By Bruce Chadwick
originally published: 03/08/2023
Photo By Matthew Murphy, Murphymade
Years and years and years ago, when the musical Cats opened on Broadway, my late wife and I went to see it. We both fell in love with the oddball cat named Rum Tum Tugger. Several months later, we got our first cat and immediately, right away, named her Rum Tum Tugger. She was a handful - food strikes, carousing with the neighborhood Tom Cat, knocking over garbage cans, hiding in the attic over the garage once for three days complaining about everything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
One of her favorite tricks was to stay out all night and then, with her whiskered boyfriend, sleep leaning against the outside of the front door. We’d open the door in the morning and she’s tumble in, just after we shooed away the Tom Cat.
We loved her madly.
This lost chapter from my distant past came back to me a few days ago when I interviewed the actor who plays Rum Tum Tugger in the current production in the long running, classical and much, much beloved musical Cats at the Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, this coming weekend (Friday at 8:00pm, Saturday at 8:00pm, Sunday at 1:30pm & 7:00pm) I hope they have two, not one plates of vittles out for Rum Tum Tugger!
The show’s longevity, and popularity over the years is just as astonishing to me as it is to Hank Santos, who play Rum in the current show and has been on the road with it since September.
“The show is amazing. We get people who saw the show in the 70s and now bring their kids and even grandkids to the show. We’ll get that in Morristown like we get it everywhere else. I don’t know the right word to describe Cats. Not legend but, er, but. Oh, I’ve got the rid word - iconic. Yes, Cats is Iconic.”
The irony of Santos and all the other performers in this play, with a lot of music and dancing, is that many of them have not actually danced on stage in two years.
Huh?
“The pandemic,” Santos said. “Many of the nation’s plays were shut down, such as Cats, so our first dancing in it, in my play, is right now. It’s tough to get back in shape, learn all the dances again.”
People do not understand how hard dance is in the theater. “It’s not just the steps, but the movement. And it’s you amid a group of people or with other people. It takes time and a lot of effort to get it right.”
Actually, Santos started out in a school for ballet as a teenager. “I liked it, but I liked acting a lot more. Now, luckily, I do the acting and the dance. It’s all very enjoyable,” he said.
Photo By Matthew Murphy, Murphymade
What is the secret of the success of Cats, though? All those years on Broadway, touring and sold out audience everywhere you turn.
“It’s a couple of things. First, the show has great, great music. When we do that song ‘Memory’ you can hear a pin drop in the theater. People cry. Second, a good storyline with cats acting as people and the acceptance of the animals as people in this wider story. Third, all those cats! Everywhere you turn! Cats, cats and more cats! People love them. Still do,” he laughs.
Then he groans. Just about everywhere is impressed that people can act so wonderfully to an actor playing a cat’s costume, but before and after the show people will come back stage and say they are disappointed because the cats are so much larger than their cats at home,” he chuckled
“Don’t laugh,” he said. “They do. You would not believe some of the things people say to us.”
Reason for show success four - Cats is different.
“It would be too easy to say it is…… a ‘different’ show, but it is. All of the great musicals are up there – pretty much the same. Cats is a very different kind of show. If you’re there for the first time you won’t know what is coming at you next, and if you’re there for the fourth or fifth time you’ll know what’s coming, and can’t wait for it to arrive.”
The actor has fallen in love with the show “It grows on you,” he said. ‘You remember a few songs, such as that gorgeous ‘Memory’ but there are 7-9 great songs in the play. Together, they are memorable. You don’t forget them,” he said.
And good old Rum Tum Tugger? She’s in heaven now….and a wonderful “memory” for all of us in the family still down here.
Cats comes to Mayo Performing Arts Center for four performances from Friday, March 10th to Sunday, March 12th. Tickets range from $69-$109 and are available for purchase online.
About the author:
Bruce Chadwick worked for 23 years as an entertainment writer/critic for the New York Daily News. Later, he served as the arts and entertainment critic for the History News Network, a national online weekly magazine. Chadwick holds a Ph. D in History and Cultural Studies from Rutgers University. He has written 31 books on U.S. history and has lectured on history and culture around the world. He is a history professor at New Jersey City University.
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