Josie and the Pussycats (TV series)

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 during the 1970–71 television season and were rerun during the 1971–72 season.
In 1972, the show was re-conceptualized as 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. This brought its national Saturday morning TV run on three networks to six years.
"Josie and the Pussycats" featured a teenage all-girl pop music 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 bassist 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 Hanna-Barbera's successful "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. 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.
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.
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.
Janssen presented the newly formed band to William Hanna and Joseph Barbera to finalize the production deal. Hanna-Barbera wanted Janssen to recast Holloway, because they had decided to portray "Josie and the Pussycats" as an all-white trio and had altered Valerie, who had been conceived as black and was already appearing as such in Archie Comics' revamped "Josie and the Pussycats" comic book, to make her white. Janssen refused to recast Holloway and threatened to walk away from the project. After a three-week-long stand-off between Janssen and Hanna-Barbera, Hanna-Barbera finally relented, allowed Janssen to keep Holloway, and changed Valerie back to being black. The Valerie character was the first black female character on a regular Saturday morning cartoon series. "The Hardy Boys" drummer Pete Jones had been the first black male to appear on Saturday mornings a year earlier.
Of the songs that were broadcast, Patrice Holloway sang lead on the series' theme song, "You've Come A Long Way, Baby", "Voodoo", "It's All Right With Me", "The Handclapping Song", "Stop, Look And Listen", "Clock On The Wall" and "Every Beat Of My Heart". Holloway was the primary lead vocalist on "Roadrunner" which also features verses sung by Kathleen Dougherty and Cheryl Ladd. Ladd sang lead on "Inside, Outside, Upside-Down", "Dream Maker", "I Wanna Make You Happy", "The Time To Love", "I Love You Too Much", "Lie! Lie! Lie!" and "Dreaming". According to songwriter/vocal arranger Sue Sheridan (known as Sue Steward at the time), Dougherty felt she was stronger on harmony than lead and ceded her spotlight to Ladd. Essentially then, Josie was the group leader but Valerie and Melody provided the trio with its singing voices.
Theme song.
The show's theme song, titled "Josie and the Pussycats", was written by Hoyt Curtin, William Hanna (under the pseudonym "Denby Williams") and Joseph Barbera (under the pseudonym "Joseph Roland"). The theme song was based on melodies from an incidental tune that had been played on various Hanna-Barbera cartoons since "The Jetsons".
A cover of "Josie and the Pussycats" performed by Juliana Hatfield and Tanya Donelly is included on the 1995 tribute album "", produced by Ralph Sall for MCA Records.
"Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space".
In September 1972, a sequel spin-off series titled "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" debuted on CBS. This version of the series launched the characters into outer space; the opening credits sequence shows the group taking a promotional photo at the launch site of a new spaceship and a jealous Alexandra elbowing the cast aside in order to steal the spotlight from Josie yet again. However, Alexandra is jerked inside along with the rest of them and accidentally triggers the launch sequence, sending them and the ship into deep space. Despite never having been in the spaceship before, Val seems to know how to pilot it. Every episode centered on the Pussycats encountering a strange new world, where they would encounter and often be captured by various alien races before escaping and attempting to return to Earth.
Musical numbers and chase sequences set to newly recorded songs were featured in this spin-off series as with the original. "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" also added the character of Bleep, a pet-sized fluffy alien adopted by Melody, who was the only one who could understand the creature's language (he only says "Bleep" repeatedly) and numerous other alien animals encountered.
The 16 episodes of "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" were re-run for the 1973–1974 season until January 26, 1974, when CBS cancelled it and ordered no more new "Josie" episodes from Hanna-Barbera. "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" contained a laugh track as well, but utilized an inferior version created by the studio.
Home media.
A VHS videocassette of "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" containing three episodes was issued by Worldvision Home Video in 1983. A second video cassette, "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space Volume 2", was released in 1985.
Two VHS volumes of "Josie and the Pussycats", each containing four episodes of the original 1970 series, minus the laugh tracks, were released by Warner Home Video (Hanna-Barbera had been sold to Turner Broadcasting in 1991, with Turner merging with Time Warner six years later) on April 10, 2001 to coincide with the release of the live-action film. A "Josie in Outer Space" episode, "Warrior Women of Amazonia", was featured in a clip/episode collection of Hanna-Barbera on VHS, released in the UK.
A "Josie and the Pussycats: The Complete Series" two-DVD box set was released in Region 1 (the United States, Canada, and Japan) on September 18, 2007. All 16 episodes, again minus the laugh tracks, were included, as well as a half-hour documentary on the life and career of Dan DeCarlo. The first episode of the series, "The Nemo's A No No Affair", is featured on the DVD compilation "Saturday Morning Cartoons: The 1970s Volume 1" released on May 26, 2009.
On October 19, 2010, Warner Archive released "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space: The Complete Series" on DVD in Region 1 as part of their Hanna–Barbera Classics Collection of Manufacture-on-Demand (MOD) releases, available exclusively through Warner's online store and Amazon.com.
Both "Josie and the Pussycats" and "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" are available on the Boomerang and HBO Max streaming services, with the latter featuring the series in remastered HD copies. Warner Archive released the HD versions of "Josie and the Pussycats" on Blu-ray on November 3, 2020, and "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" on April 13, 2021.
Reception.
"Josie and the Pussycats" was named the 100th best animated series by entertainment website IGN, which referred to "Josie" as an amusing show for the way in which it combined elements from "The Archie Show" and "Scooby-Doo".
After cancellation.
"Josie and the Pussycats" made a final appearance as animated characters in a guest shot on the September 22, 1973, episode of " The New Scooby-Doo Movies", "The Haunted Showboat". Early production art for Hanna-Barbera's 1977 "all-star" "Battle of the Network Stars" spoof "Laff-A-Lympics" featured Alexandra, Sebastian, Alexander, and Melody among other Hanna-Barbera characters as members of the "Scooby Doobies" team, but legal problems prevented their inclusion in the final program.
In 1976, Rand McNally published a children's book based on the "Josie and the Pussycats" TV show, "Hanna-Barbera's Josie and the Pussycats: The Bag Factory Detour".
The original "Josie and the Pussycats" series was re-run on NBC Saturday morning for the 1975–1976 season and weekdays in syndication from 1977 to 1982. In the mid-1980s, both series, along with a number of other 1970s Hanna-Barbera cartoons, were on board USA Network's "Cartoon Express"; they would next appear on Cartoon Network in 1992, where all 32 episodes were run in the same time slot. Both programs, as of March 3, 2014, are in the library of Boomerang (Turner Broadcasting's archive cartoon channel).
Spin-offs and spoofs.
In 2001, Cartoon Network began airing a "Josie and the Pussycats" short called "Musical Evolution" that featured the Pussycats performing their theme song through the various eras of popular music, including pop, disco, punk, Kiss-like heavy metal, country, and techno. Different animation styles are used for each era. That same year, the characters were adapted into a live action film. The film starred Rachael Leigh Cook as Josie, Tara Reid as Melody, and Rosario Dawson as Valerie.
The 2004–2007 Comedy Central animated TV series "Drawn Together" featured a character named Foxxy Love. An African-American mystery-solving musician, she was a direct parody of the "Josie and the Pussycats" character Valerie Brown.
Several episodes of "Speed Buggy", a later Hanna-Barbera show, had similar plots to some "Josie and the Pussycats" episodes, specifically the two "Josie and the Pussycats" episodes "A Greenthumb is Not a Goldfinger" ("Island of the Giant Plants" in "Speed Buggy") and "X Marks the Spot" ("Out of Sight" in "Speed Buggy"), and the "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space" episode "Warrior Women of Amazonia" ("The Hidden Valley of Amazonia" in "Speed Buggy").
The ship from "Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space", along with other iconic ships, appears as space debris in the "Futurama" episode "Mobius Dick".
In 2016, "Josie and the Pussycats" was rebooted as a comic book. This update features a new version of the origin of the band, where struggling musician Josie joins up with her roommate Melody and Valerie, a veterinarian's assistant, to start the Pussycats, despite the jealousy of Josie's former best friend Alexandra.
The 2017 live-action TV series "Riverdale" featured Josie and the Pussycats as African-American students at Riverdale High School, played by Ashleigh Murray (Josie), Hayley Law (Valerie) and Asha Bromfield (Melody). Murray later co-starred in the "Riverdale" spin-off "Katy Keene" starting in 2020 as an adult Josie, with Lucien Laviscount as Alexander and Camille Hyde as Alexandra.