How to Make Your Cat an Internet Celebrity

by Patricia Carlin

  IS YOUR CAT A SCARY UGLY BEAST?

  • Since owning the cat, has your appetite significantly decreased?

  • Does the cat’s face lack symmetry, two eyes, or fur?

  • Has the cat ever been mistaken for a chupacabra?

  Managing the Scary Ugly Beast: When nature accidentally produces a monstrosity, society usually corrects the mistake by drowning the creature at birth. If those checks and balances fail, the world teeters on the edge of aesthetic ruin. What good is a gorgeous natural tableau if it’s studded with hideous wildlife? Even Thoreau would agree. But your cat somehow beat the system; good on her. And fortunately even the most grotesque cat can have a long and successful Internet career. In the same way that we enjoy a horror film or a KISS reunion tour, we enjoy looking at your cat and being frightened. Just so long as we can turn off the monitor and make her go away.

  How to film the Scary Ugly Beast: Take advantage of the revulsion your cat inspires by simply walking her down a busy street. Record the candid reactions of passersby. Walk past a schoolyard at recess. Capture the screams. Or try re-creating moments from classic horror movie scenes with your cat as the villain: Psycho shower scene (cat as Bates); Silence of the Lambs (cat as Lecter); Elephant Man (cat as Merrick).

  IS YOUR CAT CLINICALLY INSANE?

  • Does the cat appear to obey unseen forces?

  • Does she attempt to climb trees that aren’t there?

  • Does she look at you like you’re the crazy one?

  Managing the Clinically Insane Cat: Life with an unbalanced cat is never boring. And even the unbalanced cat can carve out a career in the world of feline videography, if you manage her carefully. After all, show business is full of colorful folks like Charlie Sheen, Crispin Glover, and Randy Quaid. They get work, so why shouldn’t your cat?

  Life with an unbalanced cat is never boring.

  How to film the Clinically Insane Cat: You’ll need to keep a closed set to contain this cat’s fragile nerves. Do not overscript the action—simply let your cat’s crazy train-wreck behavior unfold in a natural, gawker-friendly way. The best approach is documentary-style. Think Grey Gardens or March of the Penguins: grotesque, Grand Guignol theater, with not much embellishment necessary. Insert postproduction commentary from an animal psychologist.

  IS YOUR CAT UTTERLY BLAND?

  • Do you sometimes forget you own a cat?

  • Are you unable to remember what the cat looks like if he’s not sitting in front of you?

  • Do squirrels or sparrows fail to react when the cat crosses their path?

  Managing the Utterly Bland Cat: Your pet may be unremarkable in every way, but that doesn’t mean there’s no work for him. His lack of standout features can become his most valuable asset. He’s the Everycat, the feline mirror in which we see our own lives reflected. He’s also easy to transform with a little creative thinking. Try lifting the cat by his armpits—is he longer than you expected? Look, everybody, it’s Longcat! (Creative camera placement can enhance this concept.) Add extra sizzle by giving your cat a signature accessory, like an eye patch, a vest, or a jaunty beret (more about using props and costumes in the next section).

  How to film the Utterly Bland Cat: Try placing this cat in an ensemble situation; adding a toddler or a dog to the mix will reduce the pressure on the cat to carry the whole show. Or consider hiring a writer to draft an interior monologue for this cat. You (or an actor) voice over what the cat is “thinking.”

  Pussy Allure: How Accessories Make Your Cat Stand Out

  Imagine yourself at a casting call. The waiting room is crowded with dozens of (insert an adjective that describes your pet’s look) cats and their (insert an adjective that describes you) managers. Except for their collars, all these cats are identical. But wait! One kitty is holding a cello case. Does he play? From which academy of music did he graduate? Who is this mysterious feline? Sensing the excitement, the casting director quickly ushers this artistic creature inside, dismissing the other losers without a second glance.

  Wow. A skill like that (or even the appearance of one) really gives a performer a competitive advantage! It’s a powerful example of how, by investing a little more time and energy, you can give your cat not just a look, but a big juicy chunk of character. Now, you’re probably used to thinking of character as something that takes a lifetime to build. And that may be true, if you just knocked a baseball through the window of your elderly neighbor’s house, denied it, and are having a heart-to-heart talk with your dad. But in the high-stakes world of Internet cat videos, character basically boils down to one word: props.

  But where, you ask, might one acquire a cat-sized cello? From a Harry Whittier Frees estate sale? Sure, but those are few and far between. Reader, you are about to discover the best-kept secret in feline entertainment management: THE AMERICAN GIRL STORE. This place is a veritable treasure trove of kitty props and set decoration, not to mention costuming!

  Remember that without his little pickax, sifting pan, and sluices, Internet sensation Miner Forty-Niner Cat would be just another tabby sitting in the mud.

  For those of you without small children, let me explain: American Girl is a popular brand of dolls depicting girls from various historical periods. But forget about the dolls. Cat managers flock to these stores because of the vast assortment of clothing and accessories available, all perfectly sized for the domestic housecat! It’s like visiting a parallel universe where everything is adorable in scale. No more carving tiny accordions from soap; simply walk right in and buy one (or order online). Does this sound like cheating? Remember that without his little pickax, sifting pan, and sluices, Internet sensation Miner Forty-Niner Cat would be just another tabby sitting in the mud.

  Here are just a few of the possibilities.

  THE PROP THE CHARACTER

  Tiny ski chalet Professional stunt-skier

  Adorable cat-sized crutches Recuperating tap-dance accident survivor

  Teeny hot-air balloon Phileas Fogg

  Pint-sized VW Beetle Cheech or Chong

  Petite camera and flash Depression-era cub reporter and opium addict

  Eensy-weensy weaving loom Sweatshop worker

  Darling little science lab Madame Curie

  Miniature baby grand piano Duke Ellington

  These kinds of props not only create visual interest, they instantly generate rich and unique storylines you can use in your videos. This is a foolproof way to build lasting fame for your pet, whose actual life is probably not very interesting.

  Does My Cat Need a Stage Name?

  In a word, probably. Many cat owners suffer from a crippling lack of originality when it comes to pet nomenclature. No big deal if your cat isn’t working, but cats with star ambition need every advantage.

  CAT COLOR white gray black

  GOOD NAMES Snowball Smoky Blackie

  Snowflake Shadow Midnight

  Snow White Misty Inky

  Snowy Grayson Boo

  Blanca Ashes Jinx

  Casper Dusty Lucky

  Coke Stormy Ace

  BETTER NAMES Ghostface Killah Earl Grey Noirman

  Ziggy Stardust

  The Preacher

  Lady Marmalade

  CAT COLOR orange calico

  GOOD NAMES Tiger Callie

  Tigger Calvin

  Ginger Patches

  Morris Spot

  Rusty Kallie

  Garfield Cally

  Sunshine Kali, Goddess of Death

  BETTER NAMES Blorange Bubbles

  CAT COLOR any color black & white

  GOOD NAMES Kitty Oreo

  Tom Tuxedo

  Whiskers Felix

  Socks Sylvester

  Boots Penguin

  Mittens B.W.

  Max Zebra

  BETTER NAMES Hulk Cookie-Puss

  Changing your cat’s name is easy enough. There’s little paperwork involved, and in all likelihood your pet is completely unaware she even has a name. The challenge, of course,
is coming up with a moniker that’s catchy and unforgettable, so full of zazz that it will go viral like a cold sore at a make-out party. Here are a few tricks that product marketers, talent agents, and best-selling authors use to generate marquee-worthy names.

  * * *

  Smoky = Enfumé

  Shadow = Ombre

  Boots = Bottes

  Socks = Chaussettes

  Bastard = Bâtard

  Clawed = Claude

  Morris = Maurice

  Tom = Tom

  (pronounced with a French accent)

  Translate your cat’s current name into French.

  This instantly creates an air of sophistication, mystery, and ennui: Adds class, doesn’t it? Très magnifique. (That would also make a great cat name!)

  * * *

  El Tigre = Tiger

  Solana = Sunshine

  Féliz = Felix

  Sanguinario = Bloodthirsty

  Descarado = Saucy

  La Bamba = Da Bomb

  Salsa = Sauce

  Perro = Dog

  Spanish works, too!

  Only Mandarin has more native speakers than Spanish, so you’re giving the cat immediate worldwide appeal. (You could try a Mandarin name, but I assume a tonal language is beyond your abilities.)

  * * *

  L. Teegray

  Mit-enz

  Jinjur

  Khit-tee

  Bütz

  Or try a phonetic spelling.

  Simply rewrite an existing name as if you were a six-year-old in a spelling bee. The pronunciation remains the same, so this is a good tactic if you don’t want to have to remember a new word.

  * * *

  $hadow

  Sh@d0

  S|-|a:D()//

  S#4<0

  :X{

  Why not add flair with special characters?

  Thanks to countless hours of texting and password invention, we’ve learned to use alphanumeric characters that our grandparents could only dream of. So reach beyond the plain ol’ ABZzzzs when compiling your pet’s new alias. Hip-hop artists do this all the time, and look how popular they are. For example, consider these variations on a typical, boring cat moniker.

  * * *

  Tom Cruise

  Brad Pitt

  Justin Bieber

  Lindsay Lohan

  Snoop Dogg

  Joe Biden

  Eli Whitney

  Larry Fine

  Mohandas Gandhi

  Or try a name that’s already working.

  Why reinvent the wheel when it’s already been reinvented several times over? True, the Screen Actors Guild forbids an actor from using another actor’s name. But guess what? Your cat will never have a SAG card anyway. So go ahead—grab a name that’s preloaded with star power and suck as much fame juice out of it as you can.

  CHAPTER 2

  Lights, Kitty, Action!

  By this point, you have transformed a dull, mundane animal that nobody would look at twice into a burgeoning star, an otherworldly creature so overflowing with charm that complete strangers can barely contain themselves in the animal’s presence. They say God doesn’t make mistakes, but you remixed one of His less impressive B-sides and came up with a killer track worthy of prime-time airplay. It’s amazing, isn’t it? Now you know how Don Kirshner felt when he “discovered” the Archies.

  Well, now you’re going to accomplish something even greater. Something that Don Kirshner never did, and not just because the Archies broke up over artistic differences. You’re going to film a hit viral video. So let’s get up to speed on some basic video techniques, and quickly, before your neighbor with the one-eyed Cornish rex turns No Depth Perception Cat into a worldwide sensation.

  Equipment Check

  “Which camera should I use?” you ask. And I answer: How the hell should I know? This isn’t Consumer Reports. Besides, do you really want to read about f-stops and megapixels? Doubt it. Suffice to say that many of today’s smartphones capture great video, and there are digital cameras and camcorders that will fit any budget. Get advice from your nephew, or that nerdy guy who’s always staring at you at work. Frankly, it’s more important to use a camera that’s easy for you to operate than to find one with all the latest bells and whistles. But if you like to use fancy-schmancy equipment that goes beyond what the average clod can operate, try renting your gear until you find something with the right combination of utility and snob value.

  Once you have camera in hand, here’s how you prep it:

  Clean the lens. Use a soft dry towelette or the hem of your shirt.

  Charge the camera. And keep the charger (or extra batteries) at the ready. It’s likely your cat will finally behave in an interesting way just as you run out of juice.

  Stabilize the camera. Use a tripod, or place the camera on something stable like a tabletop or a Canadian. True, lots of movies use a “shaky camera” effect to achieve a raw, amateur look. But your footage will be plenty amateur enough.

  Test the sound system. Some microphones are better than others. Experiment to find out how close you need to be to capture the best sound. By the way, do you even know where the microphone is? Make sure you don’t block it with your finger. And don’t forget, your voice is liable to drown out everything else. Nix the monologue, Spaulding Gray, and let your star do the vocalizing.

  Planning the Shoot

  It’s tempting to think that movie making is simply a matter of switching on a camera and letting things happen. That may work for a mom recording her kid’s soccer game, or for Robert Altman. But film is a director’s medium. You are the artist, the screen is your canvas, and you have just one brush. A brush that will spend all its time licking its own foot if you don’t take control. So here’s what you do.

  Dress the set. Look through the camera’s viewfinder and see your home through the eyes of a stranger. Anything incongruous, distracting, disturbing, or confusing—aside from your backflipping tabby—must go. Does that mean repainting the living room in earth tones and buying generic self-assembled furniture from a Scandinavian warehouse store? Well, sure, that’s a sensible idea. Or you can just shove your tear- gas canisters and taxidermy station to one corner of the apartment so they’ll be out of the shot. Or throw blankets over everything.

  Good set dressing: classy decor, throw pillows, primary colors.

  Bad set dressing: Cat is barely visible. Move the horse.

  Frame your shot. Next time you’re watching TV—you know, that thing you used to watch before the Internet—notice where the action is during a favorite program or commercial. At the very top? No. All the way to the extreme left? Nope. Dead center? Wrong. Even the blandly competent cinematographers of The Bold and the Beautiful are aware of a little thing called “The Rule of Thirds.” And you, too, can benefit from this strategy, which dictates where to place the action to create a dynamic shot that draws your viewer into the scene like a glue-sniffer in an envelope factory. It’s easy:

  1. Look into the viewfinder or screen of your camera.

  2. Mentally draw vertical and horizontal lines dividing the screen into vertical and horizontal thirds.

  3. Place the camera so that the cat is located where the lines intersect. If the cat moves, move the camera accordingly.

  Let there be lighting. Cat videos are best shot in a controlled environment, which usually means an indoor setting from which the animal can’t escape. The downside is that you lose access to natural sunlight, which is not only free but also extremely flattering and appealing (though, to be fair, it can also give you cancer). Not to worry. With a few extension cords and floor lamps, you can illuminate even the dimmest recesses of your home. For some cameras, bright lighting allows you to narrow the aperture, which means that a wider depth of field can stay in focus. My God, you see how boring camera talk can be?

  Silence unwanted sounds. “Quiet on the set” is a phrase you should be ready to bust out at a moment’s notice—except that it will only elicit blank stares from an
y clueless non-show-business types in the room. So arm yourself with a few stock phrases applicable to your particular milieu, such as “Zip your lid,” “Can it,” “Shut your word hole,” “Silence, I tell you,” and so on. Better yet, remove all extraneous loudmouths from the set, including spouses and parents.

  Directing the Talent

  From Orson Welles onward, every great Hollywood director has understood that you cannot direct a cat; that’s why the overwhelming majority of motion pictures are built to showcase human performers instead of kittens. The best you can hope to do is trigger your cat’s natural charm and/or freak factor, then capture it on camera during the few fleeting seconds when the animal’s genius evinces itself in an intuitively entertaining manner. The result, if you’re lucky, will be the Citizen Kane of Internet cat videos.

  But what if your feline seems preoccupied with staring at some invisible object in the corner of the ceiling? In that case, you must prod your cat toward greatness by any means necessary. Here are some ideas to get the ball rolling.

  Get Your Do-Nothing Cat to Do Something: 27 Prompts for Cinematic Glory

  1. BOXES