Vanity Fair: Cats VFX Editor Confirms the “Butthole Cut” Was Very Real, Very Terrible

[Maddox]

Another day, another dispatch about the mythical “butthole cut” of Cats. In an interview with the Daily Beast, a visual-effects editor who worked on the beguiling movie musical confirmed that an early, half-finished iteration of Cats did indeed feature a few accidental anuses.

The visual-effects team was taken aback when they watched an early version of the film back and realized what was happening, the source recalled.

“When we were looking at the playbacks, we were like, ‘What the hell? You guys see that?!’” the source told the outlet. “We paused it. We went to call our supervisor, and we’re like, ‘There’s a fucking asshole in there! There’s buttholes!’ It wasn’t prominent but you saw it…And you [were] just like, ‘What the hell is that?... There’s a fucking butthole in there.’ It wasn’t in your face—but at the same time, too, if you’re looking, you’ll see it.”

The source’s remarks mirror earlier comments from an anonymous Cats crew member, who told writer Ben Mekler that the “butthole” cut was an unintentional byproduct of the film’s unique visual effects. The film’s initial VFX process, the crew member said, made the cats of Cats look like their skin and fur had been “groomed or just folded in a way that really REALLY looked like very furry lady genitals and buttholes by accident.” In the Daily Beast interview, the source noted that the job of editing out all of the buttholes was ultimately left to one crew member who was hired specifically to excise unintended buttholes.

As much as this story has delighted fans of the film—adding to the berserk lore of an ill-fated project—the source who worked on the film’s visual effects who spoke to the Daily Beast also said that working conditions were miserable for Cats employees. Director Tom Hooper, the source alleged, knew nothing about animation, and was “horrible,” “disrespectful,” “demeaning,” and “condescending” toward employees. “He talks to you like you’re garbage,” the source said, noting that they worked 90-hour weeks for months on the project.

“It was pure, almost slavery for us, how much work we put into it with no time, and everything was difficult,” the source said. “We were so rushed on the project that we’d have no time for anything. So when people say, ‘Oh, the effects were not good,’ or ‘The animation’s not good,’ or anything, that’s not our fault. We have no time.”

The source added that it took six months just to complete a two-minute trailer released ahead of the film’s debut—and four months to finish the film. “Six months to do a two-minute trailer and four months to do a film of an hour and a half. My math is pretty good... You could figure that doesn’t make any sense,” the source said.

Representatives for Hooper and for Universal have not yet responded to Vanity Fair’s request for comment.

Cats VFX Editor Confirms the “Butthole Cut” Was Very Real, Very Terrible

“We went to call our supervisor, and we’re like, ‘There’s a f--king a--hole in there! There’s buttholes!’”

www.vanityfair.com