The 60s version was converted for Mexico with unusual care: they built on Top Cat's succinct visual brio by filling the scripts out with Mexican references, and invested heavily in the vocal dubbing – essential in a country that, 30 years ago, still had high illiteracy rates. In some ways, though, retailoring for local audiences has always happened, and it seems to be responsible for Don Gato's popularity in the first place. Screenwriter Rubén Arvizu then tweaked their work for the Latin American market, as he did for the original cartoon in the 1970s. American writers created the first drafts of the script – in which both Top Cat and Officer Dibble (Oficial Matute in the Spanish-language version – Matute is Argentinian slang for policeman) are wrongfooted by the appearance of a tough new police chief. It's in keeping with the current trend in Hollywood towards productions for local markets, or – if Warner are planning a US release in this case – co-productions that outsource the risks of R&D and market-testing to other parties. Warner farmed the new version, available in 3D as well, out to Mexico's Anima and Argentina's Illusion studios. Just the kind of fallow pop-culture backlot, in other words, that's been routinely dug up in the last decade for global audiences, in everything from Bewitched to The A-Team.
Thirty 25-minute episodes, sponsored by Kellogg's and pharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers, were broadcast from September 1961 to April 1962 on ABC the show's knockabout feline squad was Sergeant Bilko reborn in Manhattan back-alley form, right down to Maurice Gosfield (who had played Private Duane Doberman) voicing Benny the Ball. That's curious thinking by Warner, considering Top Cat seems on the surface to be a pedigree American pussycat. It's also come out in Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay, with a Peru release happening this week – but no news about the US, or anywhere else, yet. After a month on release it's cleared the $7m mark, putting it in with a shout of becoming the most successful ever local film at the Mexican box office – a title currently held by the 2002 Gael García Bernal drama El Crimen del Padre Amaro ($16.3m). Most effectual – but not quite the indisputable leader of the gang yet. One former viewer I spoke to said, "You could ask any middle-aged Mexican about the programme and they'll probably be able to name all of Don Gato's gang and a few of the incidental characters, as well as a good number of catchphrases and the storylines of quite a few shows." So Warner Brothers, owner of the Hanna-Barbera properties, has turned to Latin American animators to produce a film just for that market.ĭon Gato y Su Pandilla (Top Cat and His Gang) opened handsomely on 16 September – 11 days before TC's 50th anniversary – with the highest-grossing opening weekend ever for a Mexican film in Mexico: 41m pesos ($2.9m).
Apparently Don Gato, to give him his Spanish name, has been one of the most beloved cartoon imports in Mexico since it was first broadcast there in the 1970s. How, in the age of the ubiquitous remake, had I not heard about this one?īecause it turns out that TC is even more of a local hero than first intended. I never knew Top Cat (or Boss Cat, as British viewers may remember him) was big in Mexico until last week, when I saw that a new feature-length animation version had been squatting on top of their box-office charts like a patronising moggie on a trashcan. One pleasure available for the modern culture-flaneur is picking out the curios of globalisation: the unlikely cultural friendships struck up.