Original Air Date: January 3, 2021
Starring: Piper
Directed by: Beth McCarthy-Miller
Cat Out of the Bag Alert! This review contains spoilers for this episode!
Synopsis: Based on the British sitcom Miranda. After the death of her father, Kat (Mayim Bialik) opens a Cat Café which only befuddles her matchmaking mother Sheila (Swoosie Kurtz).
Cat Burglar (Scene Stealer): In this pilot episode there is one featured cat, a tortoiseshell which Kat asks her employees Phil (Leslie Jordan) and Randi (Kyla Pratt) to name, promising an extra paid sick day to the one whose name is chosen. Phil suggests Puddin’. “‘Cause I could just eat him with a spoon!” (Him??) Randi then suggests Firework, “because it looks like one just exploded in his ass.” That is the name chosen. Kat even comments that she thinks it’s “purr-fect”.
Firework is also featured near the end of the episode when Randi explains that the bully cats led by Patricia have cornered him in the cat basket. Kat removes Firework and takes him upstairs where her mother is waiting in the dark. Kat is startled and drops Firework, then says, “You scared the cat out of me!”
After a discussion with her mother who worries that Kat’s going to become a crazy cat lady, Kat picks up Firework and says she’s going to be a rad cat lady.
She sets Firework on the counter and later sings to the song Firework to him. Firework was played by a cat actor named Piper. Bialik was quoted in an interview for The Dog People that “Piper was a particularly grouchy girl and she needed some space to be her grouchy awesome self.” (Which might explain the otherwise odd explanation for choosing the name Firework.)
Cat Cattle Call: Most of the cats in the series are in the background of the café, sitting on cat trees or furniture. Bialik explained in the same articled quoted above that many of the cats are Ragdolls which are known for being docile. She also said that she was proud that none of the cat actors are either tethered or drugged.
It is wonderful to see so many cat actors gainfully employed but anyone who has visited a real cat café knows that the set up on this show is highly unrealistic (there are no double doors to prevent cats from escaping, in the first place). But everyone on the set are cat lovers and the cast supports cat charities, which is lovely.
Cat Credits: In the opening credits Kat holds up pictures of all of the regular cast members with cats.
The cat trainers on the show are David Allsberry and Andrea Ver Meer working for Animals for Hollywood.
Final Mewsings: If only the episodes spent even more time with the cats!
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