Three Cool Cats: CC, Room 8, and Henri, le Chat Noir
Opening Remarks
Some cats have so captured human affection that they've secured a place in the cultural imagination and achieved a degree of fame bordering on celebrity. To illustrate this, I recently discussed the cases of Félicette the Space Cat, Casper the Commuting Cat, and Oscar the Therapy Cat: click here.
Here, at the request of several cat-loving readers, are three further examples drawn from the modern period that particularly interest or amuse ...
CC (Copy Cat)
Just as many people know the name of Laika, the Soviet space dog, but are unfamiliar with the French cat Félicette, so it is that whilst most have heard of Dolly the Sheep, very few are acquainted with a shorthaired, brown and white tabby cat called CC - an initialism standing for either Copy Cat or Carbon Copy, depending on who you ask - even though she holds the distinction of being the world's first cloned pet, born in Texas, in 2001 [1].
Whilst figures ranging from Jean Baudrillard to Adam Gibson have expressed reservations about cloning as a technique - Doesn't anybody die anymore? - I'm pleased to say that CC appeared to be a happy, healthy cat who, in September 2001, gave birth to four genetically unique kittens (one of whom was, sadly, stillborn), fathered naturally by another lab cat, named Smokey, before dying peacefully, aged 18, in March 2020.
Room 8 (The School Cat)
If asked to identify my favourite type of cat, then I would have to say one that comes from out of the blue; i.e., not a breed, but either a fateful event in and of themselves, or the herald of such - a kind of feline angel with whiskers rather than wings.
My little black cat is one such creature, who just turned up one day and decided to stay ... And so was an American pussy who came to be known as Room 8 ...
Room
8 wandered into a
classroom at Elysian Heights Elementary School in Echo Park,
California, in 1952 and decided he was henceforth going to live there during the school year; vacationing for the summer months, but always returning when classes resumed in the Fall.
This happy (somewhat unusual) arrangement continued without interruption until the mid-1960s.
Eventually, the news media discovered what was happening and they would send reporters and film crews to await the cat's return. This resulted in him receiving fan mail (up to a 100 letters a day) and becoming the subject of both a documentary film and a children's book.
When age, sickness, and injury began to take a toll - he was hurt in a fight when older and suffered from feline pneumonia - Room 8 was taken in by a kind family living close to the school.
When he died, in August 1968, thought to be aged around 21, his obituary in the LA Times ran to three columns and was accompanied with a photograph. Past and present students at the school raised funds for his gravestone and CC was laid to rest at the
Los Angeles Pet Memorial Park in Calabasas, California.
Finally, for those who find such details fascinating, Room 8's paw prints can be found immortalized in cement on the pavement outside Elysian Heights.
Henry aka Henri, le Chat Noir
Technically, Henri, le Chat Noir is a fictional cat created by the human William Braden, who wrote and directed a short series of films posted online that explored the existential musings of the former.
But Henri was portrayed by a real (longhaired black and white) cat, Henry, belonging to Braden's mother, so I think it's legitimate to comment on his case here, particularly as videos featuring Henri have been viewed millions of times and received critical acclaim, making him one of the world's best-known and most celebrated cats.
Braden began his project whilst a student at the Seattle Film Institute. He was inspired by the American perception of French films as pretentious and self-absorbed. The first short, Henri (2007), was written, filmed and edited in eleven days.
The second film, Henri 2: Paw de Deux didn't follow on YouTube until five years later in 2012, but it won the Golden Kitty Award for Best Cat Video On The Internet at the Walker Art Center's Internet Cat Video Festival. Critic Roger Ebert also declared Henri 2: Paw de Deux the 'best internet cat video ever made' [2].
Many sequels followed between 2012 and 2018 - seventeen short films in all. In the final film, Henri announced his retirement and thanked all his fans around the world for their support.
During this period, two books were also published: Henri, le Chat Noir: The Existential Musings of an Angst-Filled Cat (2013) and Reflections on Human Folly (2016), both written (obviously) by Braden, but one likes to think with Henry's approval.
I think my favourite description of Henri was provided by a journalist at The Huffington Post who wrote that he was 'like a feline Serge Gainsbourg, just without the singing, or the alcoholism, or the public scandal' [3].
It's actually a little disapointing to discover that in real life Henry was, according to Braden, a good natured and happy cat who never suffered a single moment of existential crisis and had nothing in common with the brooding character Henri he portrayed on film.
In December 2020, Braden announced that Henry had been euthanized at the age of 17 because of a debilitating deterioration of his spine ... C'est la vie! as he fictional French self might shrug.
Notes
[1] CC was genetically identical to Rainbow, the male cat who donated the genetic
material. But the cats looked different because coat patterns and other
features can be determined in the womb. Her surrogate mother was named Allie.
[2] Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, (31 Aug 2012).
[3] Written in a Huffington Post review (27 June 2012) of Henri 3: Le Vet (2012).
