Ella the tabby cat, like many of us, has a favorite movie — and hers is the 2018 animated film The Grinch, featuring the voice of Benedict Cumberbatch.
Ella’s owner Emily shared how her loveable senior cat Ella is obsessed with the movie, in a hilarious video shared on The DoDo’s YouTube channel.
Give me my Cumberbatch!
The video shows Ella meowing insistently at her owner and leading her to the television; the tabby is looking for her daily fix of Cumberbatch.
Emily explained that the cat with a strange obsession for Shakespearean actors tackling the works of Dr. Seuss only entered her life because of her husband.
Welcoming Ella
The unique cat’s owner shared that her husband is a cat person whereas she always preferred dogs.
When they decided to welcome a cat into their home Emily struggled to connect with any of the potential adoptees.
Until she met Ella. Describing the moment that she first encountered Ella in the rescue center, Emily said:
“Finally one day we went and we saw Ella, she was a senior cat. When I first saw her she came up to me, and immediately licked me. I feel like I love his cat already.”
An obsession begins
Emily shares that the couple adopted Ella around the holidays and that she was working several jobs from home at the time.
Feeling exhausted and burnt out from fulfilling her many roles, Emily turned to Netflix to provide some comforting background noise as she worked.
Little did she know that by choosing to put on The Grinch, she would change her tabby cat’s life forever.
Upon hearing the dulcet tones of the London-born actor, Ella was immediately transfixed: she stared intently at the screen, having officially become a devoted Benedict Cumberbatch fan.
The cat’s strange behavior shocked Emily, describing her initial reaction to Ella’s fixation with the film, she said:
“And I was like ‘what is happening?’”
An actor of exceptional range
And thus began Emily’s enforced daily viewing of the Christmas film with a passable score of 59% on Rotten Tomatoes.
She explained that after that first fateful viewing, watching the film was no longer optional, as Ella quickly took to meow-screaming at her owner until she put on the film that had the power to fully mesmerize the cat.
Within the DoDo video, Emily pauses The Grinch as Ella is contently watching it and the cat slowly turns her head to give her owner a withering stare of pure contempt.
Perhaps the tabby is dazzled by the exceptional range that Benedict Cumberbatch displays in the film by seamlessly embodying a surreal green-haired creature.
No other film will do
Emily explains that Ella is very particular in her tastes and will not be swayed from her favorite version of the famous Dr. Seuss story, saying:
“It’s only The Grinch with Benedict Cumberbatch, we’ve tried the Jim Carrey version and we’ve tried the original cartoon and she will not watch it.”
Movie time has officially become a daily activity within the family’s house and it is always, according to Emily, a happy bonding experience… as long as Ella gets to choose the movie.