Andrew Lloyd Webber Is Now Calling The Cats Movie “Ridiculous”

Last year’s big-screen adaptation of Cats will never cease to be a wonder, whether you’re counting how universally disliked it is, how much money it supposedly lost (around $113 million, but who’s counting?), or how it became the first movie that needed a post-release visual patch while still in cinemas.

The movie was the subject of ridicule at February’s Academy Awards, which resulted in the industry’s Visual Effects Society officially disowning it–and now even the show’s original creator Andrew Lloyd Webber has spoken out against the Cats movie. In an interview with The Sunday Times, as picked up by Deadline, Webber knows exactly where he wants to put the blame for Cats’ failings.

“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,” Webber said in the interview. “The whole thing was ridiculous.”

The composer has previously criticized James Corden’s Bustopher Jones, complaining about the reinterpretation of the character in a live video commentary for the 1998 filmed version of the musical. “This song is about wit not coarse jokes,” Webber complained of the movie’s version. “I cannot tell you how absolutely un-Eliot it all was.” For the record, Corden himself doesn’t seem to be a fan either–he was part of the Academy Awards skit lampooning it, after all.

Contrary to his criticism, however, Webber was involved in the production of the movie–he co-wrote the new song Beautiful Ghosts with Taylor Swift, and consulted on some elements–though he has said that the movie is “very much Tom’s vision” in a previous interview.

Before the movie premiered, ALW seemed to be a fan of the finished product, with a tweet calling the film “magical.” The composer seems to have since changed his mind following the wave of criticism and memes that sprung up after Cats made its way to theaters.