Everett staging is another life for "Cats"

Melanie Burgess, the costumer, designed 25 cat costumes and wigs.

Alex Berry, the set and light designer, spent a lot of time on his hands and knees to get a cat's perspective on life. It helped that he is the father of a preschooler.

Director-choreographer Steve Tomkins had to look no further than Edna, his 14-year-old cat, for inspiration.

All this went into re-imagining "Cats," the popular musical that the Village Theatre will present starting Friday at the Everett Performing Arts Center.

The show, the theater's most expensive ever, also has been the company's most difficult production, Tomkins said.

"The elements are so specific, and it all has to be built from the ground up," he said.

"We are the first production in this area that has taken 'Cats' and reconceived it to fit our needs. All the shows that have come through are remakes or tours of the Broadway show."

More than a year of research, design and rehearsal went into "Cats," which opened Nov. 12 in Issaquah and played to near-sellout crowds, adding an eighth show each week as well as an extra week in both Issaquah and Everett.

Since 1981, when the musical opened in London before transferring to New York, it has won seven Tony Awards and played more than 250 cities in 20 countries.

"We could be running 'Cats' through Easter," Tomkins joked. "In our pre-sale in Everett, we've broken all records."

Tomkins went back to the source for inspiration: poet T.S. Eliot, whose "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats," a children's work, was the basis for the musical.

Andrew Lloyd Webber had set the poet's verse to music.

"Every English schoolchild knows it [the book]. It's part of their culture," Tomkins said. "It was a very interesting choice for Andrew Lloyd Webber to musicalize the poems.

"I didn't realize until reading the book how witty and clever the original source was. One of the things I wanted to bring to our production was that whimsy and sense of humor."

This nonstop suite of songs and dances has plenty of both.

It doesn't take long before these slinking, seething, hissing creatures take on personalities, including Jennyanydots, doing good works among the mice; Rum Tum Tugger, the Mick Jagger of cats; Bustopher Jones, a vain cat in spats; Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer, double-trouble calicoes; and Old Deuteronomy, the wise patriarch who has fathered many cats and lived many lives.

"It's absolutely one of the best regional-theater productions I have ever seen or been involved in," said Ekello Harrid Jr., who plays Old Deuteronomy. "Because of how small the theater is, we are able to physically get to the audience in a way that hasn't been seen before. The ability to climb out on the seats is just surprising to the audience."

The audience giggles during one of the first numbers, "The Naming of Cats." The cats crawl into the audience, lazing on people, sitting on laps, stretching and preening. Unlike a huge Broadway house, no seat is far from the stage.

Because the show is all song and dance, it taxes the actors to the limits of their physical abilities. One move has mischievous Mungojerrie doing two cartwheels back-to-back across an 8-foot-tall fence that's only 2 ½ feet wide.

All summer, Tomkins, assistant choreographer Kathryn Van Meter, who also plays Jennyanydots, and others worked out the language and the look of cat movement, developing the characters and modernizing the line.

Burgess worked with wig master Douglas Decker to design the cast's cat wigs, and Emily Stansifer designed the makeup.

Everything had to be built cat-size, including props that dwarf the actors: large trash cans, a newspaper, a discarded easy chair and an old ladder.

"For me, it was also creating images in a world we could all relate to," Tomkins said. "In designing it, we really pushed it all forward so you're engulfed in the world of cats."

Ironically, there are all sides of humanity in the show, too. Webber set the show's signature song, "Memory," on Grizabella, the cat the audience generally finds the most fascinating. Karen Kaiser sings the role in this production.

"She's got a beautiful voice, full of emotion," Tomkins said.

After many years away from her tribe, Grizabella returns with a torn coat and dashed dreams to sing, "I remember the time I knew what happiness was / Let the memory live again."

"How do you define happiness?" actor Harrid asked. "I think that's why T.S. Eliot's prose is so important. It makes you imagine the feeling."

In the beginning, Tomkins told his design team: "We don't want to remount a Broadway show. Let's find a language and a style that works for our theater without throwing out what makes the show great."

Diane Wright: 425-745-7815 or dwright@seattletimes.com