The Cat in the Hat been adapted for various media, including theater, television, and film. The animated musical TV special premiered in 1971 and starred Allan Sherman as the Cat. In 2003, a live-action film adaptation was released, starring Mike Myers as the Cat. Boxoffice.com reports that the film grossed $133,960,541 worldwide on an estimated $109 million budget. In 2012, following the financial success of "The Lorax", the animated film adaptation of the Dr. Seuss book of the same name, Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment announced plans to produce a CGI adaptation of "The Cat in the Hat". Rob Lieber was set to write the
The Cat in the Hat most important academic controversy" of the Cold War era. Academic Louis Menand contends that ""The Cat in the Hat" transformed the nature of primary education and the nature of children's books. It not only stood for the idea that reading ought to be taught by phonics; it also stood for the idea that language skills—and many other subjects—ought to be taught through illustrated storybooks, rather than primers and textbooks." In 1983, Geisel told Jonathan Cott, "It is the book I'm proudest of because it had something to do with the death of the "Dick and Jane" primers." The book led