The Cat's Meow

Plot

On November 15, 1924, various individuals board the luxury yacht Oneida in San Pedro, California, including its owner, publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst, and his mistress, silent film star Marion Davies; motion picture mogul Thomas H. Ince, whose birthday is the reason for the weekend cruise, and his mistress, starlet Margaret Livingston (who would portray "the Woman From the City" in F.W. Murnau's Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans three years later); international film star Charlie Chaplin; English writer Elinor Glyn; and Louella Parsons, a film critic for Hearst's New York American.

Several of those participating in the weekend's festivities are at a crossroads in their lives and/or careers. Chaplin, still dealing with the critical and commercial failure of A Woman of Paris and rumors he has impregnated 16-year-old Lita Grey (who appeared in his film The Kid), is in the midst of preparing The Gold Rush. Davies longs to appear in a slapstick comedy rather than the somber costume dramas to which Hearst has kept her confined. Ince's eponymous film studio is in dire financial straits, so he hopes to convince Hearst to take him on as a partner in Cosmopolitan Pictures. Parsons would like to relocate from the East Coast to more glamorous Hollywood.

Hearst suspects Davies and Chaplin have engaged in an affair, a suspicion shared by Ince, who seeks proof he can present to Hearst in order to curry favor with him. In the wastepaper basket in Chaplin's stateroom, Ince discovers a discarded love letter to Davies and pockets it with plans to produce it at an opportune moment. When he finally does, Hearst is enraged. His anger is fueled further when he finds a brooch he had given Davies in Chaplin's cabin. Hearst concludes it was lost there during a romantic liaison, and he rifles Marion's room for further evidence.

Armed with a pistol, Hearst searches the yacht for Chaplin in the middle of the night. Ince, meanwhile, runs into Davies and the two sit and talk with Ince donning a hat Chaplin had worn. Davies explains to Ince her love for Hearst and her regret at an earlier affair with Chaplin. She states "I never loved him" just as Hearst arrives behind them. Thinking Davies is referring to him, and mistaking Ince for Chaplin, a jealous Hearst shoots Ince. The assault is witnessed by Parsons, who had heard noises and went to investigate.

Hearst arranges to dock in San Diego and have a waiting ambulance take the dying Ince home. He phones the injured man's wife and tells her Ince attempted suicide when Livingston tried to end their affair, assuring her the truth won't reach the media. To the rest of his guests he announces Ince's ulcer flared up and required immediate medical attention. Davies, of course, knows the truth, and confides in Chaplin. Also armed with that knowledge is Parsons, who assures Hearst his secret will be safe in exchange for a lifetime contract with the Hearst Corporation, thus laying the groundwork for her lengthy career as one of Hollywood's most powerful gossip columnists.

Production

Basis in reality

Film scholar Jonathan Rosenbaum, editor of the 1992 book This is Orson Welles — a record of interviews Peter Bogdanovich conducted with Orson Welles — began his April 2002 review of The Cat's Meow with this exchange about Citizen Kane (1941):

OW: In the original script we had a scene based on a notorious thing Hearst had done, which I still cannot repeat for publication. And I cut it out because I thought it hurt the film and wasn’t in keeping with Kane’s character. If I’d kept it in, I would have had no trouble with Hearst. He wouldn’t have dared admit it was him.PB: Did you shoot the scene?OW: No, I didn’t. I decided against it. If I’d kept it in, I would have bought silence for myself forever.

"The incident Welles alluded to in this exchange is the subject of The Cat’s Meow, directed by Bogdanovich and adapted by Steven Peros from his own play," Rosenbaum wrote. "Bogdanovich may see Welles as the inspiration for his film, but I have no idea where Peros got his facts."

Rosenbaum did find a similar story in the 1979 edition of The Film Encyclopedia by Ephraim Katz, in the entry on Thomas Ince; and in the 1971 essay on Citizen Kane by Pauline Kael:

Her principal source was John Houseman, script supervisor for cowriter Herman Mankiewicz, and it seems safe to conclude, even without her prodding, that some version of the story must have cropped up in Mankiewicz’s first draft of the script, which Welles subsequently edited and added to. According to Kael, the only trace of the subplot left in the script is a speech made by Susan Alexander, who was loosely based on Davies, to the reporter Thompson about Kane: “Look, if you’re smart, you’ll get in touch with Raymond. He’s the butler. You’ll learn a lot from him. He knows where all the bodies are buried.” Kael writes, “It’s an odd, cryptic speech. In the first draft, Raymond literally knew where the bodies were buried: Mankiewicz had dished up a nasty version of the scandal sometimes referred to as the Strange Death of Thomas Ince."

"I don’t think we’re likely ever to know for sure what happened on Hearst’s yacht on November 19, 1924," Rosenbaum concluded.

Casting

Bogdanovich cast Kirsten Dunst in the role of Marion Davies, as she had "always wanted to do a twenties story. She has a wonderful period face, looks great in those clothes, and had great instincts." In the role of William Randolph Hearst, a different actor had been cast, but Edward Herrman replaced the unnamed actor after he backed out of the project. Eddie Izzard, who Bogdavonich had seen performing stand-up comedy (and who was primarily known as a comedian) was given the role of Charlie Chaplin, as Bogdanovich felt his comedic sensibilities were compatible with the character of Chaplin, who himself was a comedic performer. Cary Elwes was cast as Thomas Ince, while Joanna Lumley obtained the role of novelist Elinor Glyn. Jennifer Tilly was subsequently cast as Louella Parsons, the forthright and nosy journalist aboard the yacht, and was offered the part by Bogdanovich, who had acted opposite Tilly in the 1997 television film Bella Mafia.

Filming

Though set in California, filming of The Cat's Meow took place in coastal Greece, and Berlin, Germany. Bogdanovich wanted to shoot the film in black-and-white to capture the feel of the silent era, but studio heads objected. (Black-and-white scenes of Ince's funeral, resembling old newsreel footage, bookend the film.) To compensate, the director ordered costume designer Caroline de Vivaise to dress the cast in only black and white. With only a few weeks to prepare prior to the start of filming, she resorted to shopping in secondhand stores for vintage clothing. Bogdanovich agreed to her request to have some silver and gold on the costumes when many of the pieces she found were trimmed with those colors.

The vessel used to represent the Oneida was actually the Marala. She was originally named Evadne, the private yacht of Charles Fairey of Fairey Aviation, and had patrolled the approaches to Bermuda, and its Royal Naval Dockyard, during the Second World War as HMS Evadne.

Music

Composer Ian Whitcomb's score was augmented by original recordings that were popular during the period in which the film takes place. These included "Avalon," "Toot Toot Tootsie," and "California, Here I Come" by Al Jolson; "Everybody Loves My Baby" and "Wild Cat Blues" by Clarence Williams; "Stumbling," "Say It With Music," "Somebody Loves Me," and "Linger Awhile" by Paul Whiteman; and "Wabash Blues" by Fletcher Henderson. In addition, Ian Whitcomb & His Bungalow Boys performed many tunes from the era, among them "Ain't We Got Fun," "I'm Just Wild About Harry," "St. Louis Blues," "A Pretty Girl Is Like a Melody," "I'm Nobody's Baby," "Rose of Washington Square," "If You Were the Only Girl in the World," "Margie," "How Ya Gonna Keep 'Em Down on the Farm (After They've Seen Paree)?," and "Alice Blue Gown."

After the film had been completed, music supervisor Joel C. High realized the version of "Charleston" heard in the birthday party scene was a jazz-tinged arrangement from the 1950s and had Ian Whitcomb & His Bungalow Boys record an authentic 1920s rendition to replace it. Bogdanovich preferred the livelier, more contemporary sound of the 1950s version but finally was convinced by High to use the more accurate recording.

Release

Box office

The film premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in August 2001. It was shown at the 2001 Flanders International Film Festival in Belgium, the 2001 MIFED (Mercato internazionale del film e del documentario) Film Market in Italy, the 2002 International Film Festival Rotterdam, and the 2002 Mar del Plata Film Festival in Argentina before going into limited release in the US in April 2002.

The film grossed $3,209,481 in the United States and $437,513 internationally for a worldwide total of $3,646,994.

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a score of 76% based on 128 reviews, with an average rating of 6.6/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "The Cat's Meow is a deliciously evoked period piece and whodunit." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 63 out of 100, based on 34 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.

New York Times film critic A. O. Scott called the film "a modest, restrained picture, as small and satisfying as one of Woody Allen's better recent efforts. There is little to distinguish it visually from a made-for-cable historical drama. We observe the events from a polite distance, rather than being plunged into the swirl of decadent Jazz Age high life. The suave camera movements never quite dispel the feeling that we are watching a filmed play. But Mr. Bogdanovich … shows his mastery in his work with the actors, who turn dusty Tinseltown lore into a spry and touching entertainment."

"Apart from its theory about the mistaken death of Ince and its cover-up, the movie's most intriguing theory is that Parsons witnessed it, which might explain her lifetime contract with the Hearst papers," wrote Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times. "The film is darkly atmospheric, with Herrmann quietly suggesting the sadness and obsession beneath Hearst's forced avuncular chortles. Dunst is as good, in her way, as Dorothy Comingore in Citizen Kane in showing a woman who is more loyal and affectionate than her lover deserves."

"In some ways, Dunst gives the film’s most impressive performance," wrote Jonathan Rosenbaum, who called the film a must-see. "What’s masterful about Bogdanovich’s direction is the cumulative detail, which adds complexity to incidental as well as central characters. He has a graceful way of switching viewpoints from one character to another and an uninsistent yet mainly persuasive sense of period. … This picture might well be considered a more impressive accomplishment than many of his early pictures. But it speaks with a quieter voice, and what it says seems substantially more personal and thoughtful."

In the San Francisco Chronicle, Mick LaSalle stated: "Bogdanovich takes a tale of old Hollywood and infuses it with velocity and enthusiasm. He avoids his twin demons, freneticism and cuteness, and delivers his best picture in years ... His deft use of a single location, his intelligent handling of his ensemble cast and his graceful camera work mark this as a true return to form."

Accolades

Kirsten Dunst was named Best Actress at the Mar del Plata Film Festival.

Home media

Lions Gate Entertainment released The Cat's Meow on VHS (UPC 031398809531) and DVD (UPC 031398809920) in 2002. A signature series DVD (UPC 031398849520) was released in 2003.