Queer Cats Strike a Pose in a Revival Set in Ballroom Culture

Queer Cats Strike a Pose in a Revival Set in Ballroom Culture

CATS: THE JELLICLE BALL is a phenomenon, I would get your tickets now; my hunch is there will be a rush for seats. pic.twitter.com/GQY7Cm7wCy

— Rob Weinert-Kendt (@RobKendt) June 19, 2024

A group of weirdos, misfits, and outsiders gather at the fringes of and on the outskirts of mainstream society, rejected by the norm, and search for a community all their own. They gather together and create a hierarchy in which they all strive to ascend toward greatness. They create their own art, their own language. We could be talking about the nascent LA punk scene in the late seventies, queer POC kids in New York the eighties or early nineties...or cats on stage.

Actually, for the purposes of this post, it's the last two. Yer boy Hank here just threw the punkers in because I've been listening to John Doe's punk scene memoir Under the Big Black Sun and it's friggin' awesome and completely gay-inclusive and I highly recommend it. But that's for another post. But, yeah...queer cats! Or should I say queer Cats. An explosively creative,  revisionist version of the Andrew Lloyd Webber mainstay gives the show the queer makeover it only sort of needed. Cats: The Jellicle Ball is playing now and extended at the Perelman Arts Center, or as it's more familiarly known, the PAC-NYC, through July 28th. As one commenter said, get those tix while you still can! I know a buddy of mine just exuberantly posted that he scored tickets for Pride Sunday, and you can color me super Jelly-cle!

Instead of felines running around the alleyways and garbage dumps looking to gain a spot in the Heaviside Layer, this new version is populated by human characters vying for top marks at an eighties-era underground ball where each song is a cat-egory. CATEGORY IS...PUNS! Think Webber through the lens of Pose and, more importantly, Paris Is Burning. That last is especially poignant because none other than Junior Labeija, one of the original ballroom kids from that era and film appears in this show as Gus the Theater Cat, with the venerable André de Shields as Old Deuteronomy.

Now, given the almost laughable (okay, totally laughable) reputation this dusty old relic of a show has gained through history, with the 2019 film flop not giving it any boost in positive recognition, many greeted the idea of this reboot much like this guy:

Never thought I'd be saying "I really wanna go see Cats again", but then this came along... https://t.co/JKbDQQeviB

— Danny Ashkenasi (@DannyAshkenasi) July 30, 2022

And when the following video hit YouTube last May, people were simply gagged! (Am I using that expression correctly?) 

The show is the collective brainchild of Zhailon Levingston, the show's co-director, a fan of the musical since he was a child, and PAC-NYC artistic director Bill Rauch who has created queer reworkings of other shows like Oklahoma. As reported in the NYTimes, Levingston explains why the show's spirit and even some lyrics transfer so easily to the world of ballroom drag. “Think about Cats being street characters in a junkyard and ballroom being these historically marginalized people. In ballroom, you have a centering of legacy and chosen family, the way cats have a tribe. Both take what’s given to them, and turn it into something beautiful.”

CATS ‘The Jellicle Ball’ was one of the most outstanding things I have EVER seen on stage. Olympic-level choreo. Brilliant framing though the queer ballroom scene. Authentic and joyful. I need to see this 20 more times. pic.twitter.com/NRRvQbsfBW

— Cory Epstein (@cory_ep) June 19, 2024

As Rauch explains, they wanted to remain true to both the structure of ballroom and the original material, while creating an interactive party atmosphere. “We want this production to be authentic to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats,’to T.S. Eliot’s words and to ballroom. All those things are of equal weight and importance to us. If there’s a ballroom choice that doesn’t honor the musical, or a musical choice that doesn’t honor ballroom, then we don’t do it.”

The show has always had a camp undertone with young gays seeing themselves up there as the misbegotten outsiders trying to scratch and claw their way to some sort of life, so it's almost a no-brainer that this flamboyantly joyful version was born. Rauch said that, at auditions, he and Levingston were moved by how many young Black and queer auditions look at the original show as “a huge safety valve of queer expression for countless youth.”

And I ask you, how fierce is this cast? Check out the backstage video shot the day they all first met. Bow to the queens!

WHO IS READY FOR THE JELLICLE BALL?!! I know I am

What’s 7 + 1? Exactly. Get a behind-the-scenes look into the “CATS: THE JELLICLE BALL” photoshoot.

Fun fact: This was the first time the cast met all together!!!!
Grab your tickets now, link in my bio ☺️#cats #reimagined pic.twitter.com/aRosokIIUd

— - Robert Silk Mason - (@robert802371) June 13, 2024

CATS: The Jellicle Ball pic.twitter.com/6KjBk82usj

— Evan Zimmerman (@evanzimm) June 19, 2024

And if you need any more convincing to grab a ticket, it comes Lin-Manuel Miranda approved!

It was so nice meeting you @Lin_Manuel last night at CATS: The Jellicle Ball Thank you for your kind words and amazing hug. This was such a pleasant surprise It hits different when a Legend gives you your flowers! MISTOFFELESS IS ITT!! See you soon!! #catsthejellicleball pic.twitter.com/jl8NDGBVLb

— - Robert Silk Mason - (@robert802371) June 19, 2024

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