The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat

The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Robert Taylor
Screenplay by	Robert Taylor Fred Halliday Eric Monte
Based on	Fritz the Cat by Robert Crumb
Produced by	Steve Krantz
Starring	Skip Hinnant
Edited by	Marshall M. Borden
Music by	Tom Scott & The L.A. Express
Production companies	Steve Krantz Productions Cine Camera
Distributed by	American International Pictures
Release date	June 26, 1974 (1974-06-26)
Running time	76 minutes[1]
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$1.5 million
Box office	$3 million[2]

The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat is a 1974 American adult animated anthology black comedy film directed by Robert Taylor as a sequel to Ralph Bakshi's Fritz the Cat (1972), adapted from the comic strip by Robert Crumb, neither of whom had any involvement in the making of the film. The only two people involved in the first film to work on the sequel were voice actor Skip Hinnant, and producer Steve Krantz. The film's music score was composed by jazz musician Tom Scott, and performed by Scott and his band The L.A. Express.

Like the first film, The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat focuses on Fritz (voiced by Hinnant), a fraudulent womanizer and leftist, who is shown in this film to have married an ill-tempered woman named Gabrielle, with whom he shares an apartment room with their infant son. Unlike the first film, The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat adopts a non-linear narrative and is presented as an anthology of loosely connected short stories, connected as cannabis-induced fantasies which occur as she berates Fritz. The stories depict him as a Nazi stormtrooper, a rich playboy, an astronaut heading to Mars, and in an alternate reality in which New Jersey has seceded from the United States as an entirely African American state, China and Russia. Except for the wraparound segment, none of the film's storylines are based on Robert Crumb's comics, and he was not credited on this film.

The film was written by Taylor, in collaboration with Fred Halliday and Eric Monte. The voice cast also featured Bob Holt, Peter Leeds, Louisa Moritz, Robert Ridgely, Joan Gerber, Jay Lawrence, Stanley Adams, Pat Harrington Jr., Peter Hobbs, Ralph James, Eric Monte, Glynn Turman, Gloria Jones, Renny Roker, John Hancock, Chris Graham and Felton Perry.

In contrast to the first film receiving an X rating, the sequel got an R rating, being the first American animated film to do so, and cementing the Fritz films as the holders of the first animated films to receive both ratings.