Josie and the p*ssycats (formatted as
Josie and the p*ssy 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, sixteen episodes of
Josie and the p*ssycats 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 p*ssycats in Outer Space, sixteen episodes of which aired on CBS during the 1972-73 season and were rerun the following season. 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 p*ssycats featured an all-girl pop music band that toured the world with their entourage, getting mixed up in strange adventures, spy capers, and mysteries. On the small-screen, the group consisted of level-headed lead singer 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 Hanna-Barbera's successful
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! than the original
Josie comic book, is famous 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 p*ssycats song played over a chase scene, which, in a similar fashion to
The Monkees, featured the group running after and from a selection of haplessly villainous characters.
The Josie and the p*ssycats recordings were produced by La La Productions, run by Danny Janssen and Bobby Young. 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 p*ssycats segment at the end of each episode. After interviewing over 500 finalists, settled upon casting Kathleen Dougherty (Cathy Dougher) as Josie, Cherie Moor (actress 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, but was in for a surprise. Hanna-Barbera wanted Janssen to recast Patrice Holloway, because they had decided to portray "Josie and the p*ssycats" as an all-white trio and had altered Valerie, who had been conceived as African-American and was already appearing as such in Arche's revamped
Josie and the p*ssycats 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 and allowed Janssen to keep Holloway, and changed Valerie back to being African-American.
Patrice Yvonne Holloway (March 23, 1951–October 3, 2006)
Holloway is most noted for her work as the singing voice of Valerie in Hanna-Barbera's 1970
Josie and the p*ssycats television series and on the concurrent
Josie and the p*ssycats album. Valerie was the first female African-American cartoon character to star as a television series regular, and was nearly cut from the show by Hanna-Barbera. Record producer Danny Janssen demanded that Holloway—and therefore Valerie—remain in the show, as he felt her voice was necessary to produce the Jackson 5-esque bubblegum pop that H-B had requested he produce. It is Patrice's voice that does lead on the series' theme song, 'Josie and The p*ssycats,' amongst many other songs.
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