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[0:00] Mike Abrams: Welcome to The Wrong Cat Died, the podcast breakdown of Cats. I'm Mike Abrams, your host, and we have another From The Vault episode. This episode was one of the very first interviews we ever did in this podcast. This was back in 2019. I believe it was released on November 7th, and it was the first in-person recording that I did with someone from the Cats community. It was with Christopher Gurr, who was Gus in the 2016 Broadway revival. At this point, when you listen back, I barely knew anything. I had not finished recording all the episodes about the characters. I really did not fully understand the musical. This will be a nice blast from the past. Christopher was extremely fun and funny to chat through his thoughts on Gus, how he thinks about the show, and he was a hilarious interview. I wanted to bring you way, way, way, way back to the beginning of this podcast for one of our From The Vault episodes. Here is the episode with Christopher Gurr.

[1:18] Mike Abrams: Welcome to The Wrong Cat Died, the podcast breakdown of The Cats. I'm your host, Mike Abrams, and today we have a special guest with us. He starred as Gus the Theater Cat and Bustopher Jones in the 2016 Broadway revival of Cats. Welcome, Christopher Gurr, and thanks for joining us.

[1:33] Christopher Gurr: Oh, my pleasure. My pleasure.

[1:35] Mike Abrams: So I want to kick things off by knowing your history on Cats. So before you played Gus, had you seen the show? Were you familiar with it?

[1:42] Christopher Gurr: No.

[1:43] Mike Abrams: Okay.

[1:44] Christopher Gurr: I had gotten the British cast album. My mom had seen it in England. She brought it back to me. I was 13 years old, a big musical theater person, but not an Andrew Lloyd Webber person at all.

[1:56] Mike Abrams: Interesting. Okay.

[1:59] Christopher Gurr: Like, vehemently. My type of guy.

[2:00] Mike Abrams: Right. But she brought the album, and I listened to it, of course, and there were certain things that I responded to. Gus was one of them. So I actually was one of those kids who did Gus in my bedroom alone over and over and over again, listening to the album. But that's all I knew about Cats. I never saw it. I never saw a tour. I didn't even see the PBS video until the night before we started rehearsal. So the 1998 video.

[2:21] Christopher Gurr: That's right.

[2:22] Mike Abrams: The night before.

[2:23] Christopher Gurr: Yeah. Because I suddenly thought, damn, I'm about to go into a rehearsal with a bunch of dancers who grew up on Cats. I should maybe get a little bit more, a broader background on what's going on.

[2:33] Mike Abrams: So that was one of my questions. Did you interpret from John Mills or any of the previous performers when you were preparing?

[2:38] Christopher Gurr: No. Literally, when I went in and did my audition, I did what I had done as a 13-year-old kid in my bedroom. I just repeated that process. And they said yes, and I did a callback, and then I did the final callback, and I booked it. So I hadn't seen anyone else do Gus at that point.

[2:53] Mike Abrams: That's amazing. And so can you tell, we have a lot of non-theater listeners to this podcast. For Gus, you actually play more than just Gus in the show. So you play Gus, Bustopher, and Peter.

[3:05] Christopher Gurr: And Peter, yeah. Peter is a random cat. He looks like every other sort of random cat out there, and is just in the opening number. Then you disappear. It's basically so they have an additional body for all that dancing in the first number.

[3:18] Mike Abrams: And how did they come up with Peter?

[3:20] Christopher Gurr: I have no idea.

[3:20] Mike Abrams: There's Mr. Mistoffelees, Rum Tum Tugger, all these crazy names.

[3:24] Christopher Gurr: Well, Peter's one of the names that we say in the naming of cats, and it's one of the ones that hadn't been taken yet. And I don't think there's a named cat in the show. There's no random names. It had to have been out of the T.S. Eliot original text, and Peter is one of those names.

[3:39] Mike Abrams: Okay. So that's a T.S. Eliot question. How did Peter end up with all the rest of these?

[3:43] Christopher Gurr: Right. Who knows?

[3:44] Mike Abrams: And so of those three characters, which was your favorite?

[3:47] Christopher Gurr: Oh, Gus. Gus. I love Gus. Yeah, absolutely.

[3:50] Mike Abrams: Well, he's an actor, for one. He's a character part, what we would call a character part in theater. He's not the hot, young, sexy one. He's kind of broken down. He's got a lot of history to him. Yeah, definitely Gus.

[4:03] Mike Abrams: And how did you play the parallels between the two? Because Gus is the very quiet, emotional character, and then you've got Bustopher, who just kind of comes in with this, at least in the movie, with the big spoon.

[4:14] Christopher Gurr: Totally, and he's got a lot of bravado. Well, the thing that they have in common is that Bustopher is not really of the tribe. Bustopher is passing through. He is above all of these cats. And while I think Gus probably started as a part of the tribe, his age has kind of pushed him so off far to the periphery that he, too, is kind of not a part of the tribe. He's not a cat who you see all night, who all of a sudden steps forward. We've never seen Gus at all until he is brought on stage to sing his song.

[4:41] Mike Abrams: Wow.

[4:41] Christopher Gurr: Yeah.

[4:42] Mike Abrams: Okay. So when you think about, you've definitely been a part of the show, when you think of all the characters, you've played three.

[4:50] Christopher Gurr: Yep.

[4:50] Mike Abrams: If who's your favorite, not of those three, just in the show, and then who's your least favorite? I'm asking characters, not people you're performing with.

[5:01] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, not people I'm performing with. Absolutely. Carbucketty is the cat who I would say is my least favorite. I'm sort of responding a little bit as if I were Gus because Carbucketty is one of the young cats. It's super athletic. It's one of the tumble tracks. And so it's always very noisy, moving very fast. I find that very irritating. So Carbucketty is my least favorite. Favorite is really tough. I mean, I'm a big fan of Grizabella. Oh, I'm missing the freaking obvious because it's so close to me. Jellylorum is my favorite cat because Jellylorum takes care of Gus.

[5:37] Mike Abrams: Yes. Sings a lot of the song with you.

[5:40] Christopher Gurr: Yeah. And in fact, in the production, Sarah Ford, who played Jellylorum, I could not have done my performance had she not been there. So yeah, totally Jelly.

[5:49] Mike Abrams: Amazing. So I want to ask you about some of the rumor mills that I've read because your characters have some very interesting ones.

[5:57] Christopher Gurr: Oh, really?

[5:58] Mike Abrams: So the first is there is a lot of rumors about what I would call the cat's family tree.

[6:06] Christopher Gurr: Yeah.

[6:07] Mike Abrams: Do you have any insight into who is actually—

[6:11] Christopher Gurr: Who's daddy?

[6:12] Mike Abrams: Yeah. I mean, Bustopher seems to be the answer for a lot of that, or at least he's lovers with most of them, it sounds like.

[6:18] Christopher Gurr: Yeah. Well, I mean, the female cats seem to carry on when Bustopher hits the property. So I'm assuming that he has gotten around to several of the lady cats. Yeah. There's a lot of swooning. I think the only other cat who gets swooned over in quite the same way is Tugger, for totally different reasons.

[6:36] Mike Abrams: For sure.

[6:36] Christopher Gurr: I mean, basically, Bustopher's a sugar daddy. He's a high class. He's got white spats on. He's dressed in a tuxedo.

[6:44] Mike Abrams: And he goes to strip clubs.

[6:45] Christopher Gurr: He goes to really nice clubs, totally. So there you go.

[6:47] Mike Abrams: No, it's clear that they're strip clubs.

[6:49] Christopher Gurr: It's gentlemen's clubs, yeah.

[6:50] Mike Abrams: Yeah. Which is crazy, again, to think about.

[6:52] Christopher Gurr: So I do have another piece. So you listened to the soundtrack as a 13-year-old, but you didn't go.

[6:58] Mike Abrams: No.

[6:58] Christopher Gurr: What is your opinion on parents bringing children to the show?

[7:01] Christopher Gurr: I heard what you said in the first episode. It's a freaky show. Well, let me tell you what I thought when I sat down that night before the first rehearsal and finally loaded in a DVD. I called a friend of mine who lived in the neighborhood, loaded in the DVD, poured myself a bourbon, sat there, watched the whole thing. And at the end, I turned it off and went, huh. So Cats appears to be two hours of soft porn punctuated by three kiddie numbers, like children's numbers, and three contemplations on death and dying.

[7:31] Mike Abrams: Yeah.

[7:32] Christopher Gurr: But essentially, it's two hours of soft porn.

[7:35] Mike Abrams: Right. And they're in the audience.

[7:38] Christopher Gurr: Yeah. And they're all over you, and they're dressed in practically nothing. Yeah.

[7:43] Mike Abrams: Yeah. But there's those kiddie numbers. I mean, I don't think they didn't cynically set off to build a thing that would make everyone in the family happy. But what they did was they built a thing that would make everyone in the family happy.

[7:57] Christopher Gurr: There's some truth to that. There's also a lot of rumors that this is why there are significantly more furries in the world.

[8:02] Mike Abrams: Is it because of Cats?

[8:03] Christopher Gurr: It's because of Cats.

[8:03] Mike Abrams: Oh, I never thought that thought before, but I'd totally buy into that.

[8:06] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, right? I mean, when I first heard of furries, the first thing I thought was, oh, it's like Cats.

[8:11] Mike Abrams: It's a Cats convention.

[8:12] Christopher Gurr: It's the Rum Tum Tugger song.

[8:14] Mike Abrams: Sure.

[8:14] Christopher Gurr: And the Cavity song.

[8:15] Mike Abrams: Done.

[8:15] Christopher Gurr: And the two.

[8:16] Mike Abrams: I believe that.

[8:19] Christopher Gurr: So I'm curious now. I'm assuming you've seen the trailer for the new movie.

[8:23] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, yeah.

[8:24] Mike Abrams: And what are your thoughts?

[8:26] Christopher Gurr: Actually, NPR called me up and asked me this question.

[8:29] Mike Abrams: NPR?

[8:30] Christopher Gurr: Uh-huh.

[8:31] Mike Abrams: Big Cats followers?

[8:31] Christopher Gurr: I guess so. Somebody over there is a Cats follower and had me on Twitter. I'll tell you exactly my experience of watching it. I was at the Neil Simon Theater when it dropped. I was watching The Cher Show.

[8:43] Mike Abrams: Wow.

[8:43] Christopher Gurr: And I came out and my phone blew up. Like, have you seen the trailer? Have you seen the trailer? I was like, I don't want to see this effing trailer. But I went home, bought myself a bourbon, watched the trailer. And I was like, oh, oh, that's good. Oh, that's too bad. Oh, my God. Well, that's wrong. Oh, oh, oh, God. Well, that's strange. That doesn't look finished. I mean, it was just like every emotion you could have. My biggest thing was the minute Judi Dench said an actual line of dialogue, I thought, they're cheating, because in Cats, you don't get to speak actual words. And clearly, they've written some lines, some language for these cats to speak, to make the story clearer, which I think is cheating if you can't do it with a song.

[9:22] Mike Abrams: So do you believe the story is clear?

[9:23] Christopher Gurr: There's a lot of debate on that in general.

[9:25] Mike Abrams: What do you mean? If you just sat down at Cats and watched it?

[9:27] Christopher Gurr: If you just watched.

[9:28] Christopher Gurr: Oh, God, no. Absolutely no. I think it's a Rorschach test. You watch it, and then what do you think just happened? That's what I think it is.

[9:36] Mike Abrams: So how do you interpret it?

[9:38] Christopher Gurr: Well, it's hard, because I was actually... Well, it's funny, because I did watch the video before Trevor talked us through the building of the backstory. What did I think? Well, I essentially thought it was soft porn, kitty numbers, and contemplations on death and dying. I'm still unconvinced that what we watch at the end there is a cat being subjected to death. One of the best responses we got from a little girl who saw the show, she—

[10:03] Mike Abrams: Great parenting.

[10:04] Christopher Gurr: ...is that she thought that we were all already dead in cat heaven, and that Grizabella was actually sent back to live again, is what she thought she had just seen.

[10:16] Mike Abrams: Wow, that's kind of dark, too.

[10:18] Christopher Gurr: All I kind of think is that it's hopeful. It's like, so the ending is, and you get to live, as opposed to, and you get to die.

[10:25] Mike Abrams: Yeah, yeah. And I think that's the intention.

[10:30] Christopher Gurr: Is that the intention?

[10:31] Mike Abrams: I think that's the intention.

[10:31] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, so I read the Sparknotes version of what it's supposed to be.

[10:35] Mike Abrams: Yeah, yeah.

[10:36] Christopher Gurr: Okay, so what's the, from the insider perspective, though, what's the conveying message of what you're trying to tell the story?

[10:43] Mike Abrams: Well, you've just asked a very, like, is there, what's the message? That's one thing.

[10:48] Christopher Gurr: Okay.

[10:49] Mike Abrams: Right? As opposed to what's the plot, or what's the story?

[10:52] Christopher Gurr: What about both? I mean, I'm curious to answer on both.

[10:55] Christopher Gurr: I love it, we're good. What's the message?

[10:58] Christopher Gurr: I don't know, I have to think about, really, what Old Deuteronomy says. I think the message is, stop and consider. If I had to pick a message for a cat, it's stop and consider. Notice. Notice how this cat behaves. Notice how that cat behaves. Notice the cat that you don't want to look at, Grizabella. Stop. Notice. Give her a full, if I had to come up with a message for Cats, that would be the one I would hope to get.

[11:30] Mike Abrams: Okay. Interesting. I kind of like that.

[11:32] Christopher Gurr: And then the plot is a bunch of cats get together in a junkyard, and one is blown to heaven.

[11:38] Mike Abrams: There you go.

[11:39] Christopher Gurr: I view it as, my interpretation, my plot was that I'm watching some ABC singing show.

[11:47] Mike Abrams: Yeah, like a competition show?

[11:48] Christopher Gurr: A competition show, like The X Factor, or The Voice, or American Idol, and Old Deuteronomy is one of the four judges, the only of the four judges, and each one comes up on stage and sings their song, and they get voted on and off by America, and one at the end wins. Instead of a million dollars and a Vegas show, they die.

[12:05] Mike Abrams: They get to ride a tire into heaven. Okay, I buy that.

[12:08] Christopher Gurr: And they belt out the last number to win.

[12:11] Mike Abrams: Sing for your life. Lip sync for your life. Sing for your life.

[12:14] Christopher Gurr: Yeah. It's an interesting message. I had never thought about it that way. I just think about what, and this is stuff, you know, who knows if it actually gets across the footlights, but Trevor Nunn, who was the original director, was our director, and who really wrote the story behind the whole piece. That event that you talked about in your first episode, I think about Deuteronomy sitting there on the tire. Well, in the old days before selfies, no one went up and took a picture with Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy simply sat there and meditated for that entire time. He sat there and thought about what he had just seen, which is the moment where the tribe rejects her for the first time in a really harsh way. And he sits there and thinks for 20 minutes about, how do I solve this problem of this tribe acting this awful way to this one cat?

[14:08] Christopher Gurr: Have like an event that they cite no it's just throughout the production well.

[14:14] Mike Abrams: Well, and here's me figuring this out without this is actually not well. This is a little backstage knowledge, but it's mostly just paying attention to what goes on in the story.

[14:22] Christopher Gurr: Which is of all the cats up there? Skimbleshanks is the most officious. He rules are the most important to Skimbleshanks of anybody up there.

[14:33] Mike Abrams: Okay, right. I want to come back to that. Okay, so I'm watching your fingers and remember that the person who says "F the rules" is Tugger.

[14:42] Christopher Gurr: Right, which is fair, right? So you have two actors who hunkered down in those positions and are given leeway to respond to things night to night. So a Tugger, depending on who's playing it, and I've seen lots of guys play it at this point, could like, you know, be scurrying around behind you while you're trying to get something done.

[15:02] Mike Abrams: Now if we're all good actors, and we were all good actors, there's a parameter around that game that you play. But if someone was to watch that from the outside, what they would see is a guy screwing around and another guy shooting dirty looks.

[15:16] Christopher Gurr: Entirely appropriate that that makes that to Skimbleshanks and Tugger because I know both those guys really, really well, and they liked each other.

[15:27] Mike Abrams: Yeah, totally. I kind of been going, "Oh, I could see how you might see that story playing out." It's rumor mill.

[15:32] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, you know, yes. I mean, there's also rumor mills about their astrology signs, which is about the cast, which is also a very crazy rumor mill.

[15:41] Mike Abrams: Yeah, okay? So Skimbleshanks, rule follower.

[15:47] Christopher Gurr: Mm-hmm. It looks like during the song he slips like a 20 to Old Deuteronomy and my interpretation, since I view this right as a viewer who's watching a show, a competition show, right? I look like it's a bribe. Looks like a bribe.

[16:01] Mike Abrams: Which I'm not positive that what you saw was Skimbleshanks handing Deuteronomy money, not Deuteronomy handing Skimbleshanks money.

[16:10] Christopher Gurr: I saw it the other way, okay? 'Cause I think who knows, you know? Well, in the little story inside a story that the Skimbleshanks number is because he's the railway cat, for those of you who don't know at home.

[16:20] Mike Abrams: So he's like the conductor, which is a really cool...

[16:26] Christopher Gurr: Oh, it's great because we build a train. But I think, I'm not on stage for this and it was many years ago, but I think that he gets tipped by different people during that as the conductor, like being a concierge at a restaurant.

[16:38] Mike Abrams: So maybe I saw the other.

[16:39] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, you maybe just saw... maybe I've been writing it this way thinking like, "God, this is..." or I'm in his way. You're right, and I'm wrong. And Jeremy Davis, who played the role, figured out a way to play it.

[16:49] Mike Abrams: Didn't work clearly, no. He just seemed untouchable. He is, as a matter of fact, if he had been thinking about Skimbleshanks and Skimbleshanks did that, he would have been off the list just outright.

[17:04] Christopher Gurr: All right, right away. Not a lot, not a lot.

[17:06] Mike Abrams: Okay? So before we get to my main question, which is my thesis, right? I would love to hear what you're currently working on.

[17:11] Christopher Gurr: Oh, oh, yeah, I'm in rehearsals. As a matter of fact, I'm on my dinner break right now working on an off-Broadway production of a new version of Cyrano de Bergerac called simply Cyrano.

[17:22] Christopher Gurr: It is a musical. The guys, the twins from the group The National are writing our music. Erica Schmidt is our director and the adapter of the piece, and Peter Dinklage is playing Cyrano. Amazing!

[17:30] Mike Abrams: And when can we catch it?

[17:39] Christopher Gurr: That starts, let's see, it starts the 11th of October's our first preview, and then we open in the first week of November, and it's down at the Daryl Roth Theatre, Union Square. Amazing!

[17:49] Mike Abrams: It's a hot ticket. Can't wait. Small theater. Awesome.

[17:55] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, okay, so back to Cats, back at my thesis.

[17:58] Mike Abrams: Yeah, is that Grizabella was the wrong choice?

[18:01] Christopher Gurr: So my question to you, yeah, as someone who is an insider, do you either agree or disagree with me? And if so, I will say there is a large team Gus.

[18:06] Mike Abrams: I did. There is a large team Gus.

[18:11] Christopher Gurr: Who would you pick and why?

[18:13] Mike Abrams: Hmm. I always thought that I'm gonna come at it from the Gus perspective. I always thought that Gus was dragged on into the junkyard to tell his story, and at first, he's very, very feeble. He can barely get through it, and then as his memories come back to him, he starts to enjoy it and he tells the story.

[18:38] Christopher Gurr: I think Gus uses up his very last bit of life doing the number. My contention is Gus does his number, then Gus crawls under a car and dies, and there's no coming back. That's the end of that. He's had as many lives as a cat is allowed.

[18:49] Mike Abrams: Yes, and that was... and actually, Q and I, as the actors playing Gus and Deuteronomy, spoke about that so that there was an understanding between us as actors that there wasn't... it wasn't like he was passing over me. He understood I was ready. I was tired. Please don't make me do this again, kind of thing.

[19:01] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, you were done.

[19:05] Mike Abrams: Yeah, I was done. So there's that, I guess I'm for Gris. I mean, who else is... I mean, the thing about you want to send someone who's broken. Like, you don't want to send someone who's in their prime.

[19:18] Christopher Gurr: That's debatable.

[19:18] Mike Abrams: Or you don't want to send a kitten because kind of what we had... we had kittens, we had young adult cats. We actually had kittens, we had teens, we had young adult cats, and then you kind of had your older.

[19:29] Christopher Gurr: And again, this is where the layers of Cats is bizarre, right? Is that it doesn't come across very well.

[19:36] Mike Abrams: Where are the two? Demeter and Bombalurina, who sing those are adult adult.

[19:43] Christopher Gurr: Okay, that makes sense. I have a past.

[19:47] Mike Abrams: Well, that also makes sense when you watch that number.

[19:47] Christopher Gurr: That's right. They better be adults.

[19:49] Mike Abrams: Yeah, they better be adults, right?

[19:53] Christopher Gurr: Okay. Yeah, so you are in team Gris. I mean, I got no problem with it being Griz.

[19:58] Mike Abrams: And I'm not sure who I would send instead of... I think there's a lot of choices.

[20:01] Christopher Gurr: Well, I got to run Tugger. He's a showstopper.

[20:07] Mike Abrams: See, I don't want Tugger to be rewarded because I come down on the Tugger's irritating.

[20:13] Christopher Gurr: See, you don't like him.

[20:13] Mike Abrams: Okay. No, I find Tugger to be irritating.

[20:21] Christopher Gurr: So all the female cats disagree with you.

[20:23] Mike Abrams: Oh, of course they do. Right. I mean, if it felt it was like truly a reward to go, then I'm gonna plump for a Jelly.

[20:30] Christopher Gurr: I think Jellylorum.

[20:30] Mike Abrams: Yeah.

[20:33] Christopher Gurr: And it's kind of a comments how it's like when life in your life in the show as the actor and then life in the show as the character combined. Not only do I think because Jellylorum is so kind to Gus and treats him so very well, but the actress who has to play Jellylorum has to be able to sing legit.

[20:41] Christopher Gurr: She's the one who pops all the high C's and all the group numbers. She has to be able to act the stuff she acts with Gus, and she has to dance in so many of the numbers, and it's not really a dance track.

[20:50] Mike Abrams: So now you've got an actress, a singing actress who's being required to dance a lot, so she's working her ass off during the show. So I think let's put her on the tire.

[20:58] Christopher Gurr: I'm gonna pull up my Jelly and Bustopher theory for you.

[21:04] Mike Abrams: Oh, excellent, because I have my own take on this.

[21:09] Christopher Gurr: Good, combining a bunch of rumors, great to make my thought on how this works.

[21:14] Mike Abrams: Yep.

[21:14] Christopher Gurr: So there's a rumor that obviously Bustopher Jones and Grizabella are friends.

[21:19] Mike Abrams: Yep.

[21:19] Christopher Gurr: And then when she gets annexed out, she's too afraid to talk to him again. Fair, right?

[21:29] Mike Abrams: And then also Grizabella and Jelly are friends.

[21:32] Christopher Gurr: Yes, but they kind of have a falling out.

[21:34] Mike Abrams: Yes, right? So there's a rumor that Bustopher and Jelly...

[21:38] Christopher Gurr: Uh-huh.

[21:38] Mike Abrams: Sorry. No, so there's a rumor that Bustopher and Jelly have slept together.

[21:41] Christopher Gurr: Oh, really?

[21:41] Mike Abrams: And so that is where my take is, is that Jelly gives up her chance to sing to Grizabella as an "I'm sorry" for sleeping with her friend.

[21:47] Christopher Gurr: Yes, deep read.

[21:49] Mike Abrams: All right, I mean is that right? You ask it like we can go to the town, we find out preparing for the show.

[21:54] Christopher Gurr: No, but I love that. That's my take, dude. That lines up.

[22:00] Mike Abrams: I mean everything you just said there, I'm thinking of actually internal acting moments that there would be no way you would know about that line up with all of that.

[22:06] Christopher Gurr: So how else can I solidify this? What other parts of the show that I'm missing because I'm, you know, I'm reading rumor mills and watching this?

[22:15] Mike Abrams: Well, if you really watch Jellylorum during the Bustopher Jones number and you watch how she specifically responds, that it totally lines up that they would have had a relationship that was specific.

[22:26] Christopher Gurr: Then you when you watch... Jelly gets really... the first time is if I'm remembering this correctly, she gets really angry and her hair really goes up and the claws come out when Griz comes out the first time.

[22:40] Mike Abrams: But...

[22:41] Christopher Gurr: By the time we get to the end statement of memory, Jelly and I are both on the floor at Griz's feet looking up at her, not in a hateful way at all. We both kind of feel for her as she gave up her apology.

[22:56] Mike Abrams: Wow, that's my take.

[22:57] Christopher Gurr: I like your deep read here. That's what happens when you research this show way too much.

[23:01] Mike Abrams: It's also what happens when you don't have the wrong kind of baggage in your head to begin with.

[23:06] Christopher Gurr: That's very true.

[23:06] Mike Abrams: Yeah, I mean again, it's a clean slate. Seen this so twice now.

[23:11] Christopher Gurr: Great, the New York both your cast.

[23:12] Mike Abrams: Okay, good, good. I saw it and then I had a friend that couldn't believe that I never seen it and then read what I had said and said, "We're gonna go ahead." And so that's my two times, and now I'm religiously watching the 1998 movie.

[23:22] Christopher Gurr: Oh, yeah, to catch up and make sure I've got all the angles coming through here.

[23:29] Mike Abrams: Cool, cool. It's interesting though, so now there's a difference between that movie and what we did because we had the Andy Blankenbuehler in, you know, who sprinkled his own stuff inside those stories.

[23:37] Christopher Gurr: And there's been some takes, like there's been some differences too. Like there was the London streetcat version of Rum Tum Tugger.

[23:44] Mike Abrams: Yeah, yeah, which was a no-no.

[23:50] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, I'm so glad we didn't do that.

[23:50] Mike Abrams: Yeah, no, I mean you brought back the...

[23:56] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, I went back to the Terry Mann version.

[23:56] Mike Abrams: Yes.

[23:56] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, amazing.

[23:57] Mike Abrams: So for any parting words for Cats fans out there or just people listening who are not Cats fans and trying to figure out what this movie...

[24:03] Christopher Gurr: So you're doing a service to the world by preparing people for the movie, which none of us know what it's gonna look like.

[24:09] Mike Abrams: That's right. And my contention is that we should not in any way judge it by that trailer. That trailer, here's... this is me speaking for me.

[24:18] Christopher Gurr: I think that trailer was rushed by the studios to get it out the weekend that Lion King hit.

[24:22] Mike Abrams: I think the director had nothing to do with that trailer.

[24:26] Christopher Gurr: Interesting, I really do. And it launched the same day as Top Gun, which I thought was an interesting choice, the Top Gun trailer. They both have an hour of each other.

[24:34] Mike Abrams: But I'm pretty sure the Cats one is tied to they wanted it in the Lion King and the Lion King.

[24:39] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, yeah, and there's... it doesn't feel quite like the play. The trailer doesn't, for no.

[24:44] Mike Abrams: No, which makes me wonder what they're gonna do.

[24:49] Christopher Gurr: Well, here's what I would say to people about going to see the Cats movie. It's what I say to people about going to see everything. Just go and get on the ride and take the ride. Don't think too much about it beforehand.

[25:03] Mike Abrams: Just go carve out two hours of your life, get a soda, some popcorn, pour some M&Ms into the popcorn. It's the best way to do it.

[25:09] Christopher Gurr: And just go on the ride.

[25:14] Mike Abrams: I would say stop and consider.

[25:22] Christopher Gurr: Dude, call back.

[25:22] Mike Abrams: Yes, just... yeah, I guess that's what I'm saying is just take the time, just stop and consider it.

[25:30] Christopher Gurr: Well, I'm really looking forward to it. I can't wait. I think a bunch of us from the cast are all gonna go together.

[25:33] Mike Abrams: You should!

[25:34] Christopher Gurr: Yeah, I think you should go to the premiere.

[25:37] Mike Abrams: Why are they not inviting you to the promo, please?

[25:39] Christopher Gurr: There's a big difference between movie people and theater people.

[25:44] Mike Abrams: Decimal points and other things.

[25:44] Christopher Gurr: Well, thank you so much. This has been amazing. I appreciate you coming on the podcast.

[25:50] Mike Abrams: I love it. And tell us, how can we follow you on Instagram, social?

[25:57] Christopher Gurr: Oh, yeah, it's very easy. Christopher Gurr, Gurr all one word, that's Instagram and the Twitter, and ChristopherGurr.com is the website. Check me out.

[26:03] Mike Abrams: Awesome. Thank you again.

[26:09] Mike Abrams: To follow along, you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at The Wrong Cat Died or check out our website, TheWrongCatDied.com.