Often considered one of the most popular and successful stage musicals of all time, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s stage sensation Cats was once the longest running musical both on Broadway and in the West End. It captivates audiences with its fantastic choreography, spectacular staging, and well written music. At the time, it won the Olivier Award for Best New Musical as well as the Tony award counterpart and 6 other Tony Awards. The show’s choreographer Gillian Lynne was also awarded the Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievements in a Musical.
The production is different from the majority of musicals produced today, being much more of a concept musical than a book musical. While a book musical is based on a story and a narrative that continues throughout the piece, a concept musical is based around a unifying concept that links the songs together. This means that there is no conventional story to carry the piece along. To some, this can leave the musical feeling a little dull and pointless but this choice is seen by many as refreshing and new. The show’s original inspiration was a book of poetry by T. S. Eliot and the majority of the songs from the show use the original poetry as their lyrics to go over the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber.
The concept to this show was that a group of Cats, the Jellicles, met up for one night a year when Old Deuteronomy would choose one of them to be born into a new life in the Heaviside Layer. The show begins with the Jellicle Cats explaining this to the audience but from then on the majority of the play centres around each individual cat explaining through song and dance their own character and why they should be chosen to start a new life. At the end of the first act Grizabella, the glamour cat, appears on stage trying to explain her story to the audience and the other cats but she is shunned due to her old age and the fact she has lost her beauty. The characters' stories continue in the second act, but at the end Grizabella returns and finally gets the chance to finish her own, singing ‘Memory’ which expresses how all she has left is her happy memories of her own past and the other cats see that though she is no longer beautiful she is still one of them. With encouragement from Jemima and Victoria, the youngest of the cats, all of the other cats agree that she should be the one to journey to the Heaviside Layer. As she leaves, Old Deuteronomy concludes with a speech to the audience.
Despite its lack of a complete storyline, this show still does remarkably well with both critics and audiences alike and its notorious success is probably mainly due to its brilliant staging. Not only do the production team do a great job putting this show together, but the actors and actresses also give beautiful performance themselves. The part of Victoria, one of the youngest cats, requires amazing ballet skills and her dance at the beginning of the show is a highlight, being both beautiful to watch as well as requiring incredible flexibility on the part of the actress. The part of Grizabella requires a brilliant singer but one that also has the ability to act with passion and emotion. The original Elaine Paige is terrific in this role and suits it well. On top of the ‘impressive’ factor, this show is also very fun to watch and, though the story is virtually non-existent, we still feel the emotion of the characters throughout.
This show has been off Broadway and the West End for some time but will be returning to the West End on 6 December this year with Nicole Scherzinger in the role of Grizabella. This new production of the show is bound to be a hit with many fans already waiting excitedly and many more people set to become fans after seeing it for the first time. If you just can’t wait for December there was also a film of the show made in 1998 available on DVD. This film was made to look like a performance on stage to give the feeling you are actually watching the production live, although it does not entirely follow the original staging of the show.
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