Rumpleteazer

Rumpleteazer (or Rumpelteazer) is a character in T. S. Eliot's book "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" and Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical "Cats".

The Poem

In Eliot's original poem "Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer," Rumpelteazer is suggested to be a male cat. "They were plausible fellows..." [Page 22, Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, London 1984] . However, Rumpleteazer is usually portrayed as female in the musical.

Rumpelteazer and her partner in crime, Mungojerrie, specialize in petty theft and mischief. In Eliot's depiction of this duo, these cats are depicted knocking over Ming vases and stealing items from their human family.

The Musical

In the original Broadway production, Rumpleteazer doubled as another character, Etcetera. In smaller local productions, this double character casting still occurs. In addition, Rumpleteazer and Mungojerrie can be cast to double as another tertiary set of characters: the twins, Tantomile and Coricopat. Of the musical score, there were changes from the original musical production as well. While the song "Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer" was sung by Mr. Mistoffelees in the original Broadway production, this was changed a few years into the run of the show. In addition, two distinct versions of the "Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer" music exist: the original London production's version has a slower tempo and more jazzlike sound, while the more common version is upbeat.

pelling

In Eliot's original work, the name is spelt "Rumpelteazer". Within the score, it is spelt "Rumpleteazer".

Costume

In the musical version of Eliot's cat poems, Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer are traditionally costumed as orange, black and white calico or tabby cats. In the original Broadway production, they wore baggy clown-like costumes seemingly made of various food wrappers as characters performing for Bustopher Jones. Generally Mungojerrie's costume is a darker, more heavily striped Tabby, while Rumpleteazer is paler. However when they perform their solo song they have additional costume pieces, a vest and stockings for Mungojerrie and leotard and stockings for Rumpleteazer. This has the effect of making them appear almost identically marked.

Cast

Rumpleteazer was portrayed by Bonnie Langford in the original London cast, Christine Langner in the original Broadway cast, and Jo Gibb, who played the role in London and in the filmed video version.

References