"He knows everything about nothing,
     and not too much about that..."

    "MII-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-W!"
 

     Henry's Cat was a mellow yellow feline with a penchant for cakes and party
     food and forty winks. He seemed to spend an awful lot of time thinking, and
     too little time actually doing. But you know, pondering the world can be
     very hard work...

     If Henry was the thinker, his best friend Chris Rabbit was the doer. Chris was
     a bouncing blue bunny who was full of beans and ever-keen to fulfill Henry's
     potential. Which was just as well really, because Chris' own potential appeared
     to have been misplaced somewhere - probably on Farner Giles' farm, from
     whence the rest of Henry's friends had arrived. Amongst the troupe were
     Pansy Pig, Denise Duck, Mosey Mouse, Douglas Dog, Ted Tortoise, Phillipe
     Frog, and Myrtle the Cow. Then there was mean old Constable Bulldog,
     who appeared keen to clobber what little sense the gang had out of their
     heads and away over the duck pond...
    
     For the record, our titular star belonged to someone called Henry, but
     we never actually saw the mystey owner in these films...   

     Henry's Cat was the third and, in Toonhound's humble opinion, the best of
     Bob Godfrey's three key tea-time series (number four, by the way, was the
     Bunbury Tales produced in 1987). Yes that flies in the face of critics and
     pundits, who indeed often place Henry third on their 'nostalgia' lists, but that
     is arguably because they've been focusing so heavily on their own childhood
     recollections from the 70s, whilst Henry was an 80s creation who arrived on
     our screens when many of those pundits had presumably given up on
     tea-time tv in favour of school discos and extracarricular beer and cigarettes.
     As created by Stan Hayward, Henry manages to be droll, astute and cute
     at the same time. His physical construction is also brilliant. Look down the
     features of his face, from his ears to his mouth. It spells 'M-I-O-W'. If you don't
     believe me, check out the first Henry's Cat DVD (more of that below...)


         

     Know your Henry's

     Henry's Cat evolved considerably through production of its three series.
     Series one and two were composed mainly of 5 minute episodes animated
     using felt pens on white backgrounds, much like Roobarb. There was a theme
     change between the two series, with Peter Shades' 'miowing' music
     being replaced by a new 'miow' based track from John Hyde. The opening
     to season two episodes now featured an animated Bob Godfrey Films
     logo with Henry 'miowing' like Clarence The Lion in those classic MGM idents.
     The end titles were redesigned too. In series one, Henry climbs down a
     ladder, closely followed by his falling rainbow paint pot. In series two, we
     see him resting casually against a picnic table with a pot of tea and a scrummy
     blancmange waiting for him, only he upends the table and its contents upon
     himself.

     By the end of that second series, episode lengths had been extended to
     15 minutes and, more importantly, Henry and the gang had shifted from felt
     pens to cel-based animation. A wholly sensible move, given the amount of
     marker pen it would have needed if the team had stuck with paper!...

     The third series ushered in a whole new production style, presumably to
     break the American market. There was a brand new 'americanised' theme
     song from Jonathan P. Hodge and the focus of attention shifted from Henry
     and friends, to that of Henry and his best friend Chris Rabbit whose adventures
     and shenanigans regularly took them to the US of A to run for President, or
     rescue Santa Claus or something else just as ludicrous. Even Bob Godfrey
     himself got in on the act, adopting an american 'twang' for his narration
     - quite a feat, considering his voice is so distinctly london-via-australia, and
     adding an extra dollop of wit to proceedings.

     This third series is an extraordinary melting pot of wit and technique. The
     Godfrey crew expanded to incorporate a bigger writing team and a trace
     and paint department. Each episode is now stuffed-to-bursting with storyline,
     which moves at a lightning pace, just like the very-best of Godfrey's short film
     work. The plain white backgrounds are regularly replaced with b/w photocopy
     montages, colour photographs and cut-outs. Godfrey himself even features in
     'The New President', where he's shown boxing an animated kangaroo! There are
     songs, much sarcasm, tongue-twisters and one-liners a-plenty, and if you blink
     you'll probably miss half a dozen, like this one:

 

      On the web


      Henry's Cat
      Here's Bob Godfrey and Stan Hayward's official Henry site which
      includes a new story and the very latest info about our yellow fellow.
      Plus there's a link through to Stan Hayward's very own online animation
      masterclass....

      Henry's Cat
      A very smart 'Henry's Cat' guide, the oldest and best, like it says
      on the front page. A cute interface, plenty  of images, themes, series
      notes. It's a quick-loader too - A top site!


 
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