Jellicle cats
{{short description|Fictional cats}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2024}}
Jellicle cats ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|dʒ|iː|l|ɪ|k|əl}}{{cn|date=May 2024}}) are a fictional{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K-B0AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA158|title=Integrating the Performing Arts in Grades K–5|author=Rekha S. Rajan|date=23 May 2012|publisher=SAGE Publications|isbn=978-1-4522-7976-3|pages=158–}} type of feline from Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, a 1939 collection of light poetry by T. S. Eliot. Jellicle cats were adapted for the 1981 stage musical Cats by Andrew Lloyd Webber, where the wide array of diverse Jellicles is central to the musical's worldbuilding.
Origins
"Jellicle cats" are briefly mentioned in T. S. Eliot's 1933 poem "Five-Finger Exercises", although they are not described until Eliot's poem "The Song of the Jellicles", depicting the cats as commonly nocturnal, black and white, scruffy cats. Eliot specifically mentions how they gather at an event called the "Jellicle Ball". The name "Jellicle" comes from Eliot's unpublished poem "Pollicle Dogs and Jellicle Cats", where "Pollicle dogs" is a corruption of "poor little dogs" and "Jellicle cats" of "dear little cats".[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1382102/Now-Lloyd-Webber-puts-Eliots-dogs-to-music.html Now Lloyd Webber puts Eliot's dogs to music – Telegraph] Milner, Catherine. Now Lloyd Webber puts Eliot's dogs to music. The Sunday Telegraph (London, UK). 20 January 2002: 6.
In contrast with their source material, the Jellicles in Cats possess many kinds of coat-patterns, diverse personalities, and individual talents. Many of the ensemble characters were created by the original 1981 London cast through extensive improvisation sessions held during the rehearsal process.{{harvnb|Sternfeld|2006|pp=130–132}} Musical theatre scholar Vagelis Siropoulos noted that the level of detail given to each character was crucial in fleshing out the fantasy world of Cats, with even the minor cats having established personalities, relationships, and hierarchies within the tribe.{{harvnb|Siropoulos|2008|pp=184–185}} In the musical, sub-plots involving individual Jellicle cats include the struggle of Grizabella, a former "glamour cat", and the kidnapping of the Jellicle patriarch, Old Deuteronomy.
A total of 54 cat names are given in Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats,{{harvnb|Robbins|2013|pp=21–22}} most of which Eliot derived from British culture, including references to Anglican traditions, historic and literary figures, as well as geographical locations.{{harvnb|Robbins|2013|p=31}} When not taken from a corresponding eponymous poem, many of the musical's character names are from Eliot's poem "The Naming of Cats".
In popular culture
The 1976 film Logan's Run has the old man offering one of his Jellicle cats to Logan.
Since 2014, the refrain of “Jellicle Songs for Jellicle Cats” from the musical cast recording has been a running gag on the animated series BoJack Horseman; the refrain plays on a loop as the “on hold” music for anthropomorphic cat Princess Carolyn.
The 2017 picture book Jellicle Cats published by Faber and Faber adapts "The Song of the Jellicles" as a standalone poem.{{cite web|url=https://www.faber.co.uk/9780571333417-jellicle-cats.html|title=Jellicle Cats|publisher=Faber and Faber|access-date=4 July 2019}}
Madame Tussauds New York displays wax figures of some of the musical's Jellicle cats since 2019, including Grizabella who performs the show's theme song.{{cite web|url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/2019/06/05/broadway-fans-love-new-immersive-madame-tussauds-exhibit/1353802001/|title=Broadway fans will love this new immersive Madame Tussauds exhibit featuring 'Cats,' 'Phantom,' 'Big' and more|work=USA Today|date=5 June 2019|access-date=5 July 2019}}
The 2020 Dungeons & Daddies episode "The Jellicle Ball" features a game played with a team of Jellicle cats.{{cite web|url=https://www.dungeonsanddaddies.com/episodes/ep35|title=Dungeons and Daddies, Ep 35. The Jellicle Ball}}
References
=Citations=
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=Bibliography=
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- {{cite book|title=Cats: The Book of the Musical|first1=T. S.|last1=Eliot|author-link1=T. S. Eliot|first2=Valerie|last2=Eliot|author-link2=Valerie Eliot|first3=Andrew|last3=Lloyd Webber|author-link3=Andrew Lloyd Webber|first4=Trevor|last4=Nunn|author-link4=Trevor Nunn|first5=Gillian|last5=Lynne|author-link5=Gillian Lynne|first6=John|last6=Napier|author-link6=John Napier (designer)|year=1983|publisher=Harvest Books|isbn=978-0156155823}}
- {{cite journal|title=Imperial Names for 'Practical Cats': Establishing a Distinctly British Pride in Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats|first=Dorothy Dodge|last=Robbins|journal=Names|year=2013|volume=61|issue=1|pages=21–32|doi=10.1179/0027773812Z.00000000035|s2cid=191334996|issn=0027-7738|doi-access=free}}
- {{cite thesis |last=Siropoulos |first=Vagelis |title=The Ideology and Aesthetics of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Musicals: From Broadway Musical to the British Megamusical |type=PhD thesis|publisher=Aristotle University of Thessaloniki |year=2008|url=http://ikee.lib.auth.gr/record/110429/files/GRI-2009-2136.pdf}}
- {{cite book|title=The Megamusical|first=Jessica|last=Sternfeld|year=2006|publisher=Indiana University Press|isbn=978-0-253-34793-0}}
- {{cite book|title=Broadway Musicals, 1943–2004, (2 volume set)|chapter=128. Cats|publisher=McFarland & Company|date=2014|first=John|last=Stewart|isbn=978-0786495658}}
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