Josie and the Pussycats (formatted as Josie and the Pussy Cats in the opening titles) is an American animated television series based upon the Archie Comics comic book series of the same name created by Dan DeCarlo. Produced for Saturday morning television by Hanna-Barbera Productions, 16 episodes of Josie and the Pussycats aired on CBS from September 12, 1970 to December 23, 1972.
In 1972, the show was re-conceptualized into Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space, 16 episodes of which aired on CBS during the 1972–73 season and were rerun the following season until January 1974. Reruns of the original series alternated between CBS, ABC, and NBC from 1974 through 1976.CD liner notes: Saturday Mornings: Cartoons' Greatest Hits, 1995 MCA Records This brought its national Saturday morning TV run on three networks to six years.
Josie and the Pussycats featured a teenage all-girl pop band that toured the world with their entourage, getting mixed up in strange adventures, spy capers, and mysteries. The group consisted of level-headed lead singer, songwriter and guitarist Josie, intelligent tambourinist Valerie, and air-headed blonde drummer Melody. Other characters included their cowardly manager Alexander Cabot III, his conniving sister Alexandra, her cat Sebastian, and muscular roadie Alan.
The show, more similar to Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! than the original Josie comic book, is remembered for its music, the girls' leopard print leotards (replete with "long tails and ears for hats", as the theme song states), and for featuring Valerie as the first regularly appearing female black character in a Saturday morning cartoon show.Charles, Don. Long Tails and Ears for Hats: The Story of Josie and the Pussy Cats. Each episode featured a Josie and the Pussycats song played over a chase scene, which, similarly to The Monkees, featured the group running after and away from a selection of haplessly villainous characters.
Series overview Josie and the Pussycats debuted on the CBS Saturday morning lineup on September 12, 1970, with the episode "The Nemo's a No-No Affair". The animated version of Josie was an amalgam of plot devices, villain types, settings, moods, and tones from other Hanna-Barbera shows such as Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, Jonny Quest, Space Ghost, and Shazzan.
Like Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, Josie and the Pussycats was originally broadcast with a laugh track. Later home video and DVD releases omit the laugh track. Cartoon Network and Boomerang, however, have aired the show in its original broadcast format with the laugh track intact.
Plot Each episode found the Pussycats and crew en route to perform a gig or record a song in some exotic location where, somehow, often due to something Alexandra did, they became mixed up in an adventure. The antagonist was always a diabolical mad scientist, spy, or criminal who wanted to take over the world using some high-tech device. The Pussycats usually found themselves in possession of the plans for an invention, an item of interest to the villains, a secret spy message, etc., and the villains chased them to retrieve it. Eventually, the Pussycats would ruin the villain's plans, resulting in a final chase sequence set to a Pussycats song. With the villain captured, the Pussycats would return to their gig or recording session, and the final gag was always one of Alexandra's failed attempts to interfere with the Pussycats' performance or steal Alan away from Josie.
Characters Josephine "Josie" McCoy (voiced by Janet Waldo, singing voice provided by Kathleen Dougherty) – The red-headed lead singer, songwriter, guitarist, and leader of the band. Josie shares an attraction with Alan, the road manager. During the 1970s, the character was known as Josie James. (Judy Waithe was originally cast but replaced before the show debuted, as her readings of the Josie and the Pussycats-hosted In the Know interstitials were not to CBS's liking; she is incorrectly credited in some copies of the episodes.) Valerie Brown (voiced by Barbara Pariot, singing voice provided by Patrice Holloway) – The band's bassist and backup singer; most often shown playing tambourines. The voice of reason in the group, Valerie is highly intelligent and a mechanical wizard. During the 1970s, the character was known as Valerie Smith. Melody Valentine (voiced by Jackie Joseph, singing voice provided by Cheryl Ladd as "Cherie Moor") – The band's drummer and backup singer and a stereotypical dumb blonde. What Melody lacks in intellect she makes up for with her perpetual sweetness and optimism. Her ears wiggle whenever there is danger. During the 1970s, the character was known as Melody Jones. Alan M. Mayberry (voiced by Jerry Dexter) – The group's tall, blond, and muscular roadie and Josie's love interest. Alexander "Alex" Cabot III (voiced by Casey Kasem) – The group's band manager, highly identifiable by his brightly colored mod wardrobe, sunglasses, and idiotic promotion schemes. He is the twin brother of Alexandra. Alex is an admitted coward but is good-hearted in sharp contrast to his sister Alexandra. Alex and Valerie have a slight attraction to one another at times. He also seems to be attracted to Melody. Alex physically resembles Shaggy Rogers in Scooby-Doo. In The New Scooby-Doo Movies crossover episode "The Haunted Showboat", Casey Kasem voices both Alex Cabot and Shaggy Rogers. Alexandra Cabot (voiced by Sherry Alberoni) – The only girl who is not a Pussycat band member of Josie's trio, but is still a member of the group. She is identified by her long black pony-tailed hair with a white streak through the center of it, similar to a skunk or a polecat (her bizarre appearance is an unexplained holdover from the comic book, where Alexandra had very limited supernatural powers, and this was the mark of the witch). Intelligent but also selfish, generally mean-tempered, grouchy and bullying, Alexandra is Alex's twin sister. She appears to have no identifiable role with the band, nor any reason for associating with it, other than the fact that she is Alex's sister and ally who tries to be the leader. She is constantly bitter and jealous of the band's success without her, believing that she should be "the real star of the band" and that the band's name should be "Alexandra's Cool-Time Cats". She constantly plots to steal the spotlight (and Alan's affections) from Josie, only to have every scheme fail in humiliating fashion. She can be a good dancer. Despite her jealousy, she remains very loyal and does care for the group. She will usually fight with them against villains, using her brash personality to intimidate the opposition. Alexandra frequently saves the lives of her teammates, frequently rescuing the clueless Melody from falling into a villainous trap. Alexandra usually rivals Josie over their shared love interest Alan. She tries to steal Alan from Josie, but her plans consistently backfire. Alexandra is the only character who "breaks the fourth wall" and addresses the audience in soliloquy fashion, often in jealousy over Josie. Sebastian Cabot (voiced by Don Messick) – Alexandra's snickering cat, whose black and white fur resembles Alexandra's hair and whose utterances sound the same as another Messick-voiced character, Muttley, but he also serves as the loyal pet sidekick of the group (in one episode he uses his sense of smell to track the rest of the group like a dog). He enjoys being mean and sometimes appears to go to the enemy's side, but usually only to trick the villain so he can have a chance to help the group escape. He sometimes uses his claws to pick locks. Alexandra sometimes recruits Sebastian to pull dirty tricks on Josie, but even these tricks usually backfire. Sebastian occasionally "breaks the fourth wall" and snickers to the audience. In The New Scooby-Doo Movies crossover episode "The Haunted Showboat", Messick voiced both Sebastian and Scooby-Doo at the same time. Sebastian's odd nature is a holdover from the comic book where he was a witch's familiar, possessed by the mind of a powerful warlock ancestor of Alexandra. He has the same name as a 20th-century character actor and a 15th-16th century naval explorer. Bleep (voiced by Don Messick) – Bleep appears only in Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space. He is Melody's blue fluffy pet alien with pink extremities and makes a "bleep" sound (thus his name) which only Melody can understand. Bleep can also generate invisible sound waves from his mouth and eyes.
Production and development Origins During the 1968-69 television season, the first Archie-based Saturday morning cartoon, The Archie Show, was a huge success, not only in the ratings on CBS, but also on the Billboard charts: The Archies' song "Sugar, Sugar" hit the #1 spot on the Billboard charts in September 1969, becoming the number one song of the year. Animation studio Hanna-Barbera Productions wanted to duplicate the success their competitors Filmation were having with The Archie Show. After a failed attempt at developing a teenage-music-band show of their own called Mysteries Five (which eventually became Scooby-Doo, Where are You!), they decided to go to the source and contacted Archie Comics about possibly adapting one of their remaining properties into a show similar to The Archie Show. Archie and Hanna-Barbera collaborated to adapt Archie's Josie comic book into a music-based property about a teenage music band, adding new characters (Alan M. and Valerie) while dismissing others.Shirley, Ian (2005). Can Rock and Roll Save the World? A History of Music and Comics. SAF Publishing Ltd. pg. 39
The music
In preparation for the upcoming cartoon series, Hanna-Barbera began working on putting together a real-life Josie and the Pussycats girl group, who would provide the singing voices of the girls in the cartoons and also record an album of songs to be used both as radio singles and in the TV series.
The Josie and the Pussycats recordings were produced by La La Productions, run by Danny Janssen and Bobby Young (a pseudonym for Bob Engemann of The Lettermen vocal group). They held a talent search to find three girls who would match the three girls in the comic book in both looks and singing ability; early plans, which did not come to fruition, called for a live-action Pussycats segment at the end of each episode. After interviewing over 500 finalists, settled upon casting Kathleen Dougherty (Cathy Dougher) as Josie, Cherie Moor (later known as Cheryl Ladd) as Melody, and Patrice Holloway as Valerie.