Trivia / Heathcliff & the Catillac Cats

• Acting for Two: Riff-Raff and Wordsworth were both voiced by Stan Jones, and then there's Mungo and Leroy, both voiced by Ted Ziegler.
• Blooper: The Catillac Cats episode "High Goon" uses a Heathcliff Episode Title Card (specifically the one of Mungo about to step on a sunbathing Heathcliff).
• Creator Backlash:
  • This show is often looked back with fondness and nostalgia for those who grew up in the 80s and early 90s, and the voice cast enjoyed working on the show without any on-set issues. However, other people who worked on this show don't have very nice memories of it.
    • John Kricfalusi (The Ren & Stimpy Show and The Ripping Friends) considered the show to be just another mediocre '80s series (the kind that would drive him to work on Ralph Bakshi's Mighty Mouse cartoon and create The Ren and Stimpy Show).
    • Scott Shaw!^note The exclamation point is part of his name. (Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew!) found DiC too disorganized.
    • One writer talked about Executive Meddling from Japanese animation producers, as TMS, or rather their subcontractors, opposed wacky cartoonish gags
    • Chuck Lorre (One of the show's co-developers, who was a cartoon writer in the 1980s before he created Two and a Half Men and The Big Bang Theory^note he also did Toxic Crusaders and the lyrics to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987)'s theme song) found this show beneath him, as he hated writing for animation.
    • Eddie Fitzgerald (Tiny Toon Adventures, the basis for Pinky and John K.'s protege) has actively blanked out all memory of working on the show, despite his name being in the end credits.
• Crossdressing Voices: In the 1990s Japanese dub, Riff-Raff is voiced by a female voice actress, Yuko Saito. Averted in the 1980s dub, when he is voiced by Hōchū Ōtsuka instead.
• Dueling Dubs: There's two Japanese dubs: One done in the 1980s and another one done in the 1990s, each one with their respective casts.
• International Coproduction: Between DIC Entertainment (USA and France) and TMS Entertainment (Japan) for the first season, with animation also contributed for the season by Araki Productions, Mushi Productions, Studio Take One, Studio Korumi and an uncredited Wang Film Productions.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes:
  • Various VHS and DVD compilations (mostly of the Heathcliff segments) were released up until in the mid-2000s, all of which are now out of print. Shout! Factory released the first 24 episodes before losing the rights to the series. Mill Creek Entertainment released the entire first season on DVD, one half in 2012 and the other half in 2013. Rescued in August 2016 when Mill Creek released the entire series on DVD, including the previously unreleased second season episodes.
  • The most recent print of Heathcliff: The Movie was released on DVD in 2004, though it can be found on YouTube
• Pop-Culture Urban Legends:
  • Popular belief is that Heathcliff and Riff-Raff did interact with each other at least once in the show. Often times, someone will claim or swear in the internet that they saw an episode where they actually meet, sometimes adding that they heard the episode only aired once for whatever reason. Actually, no such episode was ever made, and the only time the two characters interacted was during the end credits and an odd cameo from Riff-Raff in the comic strip. However, this belief is so strong even today that it will not probably fade anywhere soon (see Common Knowledge in YMMV).
  • Heathcliff is often called the last original character who Mel Blanc voiced. While certainly his last lead character, he did do several smaller original roles during the '80s.
• Screwed by the Lawyers:
  • Ever wonder why Heathcliff and Riff-Raff never meet outside the end credits? Heathcliff's owners at the time, the McNaught Syndicate, apparently didn't want characters not created by them appearing with Heathcliff, so hence Riff-Raff and Cleo were both unable to appear; Hector, Wordsworth, and Mungo were created specifically so they could appear in both segments.
  • The Catillac Cats segments are referred to as "Cats & Co." in the credits due to a lawsuit from Cadillac.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Per an interview with voice actress Donna Christie, the second season would have been longer had it not been for Mel Blanc's failing health.
  • In 2010, a teaser was released for a CGI movie starring Frank Welker as Heathcliff. Nothing was ever done with the idea since.
  • One early model sheet shows that Bush the sheepdog was originally called "Wolf".

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