A riotous, bawdy, and often slapstick story about a large yellow cat who, according to numerous complaints, had been assaulting dogs, stealing tennis balls, stalking mailmen, and attacking Macy's trucks.
An eccentric millionaire who loathes all canines, is struck with admiration for any cat with the guts to go out and avenge his entire race and decides to adopt him.
Thaddeus Whitcomb Banner (the dog-hating millionaire), charmed by the cat's pugnacious attitude, calls his new pet, Rhubarb, a baseball term for a violent and noisy altercation. Rhubarb takes a liking to Thad and his press secretary Eric Yaeger, but he is indifferent if not downright vicious to everyone else. When his owner dies only forty-eight hours after signing his last will and testament, Rhubarb is there, sitting in his master's lap.
In his will, Thad praises Rhubarb for his unsparing love and solace and thereby leaves him his entire fortune, including ownership of a professional baseball team, the New York Loons. Eric Yaeger is appointed Rhubarb's guardian, and Thad's daughter Myra, a mean-spirited young hipster doofus, is summarily disinherited.
Post WW2 American comedies offered escapist entertainment for Depression-era audiences and were largely characterized by zany, fast-paced and unusual events, gags, screwy plot twists, barbs aimed at the leisure-upper class, verbal dueling and witty sarcastic dialogue -- Rhubarb is all that.
Introduction to a Cat
On a morning in late December two years before the events about to be related in this book, a radio actress, by name Rebecca Ross, left her apartment in the community of Jackson Heights on Long Island. Miss Ross was but newly come to Jackson Heights else she would have turned left instead of right when she emerged from the building where she made her home, for she was accompanied by a dog. She would have known.
It was not a fit morning to be strolling the streets with or without a dog, for a cold and copious rain was falling straight downward, California fashion; yet neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night could ever stay Miss Rebecca Ross from the swift completion of her appointed rounds with Mitzi.
Actress and dog were attached by leash as they moved northward in the rain, and there are people in this world who might have concluded that they made a pretty picture together. They wore matching costumes. The dog had on a green dog slicker with a cowl that hooked over her ears, and each paw was encased in green rubber booties. Miss Rebecca Ross wore a green raincoat, green galoshes, a small green hat, and carried a green umbrella. Before long her face would match her costume.
Miss Ross was by no means a prominent actress. Such small reputation as she owned in radio derived from her frequently repeated role as an off-mike scream. ‘She was a large, chesty woman and she had perfected a feminine shriek of horror which created a demand for her services on radio murder programs wherein a lady is present when the victim's body is discovered. This profession furnished a small but adequate livelihood and made it possible for Miss Ross to buy matching food and clothing for herself and Mitzi.
The two females, dog and woman, were stepping along beside a hedge which bordered a six-hole golf course when the cat showed himself. He came from behind the hedge and he was walking in a peculiar sort of crouch. He was a rangy, muscular cat the color of yellow smoke.
There was no hint of alarm in Miss Rebecca Ross's voice when she first addressed the cat; her voice, in fact, was admonitory, commanding.
"Scat!" she said.
The injunction had no perceptible effect. The cat never faltered in his stalking approach and he was headed straight for Mitzi. The dog barked.
The cat continued his advance, and Miss Ross, still unable to believe that one of Nature's lesser laws was being flouted in her very face, noted a peculiar anatomical deformity at the creature's stern. The long yellow tail looked as if a door might have been slammed on it, shaping it in the manner of a sharp jog in a road. And in the area of this double bend the tail was now jerking in a mechanical sort of rhythm like a gadget in the Museum of Science and Industry.
"Scat!" cried the actress again. "Scat the hell outa here, you yella devil!"
Mitzi was not a large dog nor a courageous one, yet some atavistic impulse called for a show of bravery. She barked quite ferociously four or five times and lunged in the direction of the oncoming cat, rearing up on her hind legs as the leash tightened.
Things happened so swiftly, so unexpectedly, that Mitzi's mistress was never able thereafter to give an altogether coherent account of them. Just as Mitzi reached her defiantly rampant posture the cat appeared to take leave of its senses. A horrible, leering grimace flashed across his yellow face, and his eyes seemed to take fire. All dash and derring-do left Mitzi. She shuddered all over and closed her eyes as a yellow horror streaked through the falling rain. The cat leaped with forelegs spread wide, simultaneously emitting a spine-chilling screech, and then the fur and green rubber flew.
It is possible that people as far off as Bliss Street, Sunnyside, heard the deep-bosomed screams of Miss Rebecca Ross, not to mention the hellish noises contrived by the animals, but the cyclonic assault was over before any kind of succor could possibly reach the actress. Mitzi lay senseless and bleeding on the pavement, her lovely green tunic in shreds, three of her booties ripped from her dainty feet. Chunks of hair had been gouged from her back and neck, and the veterinarian found incisions across her face and down her barrel that looked as if they had been made by a buzz saw. The yellow cat was gone.
Her mistress . . . Well, let it be said to her credit that she did not faint during the awful assault. By the time she was able to talk she made an effort to describe events as they had actually occurred. An ordinary cat, she said, an ordinary alley cat, though bigger than most, with a big head and a crooked tail. Her story was altogether credible in Jackson Heights, but in Manhattan people simply would not believe her.
Mitzi never really got over it. For this she is not to be blamed. No dog with fair sense would ever have got over it. Few dogs ever did.
On a morning in late December two years before the events about to be related in this book, a radio actress, by name Rebecca Ross, left her apartment in the community of Jackson Heights on Long Island. Miss Ross was but newly come to Jackson Heights else she would have turned left instead of right when she emerged from the building where she made her home, for she was accompanied by a dog. She would have known.
It was not a fit morning to be strolling the streets with or without a dog, for a cold and copious rain was falling straight downward, California fashion; yet neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night could ever stay Miss Rebecca Ross from the swift completion of her appointed rounds with Mitzi.
Actress and dog were attached by leash as they moved northward in the rain, and there are people in this world who might have concluded that they made a pretty picture together. They wore matching costumes. The dog had on a green dog slicker with a cowl that hooked over her ears, and each paw was encased in green rubber booties. Miss Rebecca Ross wore a green raincoat, green galoshes, a small green hat, and carried a green umbrella. Before long her face would match her costume.
Miss Ross was by no means a prominent actress. Such small reputation as she owned in radio derived from her frequently repeated role as an off-mike scream. ‘She was a large, chesty woman and she had perfected a feminine shriek of horror which created a demand for her services on radio murder programs wherein a lady is present when the victim's body is discovered. This profession furnished a small but adequate livelihood and made it possible for Miss Ross to buy matching food and clothing for herself and Mitzi.
The two females, dog and woman, were stepping along beside a hedge which bordered a six-hole golf course when the cat showed himself. He came from behind the hedge and he was walking in a peculiar sort of crouch. He was a rangy, muscular cat the color of yellow smoke.
There was no hint of alarm in Miss Rebecca Ross's voice when she first addressed the cat; her voice, in fact, was admonitory, commanding.
"Scat!" she said.
The injunction had no perceptible effect. The cat never faltered in his stalking approach and he was headed straight for Mitzi. The dog barked.
The cat continued his advance, and Miss Ross, still unable to believe that one of Nature's lesser laws was being flouted in her very face, noted a peculiar anatomical deformity at the creature's stern. The long yellow tail looked as if a door might have been slammed on it, shaping it in the manner of a sharp jog in a road. And in the area of this double bend the tail was now jerking in a mechanical sort of rhythm like a gadget in the Museum of Science and Industry.
"Scat!" cried the actress again. "Scat the hell outa here, you yella devil!"
Mitzi was not a large dog nor a courageous one, yet some atavistic impulse called for a show of bravery. She barked quite ferociously four or five times and lunged in the direction of the oncoming cat, rearing up on her hind legs as the leash tightened.
Things happened so swiftly, so unexpectedly, that Mitzi's mistress was never able thereafter to give an altogether coherent account of them. Just as Mitzi reached her defiantly rampant posture the cat appeared to take leave of its senses. A horrible, leering grimace flashed across his yellow face, and his eyes seemed to take fire. All dash and derring-do left Mitzi. She shuddered all over and closed her eyes as a yellow horror streaked through the falling rain. The cat leaped with forelegs spread wide, simultaneously emitting a spine-chilling screech, and then the fur and green rubber flew.
It is possible that people as far off as Bliss Street, Sunnyside, heard the deep-bosomed screams of Miss Rebecca Ross, not to mention the hellish noises contrived by the animals, but the cyclonic assault was over before any kind of succor could possibly reach the actress. Mitzi lay senseless and bleeding on the pavement, her lovely green tunic in shreds, three of her booties ripped from her dainty feet. Chunks of hair had been gouged from her back and neck, and the veterinarian found incisions across her face and down her barrel that looked as if they had been made by a buzz saw. The yellow cat was gone.
Her mistress . . . Well, let it be said to her credit that she did not faint during the awful assault. By the time she was able to talk she made an effort to describe events as they had actually occurred. An ordinary cat, she said, an ordinary alley cat, though bigger than most, with a big head and a crooked tail. Her story was altogether credible in Jackson Heights, but in Manhattan people simply would not believe her.
Mitzi never really got over it. For this she is not to be blamed. No dog with fair sense would ever have got over it. Few dogs ever did.
Release Date: August 29, 1951
Running Time: 94 minutes
Cast:
Orangey as Rhubarb
Ray Milland as Eric Yeager
Jan Sterling as Polly Sickles
William Frawley as Len Sickles
Gene Lockhart as T.J. Banner
Elsie Holmes as Myra Banner
Taylor Holmes as P. Duncan Munk
Willard Waterman as Orlando Dill
Henry Slate as Dud Logan
James Griffith as Ogelthorpe 'Oggie' Meadows
Jim Hayward as Doom
Donald MacBride as Pheeny
Hal K. Dawson as Mr. Fisher
Strother Martin and Leonard Nimoy(uncredited)
Awards:
Orangey won PATSY Awards (Picture Animal Top Star of the Year, the animal version of an Oscar) for his appearances in both Rhubarb and Breakfast at Tiffany's, the only cat so far to win more than once.
Eric Yeager: How about some bait?
Owner of the pet shop: I'm sorry sir, we have no meat department.
Eric Yeager: Meat? Golf balls is this cat's meat.
*****
Judge: [to Polly Sickles] You're sneezing under oath. An untrue sneeze could find you guilty of perjury.
H. Allen Smith was born on December 19, 1907 in McLeansboro, Illinois, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Rhubarb (1951), Playhouse 90 (1956) and Low Man on a Totem Pole (1964). He died on February 24, 1976 in San Francisco, California, USA.
“On Monday mornings I am dedicated to the proposition that all men are created jerks.” ― H. Allen Smith
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