Grizabella/Interpretations

Because of the vague and fluid nature of the show, character backstories and portrayals often vary depending on the production and actor. The following are quotes from creatives and cast members on how they interpret and/or portray the character of Grizabella.

Elaine Paige
Elaine Paige originated the role of Grizabella in the London production, and reprised the role for the 1998 film.


 * On Grizabella's backstory:

"Grizabella, well, she's really an old dilapidated cat who's had a very good life, indeed, and has been in a few scrapes in her life. I think she has a few regrets. And I think she may now, at this point in her life, feel a little tired and lonely, and certainly feels rejected in this piece, because every time she appears, poor thing, they all shun her. And she just wants to be loved, and to be involved in the life of the community of these cats, and, ah, but they don't want her around."

- Elaine Paige


 * On "Memory Act 1":

"When she sees the young kitten [ Victoria ] dancing before "Memory", the song - the big eleven o'clock number, she sees the young kitten dancing and she tries to emulate because she remembers how she could do the same thing when she was young, and of course now, she can't do any of those things, she's sort of old and weary [...] That was the extraordinary thing with Gillian Lynne, when we discussed the character - this is way back in 1981 when the original show opened - she knew I loved to dance and so she said 'I want you to have a little dance number before you sing the song. You'll see the kitten and you try to emulate her and you just can't because your back hurts and your legs ache and you end up on the floor before you sing. Because you're just a mess, you can't get it together.'"

- Elaine Paige

Betty Buckley
Betty Buckley originated the role of Grizabella in the Broadway production.


 * On the emotional entry point for the character of Grizabella:

"The job assignment was to "stop the show". But within that, you have to find in yourself a world of profound isolation and loneliness. Grizabella is in the last moments of her life. As the Glamour Cat in her youth, she lived life to great excess. She was considered a great beauty. And she drank too much, smoked too much, and she was promiscuous. And now in her later years she is no longer desired and has become the pariah of the Tribe of Cats. She longs to be included but the cats shun her and keep sending her away."

- Betty Buckley

Harry Groener
Harry Groener originated the role of Munkustrap in the Broadway production.


 * On why Grizabella is excluded from the tribe:

"I don't know. No answer was given. It was an instinctual thing. I didn't want to know why. If we had to find a reason, we'd have become humans instead of cats [...] We call her 'the Glamour Cat,' not 'the Whore Cat.' Anyway, cats are promiscuous so why would we reject her for promiscuity?"

- Harry Groener

Mamie Parris
Mamie Parris played Grizabella in the Broadway revival.


 * On Grizabella's backstory:

"Grizabella was once one of the kittens that had a lot to offer to the cat tribe that we meet and we learn to understand more about during the show. She leaves the tribe on her own accord to go with this cat Macavity, who's a troublemaking cat, and goes down a dark path. If you wanna humanize it, you think of somebody who needs to get out of their close-knit family or community and see the world, and they wind up falling into drugs or into alcohol and in with the wrong people in crime. And so that happens with Grizabella and she's shunned by the tribe. This cat [Macavity] leaves her and goes off with another younger cat [ Demeter ], who shuns him and is accepted back into the tribe. So I think it's twofold for Griz that she not only was shunned by the tribe to begin with, but then Macavity's next lover was accepted back into the tribe. And it's hard for Grizabella to understand why she has not, because she doesn't see what she's become, she's not the same cat anymore. She doesn't have the same things to offer as she once did. Deep down we know that there's a different cat there, that she really does still have something to offer and it takes kind of a greater force to help the tribe understand what she is and how her well-being impacts them. The themes that I really had a hand in portraying and bringing across in the show are really epic human ideas of love, and loss, and loneliness, and the memory of a lost youth, of the potential you had that you didn't achieve."

- Mamie Parris


 * On portraying Grizabella:

"I mean it's a very avant garde piece - it's absolutely living in the lives of these cats. You want people to identify with these characters so you have no choice but to really humanize them. And especially as an actor, in order to inhabit them, I have to find a way to identify with her. I like to have a little bit of room to actually be a little more physical. I like to do some yoga, I definitely like to do some breathing exercises 'cause she's a hefty sing. And so much of breath inspires her posture and her movement, I find."

- Mamie Parris


 * On "Memory":

"There's a line of his [Walt Whitman] that describes Grizabella: 'I sound my barbaric yawp.' It's her desperate cry to the gods, and if nothing comes of it, she's done. It's her 'barbaric yawp.'"

- Mamie Parris

Keri René Fuller
Keri René Fuller played Grizabella in the 6th US tour.


 * On the redesigned younger Grizabella:

"Since they started casting Grizabellas a little younger than middle aged, they wanted to find a different backstory with what her makeup said since they were no longer necessarily using the older cat as her characterization. So we've added a scar, we've added a lip smudge. Her costume design is actually a little more updated, we've added a corset so it's a corset with tassels, and we've added what look like thigh highs with a garter just to really drive home the contemporary glamorous look of what the 2000s have been. I do my makeup, which has gotten faster of course as I've done it more often. That still takes about 40, 45 minutes. It might be a little different than previous Grizabellas that have come before me, simply because I'm just younger in years. I don't really know what it's like to age out of glamour. So for myself, when I think about Grizabella and who she is, I think of her as a very ambitious cat. She also wants to see what's on the other side of the tracks. All Grizabella wants on the night of the Jellicle Ball, which everybody sees, is to come back home, to be accepted and she's been trying to come back home yet has been shunned for many years now. Tonight, she's just is hoping tonight's the night that they're like 'yes, come home'."

- Keri René Fuller