In this beloved animated feature—the first cartoon completed without Walt Disney—a pedigreed mother cat, Duchess, and her three kittens, Toulouse, Berlioz, and Marie, are catnapped by a greedy butler named Edgar. Edgar hopes that by stealing the cats, he will gain the inheritance left to them by their owner, Madame Bonfamille. Things look pretty hopeless for the cat family until they are befriended by Thomas O’Malley, an easygoing alley cat. Thomas also rounds up a gang of alley cats and a mouse named Roquefort to help rescue Duchess and her kittens. Directed by Wolfgang Reitherman, The Aristocats premiered in Los Angeles on December 11, 1970. The film features the vocal talents of Phil Harris, Eva Gabor, Sterling Holloway, Scatman Crothers, Paul Winchell, Thurl Ravenscroft, Hermione Baddeley, Roddy Maude-Roxby, Bill Thompson, Maurice Chevalier, and others. The Aristocats took more than four years to complete, budgeted at more than $4 million, and included 325,000 drawings made by 35 animators. The film was a box office hit, earning reissues in both 1980 and 1987.
