Oh, for it to be December 2019 again, when the most pressing global disaster plaguing the world was Cats the movie.

Here in August of 2020, Cats composer Andrew Lloyd Webber offered us a brief respite from coronavirus news and various other evolving emergencies with his opinion on Tom Hooper's notoriously derided adaptation of Webber's most popular work.

Speaking to The Sunday Times, Webber said, "The problem with the film was that Tom Hooper decided that he didn’t want anybody involved in it who was involved in the original show… The whole thing was ridiculous." Cats, you'll remember, is about singing and dancing cats auditioning for the chance to die. The story was adapted from T.S. Eliot's Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, which is a poetry collection about various feline characters.

This is not the first time Webber has publicly dunked on the film. Doing live commentary on a 1998 stage production in May, Webber criticized James Corden's performance as Bustopher Jones. Corden's performance took liberties with the original ideation of the character, creating a jarring moment where Corden's Jones, in the middle of singing about how much he loves being a fat cat, suddenly goes for laughs by telling another cat he's sensitive about his weight.

"I cannot tell you how absolutely un-Eliot it all was," said Webber. "The song is about wit, not coarse jokes."

Some on Twitter pointed out it was ironic that Andrew Lloyd Webber found the film version of Cats ridiculous considering the stage version of Cats.

Andrew Lloyd Webber thinks the film adaptation of his musical comprised of cast members pouncing and preening like real cats is "ridiculous." I'll just leave that there. pic.twitter.com/oYsinEvjxJ

— John Troy (@johnfolsomtroy) August 4, 2020