You know him! Did you know who is hiding behind this cat’s forehead?

In the early 2000s, four years after covering Jim Carrey with long green hair to turn him into the Grinch, Universal Pictures studio and producer Brian Grazer suspended another famous character from the famous Dr. Seuss, a children’s author to whom we also owe Horton or The. The Lorax.

This time, it is Le Chat Chapeauté, one of the most popular works of the writer and illustrator, that the studios decide to dedicate their new feature film to live action.

In this tale, siblings with opposite characters – young Sally is a very serious little girl, while her brother only thinks about playing – find themselves home alone when they see a very special character enter their living room. Extravagant: A large talking cat wearing a hat who claims to teach them how to have fun.

Like Jim Carrey, who put his svelte figure and supple face to work as the Grinch, a chameleon and flexible actor were essential to portraying this curious hero. So it depends on Mike Myers – a fan of clever makeup, as he already proved with the Austin Powers trilogy, but also of amazing characters, because he already gave voice to Shrek in the first part of the animated saga – it was to offer the role of this cat like no other.

As with The Grinch, Myers’ makeup was assigned first to Rick Baker (who would eventually leave the project due to disagreements with Mike Myers) and then to Steve Johnson. According to the film’s director Bo Welch, the whole challenge was to transform the actor into the Cat in the Hat without disrupting his acting:

“You have Mike Myers. He has a very supple and expressive face, so we really didn’t want to bury him in prosthetics and make-up, because that would make his job, which was already difficult enough, even more difficult.”

“They managed to achieve a perfect balance between my face and makeup. I have to say, the stuff went on so well that even I think I scratched my nose once, thinking I had an itch.”Mike Myers himself said, apparently very pleased with the result, while filming.

However, the process was not easy for him. After three and a half hours of make-up a day, she donned a fur suit and stepped out into the sun to do her scenes (the film was shot in summer and in California!).

“My ears were remote controlled, as were my hat and tail. It really felt like NASA was involved in a lot of my movements.” He also said.

“A few times in the movie I wore this really big hat, all this fur, it was 32 degrees in Pomona and I had to walk three blocks. It was intense.”

Unfortunately for him and the Chat Chapeauté team, their efforts failed to ensure that the film had a very warm critical reception. In 2004, despite grossing $130 million at the worldwide box office, the feature film received 8 nominations at the Razzie Awards (which “awarded” the worst works of the year).

(Re)discover the ‘Chat Chapeauté’ trailer…