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[0:00] Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Ariana Grande, hi. I'm Cynthia Erivo, and you're listening to the Broadway Podcast Network. Visit bpm.fm, to discover more.

[0:12] Speaker 2: Welcome to the wrong cat died the podcast breakdown of the cat's tastrophe. We met our dad cat in episode one. Next up is our cat mom, Jenny. Any dots Cue the intro music. There's

[0:23] Speaker 3: a cat over here, there's a cat over there, and the wrong one died, and the wrong one died.

[0:39] Speaker 2: Welcome to the wrong cat died the podcast breakdown and the cat's tastrophe. Let's talk about our motherly figure, Jenny. Any doubts? Just like all these crazy cats, I'm gonna get super tired of saying Jenny, any dots. So from here on out, we're calling her Jenny. If you had any doubts about how weird this show is, Jenny is about to blow your mind. But before we get into the weirdness, let's discuss who is Jenny. Jenny is bipolar. Basically, Jenny is the lazy cat sleeping and doing absolutely nothing of value during the day, but at night, Jenny is the mom getting everything in order. The song follows that same bipolar style, with monkeys trap singing the daytime life in a slow narrative, while her nighttime life is sung by three cats who I don't even know who they are. I'm pretty sure one of them is Taylor Swift. It's pretty clear that the cats have mixed reviews on her, but some seem really excited to see her, while others are a little less excited. So what do we know about Jenny? Jenny works the graveyard shift after sleeping all day, but at night, she is running the show as mom. She's teaching mice crocheting and tatting. I don't know what tatting is. I don't know if anyone knows what tatting is. I initially thought that she was teaching mice how to ink prison tattoos on cats, but I can't imagine. That's what Andrew Lloyd Webber actually had in mind. I have to assume it's something like knitting. I don't know, but the visual of Jenny any dots teaching mice how to ink teardrops under rum tug Tugger eye is a visual I really want to have. We get a costume change mid song where Jenny goes from the crazy looking grandma and a monster fur coat at the mall doing a mall walking routine to a slightly inappropriately dressed mom in a skimpy outfit at a PTA meeting. Either way, after she teaches the mice and gets into that skimpy outfit, we learn she also teaches cockroaches. She claims that they just need employment to prevent from destroying this is one of the few times the song actually rhymes. So I'm going to ignore the idea of finding cockroaches jobs. The song culminates with this monster tap dance number with Jenny and all the cockroaches. It's a monster tap dance number for two reasons. It's extremely well done. So it's a monster, but it's also a monster because it has human sized cockroaches. If you're a New Yorker like me, you're probably terrified of them, and it's one of your biggest fears seeing human sized cockroaches, and one of the many things in this play that will haunt your nightmares, the tap dance ends with the cat singing For she's a jolly good fellow, and then the number just is over. It's a little out of place, but that's how the song ends, just like the song ends anticlimactically. So is this section. Let's dig into how Jenny, any dot song, differs from the poem. In the book, the song stays pretty true, with the lazy moments being slightly shortened, but nearly identical. The book also covers her work with mice and cockroaches, but where it differs is it goes into way more details. We already know that she teaches the mice to crochet and tat, but the poem goes even further. We learn that Jenny feels the mice aren't quiet due to their irregular diet. She goes to remedy this situation by cooking the mice cake of bread and dried peas along with the beautiful fry of Lean bacon and cheese. Again, TS Eliot rhymes a lot better. I don't know about you, but the mice seem like they're in the retirement community. They're crocheting and tatting during the day and eating bread, cake and dried peas at night. If these mice aren't already 90, they will be soon. I know that this is a podcast, but the poems are accompanied by some incredible drawings. Jenny is standing in front of a composer stand showing mice how to crochet, but actually just looks like she's playing with the ball yarn. Cat with ball of yarn. Brilliant move. T, S, Eliot. Let's dig into some real and fictional characters of Jenny. Any dots? Jenny's bipolar nature makes her a natural Jekyll and Hyde. But I want to focus on her momness and cover a few TV and movie moms that she really reminds me of. The first is the obvious one, Mrs. Molly Weasley. She's a red headed mom who takes pride in cooking food for everyone that comes around. She also keeps the entire Weasley family in order teaching all of her children. She wears some beat up clothes, which feels very similar to the intro coat that Jenny starts in plus, I can definitely picture her being super lazy when she becomes an empty nester. So she has a little Jenny any dots during the day in her future? If Molly Weasley was the pre costume change, Jenny then Peggy Bundy with from married with children, is definitely the post costume change. She is constantly and slightly in a problem. Great outfits. Peggy is notorious for being super lazy and epitomizes everything of Jenny's daytime life. She spends most of her day sitting on the couch watching soap operas, just like Jenny sleeps all day. Plus, I remember Peggy had a weird ability to play the accordion, which feels a little out of place, just like when Jenny busts out a full tap dance number out of nowhere with cockroaches shifting gears a little bit. Let's go to a classic TV mom who has some Jenny tendencies. What about June Cleaver from Leave It to Beaver, she definitely gives off some Jenny vibes. She has a bunch of hobbies like needle pointing and cake decorating, which definitely feels like crocheting and tatting. And the beaver house is also filled mostly with British furnishings, which makes sense since the original Jenny production is from the UK, and my last TV mom and one of my favorite TV moms of all time, it's a little bit of stretch for Jenny, but stick with me is Jill Taylor from home improvement. Jill is the saving grace for that family, keeping everything in order by teaching the three sons to be actual functioning human adults with their insane father, she can't cook. But the part that really stuck out to me for Jenny is the anniversary episode towards the end of the second season, Tim can't dance to save his life, but they go to a ballroom dancing teacher to learn Jill was a natural, which makes me think that she would totally crush a cockroach infested tap dance number at the end of a random Tool Time episode. Welcome to the internet rumor mill. Jenny. Any doubts? Rumor is a little light, but let's tackle the couple pieces I could find. First thing I found was that Judy Dench, who was going to play the Old Deuteronomy in the movie, was actually slated to play Jenny. Any dots in the original UK production? I wonder if she's going to give Rebel Wilson any pointers, I didn't see any rumors on Jenny being certain cats moms, but based on the rumors from Old Deuteronomy, I'd be really surprised if that's not the case. So I'm gonna start that rumor. She has to be the mother of a handful of these kittens, right? My best guess is Mungo Jerry and Rumpel teaser. They're definitely gotta be her offspring, and we'll get to them in a later episode, where I'll kind of explain why the last rumor I found is the one that I told you I know nothing about, which is that Jenny any dots is a Gemini. So I mentioned in episode one, I don't know squat about astrology, but since there's really not that many rumors, I decided to do a little digging for you. I found a website called Cat time.com which breaks down what your cat's zodiac sign says about your cat. Let me summarize what it says about a Gemini cat. Gemini cats are chatty and charming creatures. They tend to win the affections of whoever's leg they rub against. Geminis are known as twins, so your cat might have some duality in its temperament. They can be joyful and manic and playful one minute and then sullen and cranky the next. Despite a sometimes hard to handle personality, the magnetism of Gemini cats makes them so hard to resist. Holy shit, that site that is matching the cats the musical characters to the zodiac sign is scary good. My favorite YouTube comments. You'll catch a trend here with Jenny. Any dots, since she's the mom, even the comments are pretty wholesome. But here are my favorites from Julia Whitmore. Julia me, age nine, I want to be Victoria. Me, age 16. I would settle for Demeter. Me, 23 turns out I'm Jenny. Any dots, hey, things could be worse. Julia, live that. Mom, life from Lottie D cracker. Lottie D cracker says, I remember seeing this live. It felt like an acid trip from white trash. Great name. White Trash says, what kind of weird psychotic human beings actually act in these place? Good question, and hopefully we're going to get some answers to that in a future episode, this one's super dark, but shade wild says, I think Jenny any dots is vegetarian, because if she isn't, she would want to eat those mice instead of teaching them. So in summary, why does Jenny any dots have my vote over Grizabella? I know I've harped on this a lot throughout the episode, but anyone who can get 10 cockroaches to tap dance a full number is an impressive human cat. Jenny is the motherly figure keeping the house in order, teaching all the scary creatures how to be productive and hopefully employed members of society. She cooks for the family and holds down the fort at night when everyone else is sleeping. Plus, I really enjoy the mid song costume change and feel that that impressive feat deserves to be rewarded in some capacity. Overall, Jenny is loved by most of the cats, and the same can't be said for Grizabella. By quick counter argument, Jenny's song isn't the best in the musical. It's a little bit of polarizing between the night and day sections, and it's hard to kind of remember doesn't stick. I never got it stuck in my head for the next week, plus she has to be dinged a little bit for sleeping all day and providing absolutely no value when the sun goes down. But overall, I'd rate Jenny on a scale of one to nine cat lives. I'm gonna give her three cats. She'd only get a half a cat if it weren't for the impressive cockroach tap dance you. Thanks for listening to episode two about Jenny. Any dots on the wrong cat died? The podcast breakdown of the cat catastrophe. 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