Back in the early 2000s, Disney Animation was developing a movie inspired by the films of legendary director Alfred Hitchcock, and it was titled Fraidy Cat. Disney ended up shelving the project in 2005 and not much information has been shared on it… until now.
/Film recently interviewed Meet the Robinsons director Stephen J. Anderson, and he was able to provide some insight on the film after screening an incomplete reel of the first two acts of the movie.
The story would have centered around a spoiled house cat caught up in a twisty mystery, and the cat character was a Jimmy Stewart-like character from Hitchcock’s Vertigo. Anderson described: “It was very paranoid, witnessed a murder, and was trying to unspool what actually had happened. And it was done in a very Hitchcock-style noir-ish presentation in the boards.”
Anderson when on to say that “It would’ve been really great. I wish it could have been made, but unfortunately, it didn’t make it.”
That sounds like it would have been a lot of fun, and it might be something that would be appreciated more now than when it was in development. Mystery thrillers are all the rage right now! The reason why it was canceled was also pretty ridiculous.
Not long after the movie was canceled Disney blogger Jim Hill wrote: “These empty suits chose to bad-mouth Fraidy Cat. [They said] that the premise of the picture was far too obscure. ‘I mean, who today even remembers who Alfred Hitchcock was? So why would kids in 2009 pay good money to see an animated film that pays tribute to an old, fat, dead movie director?'”
When you hear stuff like that, you can’t help but wonder how these studio executives got jobs making movies, it certainly wasn’t because they were smart. Yet, for some reason, Hollywood continues to hire these types of people!
Hill explained what the executives were saying about the film after screening the two-act reel: “They kept whispering and whispering. Saying things like ‘This project has such limited commercial appeal. There’s no way that we’re going to be able to persuade a major manufacturer to make Fraidy Cat toys’ and ‘How is this film going to expand the Disney brand? Are there characters here that we can use for a Saturday morning spin-off? Or for a home premiere sequel?'”
So, that’s a shame. But, it’s par for the course at Disney. This sounds like it could have been a great animated film! Unfortunately, we’ll never know.