When I watched “Lady and the Tramp” as a child, nothing scared me more than the Siamese cats.
They’re diabolical little sneaks, who trick their owner into thinking poor Lady has attacked them and wreaked havoc on the house. While spreading their chaos, they sing the most annoyingly catchy song Disney ever created: “The Siamese Cat Song.”
Most Americans, whether born before or after the film came out in 1955, should recognize the chorus: “We are Siamese if you please/ We are Siamese if you don’t please.”
The cats speak in broken English — “We are former residents of Siam/ There are no finer cat than I am” — and are drawn with exaggerated Asian stereotypes, including squinty eyes. It’s annoying with a side of distasteful. The song and the cats’ illustration don’t quite add up to Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” but it’s easy enough to see why Disney scrapped the song from its upcoming live-action remake.
Still, it’s a little odd that in addition to having rhythm and blues singer Janelle Monáe create new music for the film, Disney will also change the characters so they’re no longer Siamese cats. An insider told Variety the cats would appear in the remake as something else. But would it really be so hard just to have some nonracist Siamese cats?
Apparently, Disney is too afraid of controversy to test out a less overtly stereotypical iteration of the iconic duo. Will they try another type of cat, maybe Burmese? Wait, that could be offensive. A Bengal cat? No, no. A Persian cat? Oh, dear.
Representing any race, whether in cartoon cat form or not, has its risks. But that doesn’t mean Disney has to forget it ever created a storyline around Siamese cats.
Disney shouldn’t be so scandalized by its own past that it has to scrub away all memory of its problematic characters. It would be more progressive to do in the remake what Disney should’ve done in 1955: represent Southeast Asia without descending into ridiculous caricatures.
