The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat
| The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Animation Comedy |
| Written by | Dr. Seuss Based upon characters created by: Dr. Seuss |
| Directed by | Bill Perez |
| Voices of | Bob Holt Mason Adams Frank Welker Joe Eich |
| Narrated by | Mason Adams |
| Music by | Joe Raposo |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| Original language | English |
| Production | |
| Executive producer | David H. DePatie |
| Producers | Ted Geisel Friz Freleng |
| Running time | 25 minutes |
| Production companies | Marvel Productions DePatie-Freleng Enterprises (in name only) |
| Original release | |
| Network | ABC |
| Release | May 20, 1982 |
The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat is an animated TV special starring two of Dr. Seuss' famous characters, The Grinch and The Cat in the Hat. The special premiered on May 20, 1982 on ABC and won two Emmys for Outstanding Animated Program and Outstanding Individual Achievement (Animated Programming). This is to date, the last Dr. Seuss special from DePatie-Freleng. This was not only Marvel's lone Dr. Seuss special, this was also the only Marvel Productions cartoon that Friz Freleng was involved in, as production began at DePatie-Freleng Enterprises and then was completed at Marvel Productions.
Allan Sherman, who had voiced The Cat in the Hat for the first two Dr. Suess specials, had died in 1973, necessitating his replacement, Mason Adams voiced the character in this special.
Plot
The special opens on a morning so beautiful that even the Grinch wakes up in a good mood. But his cheerfulness is soon revoked when his reflection in the mirror talks back to him and reminds him that he's a Grinch and therefore shouldn't be cheerful, by repeating 'the Grinch's Oath' with him:
A Grinch is unhelpful, unfriendly, unkind, with ungracious thoughts, in an unhealthy mind. A Grinch is uncheerful, uncouth, and unclean. Now say this together: I'M FRIGHTFULLY MEAN! My eyes are both shifty, my fingers are thrifty. My mouth will not smile, not half of an inch! I'm a Grinch! I am a Grinch. I'M A GRINCH!
Out to prove himself to his reflection, the Grinch goes out to cause misfortune. Meanwhile, the Cat in the Hat goes on a picnic and soon crosses paths with the Grinch when the Grinch crashes into his car. The Grinch demands that the Cat "get this crate out of my way", but when the Cat willingly and cheerfully agrees to his demands, the Grinch pursues him in a car chase for mistakenly calling him 'Mr Green-Face'.
Realizing he's upset this person, the Cat returns to his house, but the Grinch tracks him there and messes with his voice using a device he has invented, "my Acoustical Anti-Audio Bleeper, otherwise known as my Vacusound Sweeper", to garble the sounds of anything that gets caught in its waves. He is undeniably proud of his invention as he sabotages all other nearby sounds, proclaiming himself the 'Master of Everyone's Ears'. Then the Grinch goes back to his house and builds a "Darkhouse" with which to mess with the Cat's sight, proclaiming, "That Cat's gonna suffer like never before!"
The Cat becomes upset with the Grinch's hijinks and has a psychiatry session with him in a thought bubble. Predictably he gets nowhere with the virtual Grinch, so he then decides to go over and have a talk with him, but in the process, the Grinch makes it so dark he can't see where he's going, and he crashes his car when he passes a "Dead End" sign (depicted here as a white octagon, instead of a yellow diamond).
The Cat attempts to hide from the Grinch in a nearby restaurant, but the Grinch's machine continues to mess with reality, and his hijinks result in wild and crazy madness all over the restaurant. The Cat is now furious with the Grinch and ponders to himself how he can change the Grinch, eventually racing through a door and sending himself hurtling into the Grinch's Dimension. There, as he ponders, he has to endure visions of a floating Grinch head of laser lights, a spinning spiral, and getting split into four different-colored outlines - blue, green, red, and yellow, which join together to become a white outline, and he turns back into himself. He soon figures it out and rallies everybody in the restaurant to follow him to the Grinch's house.
There, he leads everyone in a song about the love the Grinch received from his mother while using his umbrella as a conductor's baton; the Grinch, having a soft spot in his heart for his mother, begins to cry tearfully when he hears this, and is afterward told by the spirit of his mum that "everything's going to be all right." Touched, the Grinch disassembles his machines and goes through his change of heart again the next morning. But when his reflection tries to revert him back to a grouch, his dog, Max, shuts the mirror up with the Vacusound Sweeper.
Home video releases
The special was first released on VHS in the mid-80s via CBS-Fox's Playhouse Video division, and reissued later in the decade by Random House Home Video; this release uses its working title, The Cat in the Hat Gets Grinched, and cuts out half of the car chase sequence, ending the chase after the Grinch drives into a mud pit. Since this is before the Cat realizes the Grinch is chasing him, his exclamation of "Phew!" (after making it home) is out of place in the edited version. However, the complete sequence was restored for the later DVD release.