Q 01/05

Which Andrew Lloyd Webber ballad, sung in Cats by a faded glamour cat, had been recorded around 600 times by 2006?

A) Pie Jesu

B) Superstar

C) Memory

D) Buenos Aires

Answer · why

C) Memory

Memory had been recorded about 600 times by 2006, in styles from easy listening to techno. Barbra Streisand and Johnny Mathis are among the stars who ...

Q 02/05

Which actress snapped her Achilles tendon rehearsing Cats in 1981 and had to give up the role of Grizabella?

A) Judi Dench

B) Maggie Smith

C) Helen Mirren

D) Diana Rigg

Answer · why

A) Judi Dench

Judi Dench withdrew a week before the first preview. Nearly four decades later she finally appeared in Cats on screen, as the Jellicle leader in the 2...

Q 03/05

Which rock star did Andrew Lloyd Webber say the swaggering Rum Tum Tugger in Cats partly pays homage to?

A) David Bowie

B) Elvis Presley

C) Freddie Mercury

D) Mick Jagger

Answer · why

D) Mick Jagger

Mick Jagger of The Rolling Stones was a model for the Tugger, who struts in to a rock song. The 2014 West End revival reworked the character as a stre...

Q 04/05

Which villain in Cats did T. S. Eliot model on Professor Moriarty, the nemesis of Sherlock Holmes?

A) Rumpus Cat

B) Macavity

C) Griddlebone

D) Alonzo

Answer · why

B) Macavity

Macavity borrows Moriarty's tall, thin frame and domed forehead, and the name itself puns on the professor's. Eliot was a devoted fan of Conan Doyle's...

Q 05/05

In which sitcom is Broadway producer Maxwell Sheffield forever taunted for having turned down the musical Cats?

A) Frasier

B) Seinfeld

C) The Nanny

D) Just Shoot Me

Answer · why

C) The Nanny

The Nanny made a running gag of Sheffield's rivalry with Andrew Lloyd Webber. The joke has a real echo: major investors did refuse to back the show be...