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| My first wonder would be why in the world you came to this site if you didn't know what CATS was, but since you're here I may as well explain something I usually wind up talking about anyway when it comes to people who aren't very well acquainted with musical theatre. Be wary, though. My pals above aren't very welcoming to critics. |
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| First and foremost, CATS is a musical: a show performed live on stage that uses dance, song, and music to tell a story...please don't call it a "play." If you want to know what it's about, well, it isn't. A well-known but constantly ignored fact is that CATS really has no plot in itself, other than what can be fixed into one sentance: a group of cats calling themselves Jellicles get together once a year to decide who among them will be the one chosen to go to the Heaviside Layer to be reborn to a new life. At least, that's all you really need to know for the casual theatregoer. If you're a major fan a whole line of plots can be drawn from the show's events. Check it out at Synopsis. But no plot obviously hasn't hindered CATS's success with the public; running for eighteen years on Broadway (and twenty-one at London's West End), it is the longest running show in Broadway's history. |
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| The basis for CATS can be found in the book "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" by the renowned poet T.S. Eliot. Dedicating over a dozen poems to feline characters, it was the rising musical theatre composer Andrew Lloyd Webber - who was known then for his Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Evita - who set those poems to music which started as simple entertainment at a party in England and turned into a record-breaking musical performed all over the world. |
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| Alright, I could go on and on about why CATS is so popular and what aspects of it make it a true original in musical theatre, but I doubt seriously that anyone would sit here and actually read it. (If you've read this far I'm impressed!) Besides, how CATS got started and what it really is has been told already by a number of people, so I'll shut up and let them take the credit for their work. For example, this article from a CATS Playbill... I only ask one thing. If you haven't seen this show, go and see it the next chance you get. Or get the video...although video musicals are always butchered from the live stage versions. All I ask is that you appreciate what you are seeing: the talent the people have who perform this show, no matter how odd it may seem to a first-timer (heck, the first time I ever saw CATS the darn thing scared me!), and appreciate what this show has done over its time and the work it took in creating it. Of course this is my site and I can say what I want on it, but this is more than just an advertisement for my favorite work in theatre. I'm serious...go see it. Would it be so scary if you wound up liking it? |
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| It's just that kind of show...you either like it or hate it. |
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| (Guess that means you'd better like it!) |
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