Reporting for NPR’s All Things Considered, Allison Keyes examines the allure of Catwoman, from her first appearance in 1940 to her leap to television in 1966 to her current comic series:

… Catwoman has changed with the times. Will Pfeifer (no relation to Michelle) writes the current Catwoman comic. He says her backstory is as tangled as a ball of string: She was orphaned, has a sister, and has a shadowy past as a prostitute.

“I like to play off that,” says Will Pfeifer. “To me, she’s just someone who’s had a really rough life, but she’s never been beaten. She really comes out on top, and she uses her experiences and moves on from them — and she has fun while she’s doing it, I think.”

Indeed, Catwoman isn’t the type to sit around twiddling her claws, waiting for anyone to bail her out of trouble — even when the offer comes from Bruce Wayne.

“This was one of the first female characters we saw on television that really spoke to empowerment,” says Suzanne Colon, author of Catwoman: The Life and Times of a Feline Fatale. “Not only empowerment; a proto-feminism that was very sexy and pretty and female, and yet very take-charge. This woman had her own gang of men who wore little cat ears … to please her.”

Keyes also speaks with veteran creator Jerry Robinson, and actors Adam West, Julie Newmar and Eartha Kitt.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 17th, 2008 at 8:52 am and is filed under Comic Books, DC Comics, Movies, Pop Culture, Television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.