The kitty as famous as a Kardashian
When the fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld died a year ago, he left a part of his $200 million fortune to his cat, Choupette.
Choupette was already known as the richest cat in the world. In 2015 alone, she earned $3 million from taking part in two campaigns, one for a Japanese beauty product and the other for a German car company.
Lagerfeld supplied her with a bodyguard and two ladies- inwaiting. She travelled everywhere with custom-made Louis Vuitton and Goyard trunks, and had her own iPad.
Over the years, Choupette has broadened her portfolio. It now includes a make-up collection with Shu Uemura, a book and a fashion line, plus a huge following on social media. Choupette is what is now known as an ‘influencer’.
her late master’s munificence has left her comfortably well- off. Like Jacob Rees-Mogg, she benefits from a full- time nanny, who sees to her every need. She feeds off designer chinaware, with separate dishes for water, croquettes and pate. her croquettes arrive e with a choice of f turkey or fish sauce.
Furthermore, at t the weekend her agent has released a set of photographs in which Choupette can be seen enjoying a three-course meal and snuggling up on a silk cushion. Choupette is, says her agent, ‘a model who’s very easy to work with. She’s used to having her photo taken and to all the noise. As soon as she sees the camera, she poses.’
Is it just me, or does Choupette look insufferably smug in these new photographs, even for a cat? having done little in her life other than purr and pose, she has been welcomed as a member of the international jet-set. no doubt she breakfasts with Gwyneth Paltrow, exchanges selfies with Kim Kardashian and makes impassioned calls for inclusivity at all the major red-carpet events.
envy is never an attractive emotion, but, by now, one or two down-at-heel readers may have already begun plotting to elbow Choupette out of the way and to take her place at the centre of the
beau monde of Paris. At first glance, it appears so easy: you wait until Choupette’s household staff are taking a welldeserved coffee-break, then you catch Choupette unawares, bundle her into a bag, throw the bag to a getaway driver, and take her place on the sofa, dressed up as her double. hey presto! A life of luxury awaits!
Which of us would not relish the chance to spend the rest of our days curled up on a sofa, tucking into croquettes in a chic Paris apartment while a furious Choupette is forced to eat Kattomeat and catch mice in a dank basement somewhere off the edgware Road?
But, on second thoughts, it will never work. If the recent film of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats has taught us anything, it is how difficult it is for us human beings to pass ourselves off as cats. We are simply too big and burly.
Those who saw James Corden squeezed into a hairy bodysuit tell me he looked more like the Yeti, or a pantomime horse; in fact, quite a few audience survivors are still being treated for post traumatic stress disorder.
So it looks as though any attempt to swap places with Choupette is do doomed to fail. In Instead, we just ha have to hope that C Choupette will su suffer the same fate th that afflicts so many ce celebrities in the w world today.
not content with her life of luxury, she will become g greedy for more a and more fame. B Before long, she will be photographed coming out of a nightclub in the early hours of f th the morning, i looking wrecked. Then close friends will tell the newspapers that they are ‘seriously concerned’ at the weight she is putting on, or taking off.
ON CELEBRITY Big Brother, Choupette will be recorded saying something offensive in an unguarded moment. She will face a twitter storm, and early departure. Damning profiles in serious magazines will follow.
her fan base will collapse, and she will be barred from appearing on even fairly modest television shows, such as Celebrity Antiques Road Trip and Loose Women.
And then, on top of it all, her misery memoir, chronicling her kittenhood on the streets of Montmartre and her recent descent into celebrity hell, will meet with disappointing sales. And in a couple of years time, Choupette will feature alongside a member of S Club Seven and a Red Setter off Animal hospital in a feature called Where Are They now?
Poor Choupette! For all its outward luxury, life as a celebrity cat is fraught with hazard. Any cat who sets foot in the high life does so at her peril.