The Ad-dressing of Cats Trivia Quiz

Answer: Jennyanydots

"I have a Gumbie cat in mind, her name is Jennyanydots" is the first line of this song following the initial sequence and invitation to the Jellicle Ball. It is one first attempt to answer the question "Who will it be?" - a candidate to ascend to the Heaviside Layer and be reborn. Probably not her, though - "She sits and sits and sits and sits and that's what makes a Gumbie cat."

Answer: Rum Tum Tugger

The Rum Tum Tugger is a typical alpha tomcat - or at least one who wants to be one. Athletic and good-looking, he exhibits cliché cat behavior by always being on the wrong side of every door and refusing any food unless it's meant to be out of his reach. "For he will do as he did, do and there's no doing anything about it."

Answer: Grizabella

The third cat is the first uninvited visitor of the night - Grizabella, the glamour cat is an aging actress who has definitely seen better days in her life. She is shunned by the others for both her frailty and by the sheer fact that she has fallen as deep as only one who has been to the loftiest heights can. "Remark the cat who hesitates towards you in the light of the door which opens on her like a grin."

Answer: Bustopher Jones

After Grizabella's intrusion, the cats turn their attention back to their lively, successful friends. Bustopher Jones is, well, "not skin and bones", and he lives up to his claims of being a high society cat. It's still early in the night and Old Deuteronomy hasn't arrived yet, so here's another "also ran" candidate, even though "No common-place mousers have such well cut trousers or such an impeccable back."

Answer: Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer

These two are also uninvited and definitely not candidates for rebirth simply because there's one too many of them and they always do everything together. Their antics are best filed under criminal mischief and they represent the kind of cat you don't want to own if you have anything fragile, expensive or both, unguarded in your house.

Their family is resigned to never knowing which cat did which mischief. "Was it Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer? Or could you have sworn that it mightn't be both?"

Answer: Old Deuteronomy

Finally, the Jellicle leader himself arrives. Old Deuteronomy, a "cat who has lived many lives in succession" is the undisputed leader of the clowder and also the one who will make the final choice of which cat will go to the Heaviside Layer. "He was famous in proverb and famous in rhyme a long while before Queen Victoria's accession."

Answer: Gus

Gus - "His name, as I ought to have told you before, is really Asparagus, but that's such a fuss to pronounce that we usually call him just Gus" - is an aging actor, much like Grizabella, but he aged well and is still well regarded. He might be a prime candidate for a new life as he's almost only living in the past now. "And he says as he scratches himself with his claws: 'Well the theater is certainly not what is was'"

Answer: Skimbleshanks

"There's a whisper down the line at eleven thirty-nine", and before you even know it, Skimbleshanks, the railway cat, is there to do his duty. He's serving the midnight mail express as foreman, conductor and also as signalman and signal in one feline personality package.
"Then he gave one flash of his glass-green eyes
and the signal went 'All clear'"

Answer: Macavity

Forget petty crime, because "Macavity's a mystery cat, he's called the hidden paw, for he's a master criminal who can defy the law." This uninvited guest has evil plans - he wants to kidnap Old Deuteronomy and prevent the Jellicle Ball from successfully concluding. When the cats corner him, he triggers a blackout and...

"Macavity's not there!"

Answer: Mr. Mistoffelees

Only one cat can help us now: "You ought to ask Mr. Mistoffelees, the original conjuring cat." This wizard of a cat (complete with pyrotechnical effects) not only manages to retrieve Old Deuteronomy, thus saving the day, but he's surely also behind the growth of the clowder, because "not long ago this phenomenal cat
produced seven kittens right out of a hat."