For fourteen years, critic Joe Queenan walked past the Winter Garden Theater in New York City without once even dreaming of venturing inside to see Cats . One fateful afternoon in March 1996, however, having grown weary of his hopelessly elitist lifestyle, he decided to buy a half-price ticket and check out Andrew Lloyd Webber's record-breaking juggernaut. No, he did not expect the musical to be any good, but surely there were limits to how bad it could be. Here, Queenan was tragically mistaken. Cats , what Grease would look like if all the cast members were dressed up like KISS, was infinitely more idiotic than he had ever imagined. Yet now the Rubicon had been crossed. Queenan had involuntarily launched himself on a harrowing personal oddyssey: an 18-month descent into the abyss of American popular culture. At first, Queenan found things to be every bit as atrocious as he expected. John Tesh defiling the temple of Carnegie Hall reminded him of Adolf Hitler goose-stepping in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower. The Celestine Prophecy and The Horse Whisperer proved to be prodigiously cretinous. And the sight of senior citizens forking over their hard-earned nickels and dimes to watch Joe Pesci in Gone Fishin' so moved Queenan that he began standing outside the theater issuing refunds to exiting patrons. But then something strange happened. Queenan started enjoying Barry Manilow concerts. He went to see Julie Andrews and Liza Minnelli and Raquel Welch in Victor/Victoria . He said nice things about Larry King and Charles Grodin in his weekly TV Guide column. He spent hours planted in front of the television, transfixed by special, two-hour episodes of Walker: Texas Ranger . He actually ordered the dreaded zuppa toscana at the Olive Garden. Most frightening of all, he shook hands with Geraldo Rivera. How Queenan finally escaped from the cultural Hot Zone and returned to civilization is an epic tale as heart-warming, awe-inspiring, and life-affirming as Robinson Crusoe , The Adventures of Marco Polo , Gulliver's Travels , and Swiss Family Robinson . Well, almost. Joe Queenan writes a weekly column for TV Guide and is a contributing writer at GQ. His pieces regularly appear in Playboy, Allure, George, Movieline, and other publications, along with his book reviews for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. The author of three previous books, he lives in Westchester with his wife and two children. Red Lobster, White Trash, & the Blue Lagoon Joe Queenan's America By Joe Queenan Hyperion Books Copyright © 1999 Joe Queenan All right reserved. ISBN: 9780786884087 Chapter One Slouching Toward Red Lobster Cats was very, very, very bad. Cats was a lot worse than I'dexpected. I'd seen Phantom years ago, and knew all Ineeded to know about Starlight Express and Joseph andthe Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, so I was not acomplete stranger to the fiendishly vapid world of AndrewLloyd Webber. But nothing I'd ever read or heard aboutthe show could have prepared me for the epic suckiness ofCats. Put it this way: Phantom sucked. But Cats reallysucked. One of the things that fascinated me about Cats was the wayI'd managed to keep it from penetrating my consciousnessfor the previous fourteen years. Yes, I'd been walking past theWinter Garden Theatre at 50th and Broadway since 1982without once even dreaming of venturing inside; and yes, I'dheard the song "Memory"; and yes, I'd heard about all the TonysCats had won; and yes, I'd seen all those garish subway posters;and yes, I'd been jostled by those armies of tourists streaming outof the theater at rush hour as I myself tried to hustle throughmidtown. But all those years that Cats had been playing, I'dsomehow avoided even finding out whatthe show was about. Wandering past the Winter Garden allthose years was like wandering past those dimly lit S&M bars inGreenwich Village: I really didn't need to know the details. Now my blissful ignorance had been shattered. So withoutany further ado, let me share the wealth. For the benefit of thetwo or three other people in this society who don't know whatCats is about, here's the answer: It's about a bunch of cats. Thecats jump around in a postnuclear junkyard for some two and ahalf hours, bumping and grinding to that curiously Mesozoic popmusic for which Andrew Lloyd Webber is famous--the kind of full-tilttruckin' that sounds like the theme from "The Mod Squad."There's an Elvis impersonator cat, and a cat that looks like CyndiLauper, and a cat that looks like Phyllis Diller. All the other castmembers look like Jon Bon Jovi with two weeks of facial growth. Sure, Cats is allegedly based upon the works of T. S. Eliot,but from what I could tell, the show had about as much to dowith the author of "The Waste Land" as those old Steve Reevesmovies had to do with Euripides. Cats is what Grease would looklike if all the cast members dressed up like KISS. To give you anidea of how bad Cats is, t