The Secret Lives of Waldo Kitty

This series is a lost slice of my youth. It's been so long since I've seen it, I thought only my sister and I were the only people in the world who HAVE seen it. As a kid, I never missed 'Waldo Kitty' - in fact up until now I had no idea there were only 13 episodes. For the many who never saw it each episode started out in live-action, usually with our hero cat being put into a seemingly inescapable situation by the local dog. He would then imaging (via voice-over) that he was a hero of some sort who would easily deal with his situation. It would then go into a cartoon where Waldo was that imagined character. I remember bits and pieces of the shows, but one stands out. It was a clever 'Star Trek' parody. To this day I still smile when I recall the 'Tunnel Of Glove' sequence! It's a shame there are so few episodes - this makes it unlikely that it will ever be issued on video, and less likely it will be rerun. But it will always hold a place in my heart! Long live Waldo Kitty!

As a cat lover, I remember Secret LIves of Waldo Kitty vividly.

As others have noted, the show began with Waldo as a real life cat, his feline girlfriend and the bulldog who terrorized them both. Voices were provided over the real animal trio.

When Waldo pondered how he would escape from this latest dilemma, he would daydream himself into anthropomorphic cartoon form.

The set-ups were five very familiar scenes; Tarzan (Catzan), Batman (Catman), Lone Ranger (Lone Kitty), Robin Hood (Robin Cat) and the STar Trek Enterprise Captain.

In each scenario, the bulldog would now have the same three henchmen over and over; three dogs, one tall, one short and I guess the last one was average, don't recall.

In the Catman adventures, the real life cat at the beginning would be joined by a real life bird, attempting to aid friend Waldo in escaping from the bulldog.

When they went cartoon, the bird of course became Sparrow, the equivalent of Batman's Robin.

Lone Kitty was without a doubt the most interesting, as in real life, Waldo the cat would have a sidekick in the form of a real rabbit. IN the cartoon version, the rabbit of course became Tonto (Can't recall the character's name).

Of the five adventures, four would become real cartoons from the same company that made Waldo Kitty.

Star Trek, with the original cast doing the cartoon voices, came out about four years earlier.

Tarzan, Lone Ranger (voiced by William Conrad of Cannon fame) and Batman (voiced by much of the 1960s TV show, including Adam West and Burt Ward) would all come about over the course of time from this animation studio.

On Waldo Kitty, as on all these other cartoon shows, the adventures played out much the same over and over.

In Waldo Kitty, the bulldog villain was always snarling laughing, kidnapping the female, only to be thwarted by the Waldo character. It never strayed from this plot. Over and over again in each adventure.

Plotwise, I recall two moments.

In Robin Cat, the hero was in disguise at the archer show to rescue Maid Marian and he motioned for her to remain quiet to his secret, so he puts his finger to his mouth and goes 'shhhhh'.

"Why do you put your fingers to your lips, sir?" She matter-of-factedly asked, perplexing him.

In Catzan, the cat would be leaving and would utter 'keep noses clean'. I guess because at nine-years-of-age, I had never heard that phrase before and so I had no idea what he meant. It was an odd phrase to even put in a children's cartoon. I have never forgotten that bit, especially from what was supposed to be a jungle-raised character.

Undeniably the saving grace was the theme. Sung by Howard Morris, showing the most majestic cat from the show walking toward the camera on a treebranch, it then gave way to some gravelly voice singing "He's Waldo Kitty" and showed the cartoon figures of Waldo.

I had never heard of Walter Mitty, so I never knew what this show was based upon. Perhaps that was for the better. I did like this show and would like to see it again.

Someone wrote about this show: "I thought my sister and I were the only ones watching it". Well, that applies to me too. Waldo Kitty is a distant childhood memory, so far removed I wondered for years if I dreamed it... and then, I looked it up on IMDb and couldn't help smiling. There it was: the song, the cat, the "Cat Enterprise" I remembered so well and felt so excited about ("Oh boy, a episode of Waldo Kitty in SPACE !").

Funny, as I watched the opening it all seemed so familiar, so immediate, so obvious. I had forgotten that there was a real live action cat, for instance, but of course there was... Why else would my sister and I love this show so much if it hadn't been for a real cat? (We had a cat back then, which probably explains a lot....)

Anyway, 7 out of 10 for sheer nostalgic fun.

Like some others above, this cartoon was a little slice of my childhood I think about once in a while. I remember the year it came out (I was 11 years old) and I was a cat lover and I mostly watched it because I liked the cats, and deep down I thought the execution of the cartoon part was pretty cheesy though I liked the overall story line. The next season when I did not see it listed in TV guide I was very disappointed, but I had a feeling it was not going to be renewed.

Anyway, 35 years later I still remember the lyrics of the song:

I am Waldo Kitty, a meek and mild kind of cat

And I'm a daring hero, and I like being that

When I see a friend in need

I want to be a friend indeed

I just pretend and - suddenly

I'm anyone I want to be - a courageous kind of cat!

Then there was an instrumental interlude. I forget if there was a second verse or not, but I suspect there wasn't because if there was I probably would have remembered at least some of it.

About the short-lived live action/animated series "The Secret Lives of Waldo Kitty"........................

For one,it was loosely based on the original story by James Thurber and also loosely based on the film "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" which starred singer-comedian-dancer and actor Danny Kaye which was released in 1947 and produced by Samuel Goldwyn Films for RKO Pictures. The story and the movie itself,based on the novel by James Thurber was about a day-dreaming henpecked husband. The movie version was very successful on all counts making it one of the biggest box office attractions of 1947. To allow for romance,the screenplay has made the timid Walter Mitty a bachelor(played by Danny Kaye),though dominated by his mother(Fay Bainter)and his pushy fiancée(Ann Rutherford). Mitty's imaginary adventures basically punctuate the film,which culminates in his taking part in a real-life adventure. Among the characters hilariously impersonated by Kaye are a fast-drawing cowboy,a Mississippi riverboat gambler,a brilliant surgeon,a dashing RAF pilot and lastly an "Anatole of Paris" French fashion designer. In Mitty's dreams,the same glamorous blonde heroine always appears which was played by Virginia Mayo. Here in the original 1947 film the dream girl finally enters his life asking the confused character to help her escape from an evil character who's been following her. That movie also starred Boris Karloff and some fascinating girls.

"The Secret Life of Waldo Kitty",which also based on James Thurber's novel and also this was a mixture of both live action and animation produced by Lou Scheimer and Norm Prescott for Filmation Productions which ran mostly on Saturday mornings on NBC-TV from September 6,1975 until September 4,1976. Only 13 episodes were produced of this series all in color. Basically same story and same premise but this one consist of animal characters-both real and animated. Just like the story the meek Waldo Kitty found himself intimidated by Tyrone,the neighborhood bullying bulldog and was perplexed by his girlfriend Felicia,a female tabby. In other words,Waldo and his feline girlfriend were both terrorized by the neighborhood bully(the bulldog,Tyrone). When Waldo would pondered how he would escape from this latest dilemma,he would daydream himself into anthropmorphic cartoon form. Voices for the characters were provided by Howard Morris(aka Ernest T. Bass of The Andy Griffith Show and was also one of the Hanna-Barbera stock voice players most notably for the voice of Atom Ant and also for Filmation as well notably for the voice of Jughead Jones on The Archies)and Allan Melvin(another of the Hanna-Barbera and also Filmation stock players too,who was also the voice of H-B's Magilla Gorilla)and also by Filmation voice stock player Jane Webb.

The fantasies Waldo displayed had of controlling the other animals in various superhero incarnations,which was all parodies of human ones from areas of TV and comic books. The set-ups were six very familiar scenes featuring the characters of Waldo,Felicia,and Tyrone...One,there was Tarzan(Catzan),with Felicia as his female companion Jane. The others were Batman(Catman),The Lone Ranger(The Lone Kitty),Robin Hood (Robin Cat),Dick Tracy(Cat Tracy),and Star Trek(Captain James T. Cat of the Starship Kittyprise). Now in each of the scenario,the bulldog would have the same hencemen over and over and each time would capture Felicia and it would be up to Waldo to save her from a certain fate. In the Catman adventures,the real-life cat would be joined by a partner,a bird which when it went into cartoon form would become Sparrow(the equivalent of Batman's Robin),attempting to aid sidekick Waldo into escaping from the evil clutches of the bulldog. The most interesting one of the series,The Lone Kitty,Waldo would have a sidekick in the form of real rabbit,and in this case the rabbit in cartoon form became Tonto. The same with the Robin Hood. This was a show that did very well,even though it ran for one season since it's biggest fantasy had to have been NBC running this for a year and thinking it could outrate the Number One show on Saturday Mornings-which was "The Bugs Bunny Show" on CBS not to even mention another tough competitor "The New Adventures of Scooby Doo" which was on ABC. After its run on NBC in 1976(which was cancelled and its replacement for the start of the 1976-1977 season was a short-lived animated series based on the adventures of heavyweight champ Muhammad Ali and countless repeated episodes of The Pink Panther Show),the series continued onward in national syndication as part of Filmation's "Groovie Ghoulies and Friends" under the title "The New Adventures of Waldo Kitty",which ran for six years in syndication in repeated episodes from the first one ending in 1980. And it hasn't been seen since.