazy, though - lifting the trunk or turning lights on is relatively small, compared to magicking an entire person back. So I think he’s saying ‘don’t scoff, I know Misto can do it’.

Which also stands in contrast to a trope I saw when poking at fanfiction - that Misto has magic and the other cats dislike or fear him for it. I never got that vibe! The cats don’t like Macavity much but it doesn’t seem to be because of his magic so much as it is because, you know, he likes to break laws lol. And I guess because of the kidnapping and stuff. They come together once a year to decide which cat is gonna reincarnate, Old Deut’s apparently telepathic, etc etc - I think the magic is just part and parcel of who they are as Jellicles and he’s got a little more than most. It was more of a “I know you can do a cartwheel, but can you really do a backflip?” kind of vibe. He is still cheeky and exuberant during the number - but it’s coming from a place of respect and belief in Misto’s abilities.

(or he’s just hoping really hard that it’ll work, but doesn’t want Misto to doubt himself - either way, his faith is justified or his faith is what it takes for Misto to believe in himself; it gets the job done.)

Which is funny because even Misto is like “uhh” at certain points while RTT is like NO YOU GOT THIS

Anyway this is, in part, why I think RTT is going to be the next Jellicle leader rather than Munkustrap

#tuggoffelees #rum tum tugger #wow why do I have so many thoughts

[underworldsarcade]

th' leader of the jellicle cats. everybody knows 'im : what's his fuck.

#mungojerrie ╭┈─ [ 01. in character ] #she undy on my world til i delete all my blogs╭┈─ [ crack ]

[discworldbooksbracket]

Here is a very silly poll!

[azeriairis]

There's a small thing that really annoys me about pretty much all of the German Productions of Cats.

So context in the first song with lyrics Jellicle Songs for Jellicle cats, most of the first few verses are sung in what I'll be calling a popcorn style, one character sings a line, then the song "pops" to the next character who sings a different line. One of the lines in the original English Version contains a reference to Whittington, an actual dude whose story was turned into a bit of folklore. Of course most German audiences won't know who Whittington is, so they did some localization and changed the line to instead reference Faust, who is also an actual dude who was turned into a legendary figure (as in a character of legend). And that's fine, I don't have an issue with that, what I do have an issue with is who they had sing the line.

They didn't have fucking Mistoffelees sing the line that's about Faust. Mistoffelees, whose name is literally derived from Mephistopheles, as in the Demon from the Faust Legend, didn't sing the line referencing Faust. Seriously what the fuck? Yes I know the original line in English is generally sung by Bomba, but also it doesn't particularly matter which cats sing which lines, so they could've just switched the order as Mistoffelees' and Bomba's parts are literally in the same verse (Not to mention the fact that even English Productions aren't always consistent with it) . Why isn't Mistoffelees singing the Faust Line? Like I'm sorry but having Mistoffelees sing the line "Warst du Schüler bei Faust?" (Literally "Were you a student of Faust") would've been so funny, and I absolutely wish they had just changed the order of singers to give him the line.

#Random ass rant #cats the musical