Cats (musical) Cats (musical) Cats is a sung-through musical composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, based on "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" by T. S. Eliot. The musical tells the story of a tribe of cats called the Jellicles and the night they make what is known as "the Jellicle choice" and decide which cat will ascend to the Heaviside Layer and come back to a new life. Directed by Trevor Nunn and choreographed by Gillian Lynne, "Cats" first opened in the West End in 1981 and then with the same creative team on Broadway in 1982. It won numerous awards, including
The King of the Cats tale several times. In John Crowley's 1987 novel "The Solitudes", "The King of the Cats" is explicitly related to "the Death of Pan" as recorded by Plutarch and interpreted by St. Augustine of Hippo as a shift in World Ages. "King o'Kats" was a single on the 1992 album "Supernatural" by The 360's. "The King of the Cats" is referenced, with slight changes, in Diane Duane's 1993 "Young Wizards" novel, "A Wizard Abroad". Henry Louis Gates wrote a profile of Albert Murray in "The New Yorker" 8 April 1996 entitled "King of Cats". China Miéville takes the idea of a