Meet the bodega cats on viral TikTok series Shop Cats
Michelle Reiss, known online as Michelladonna, plays with Ashley the bodega cat at Rodriguez Grocery & Deli in New York. PHOTOS: JUTHARAT PINYODOONYACHET/NYTIMES
NEW YORK – If you are in a deli or a bodega in New York City and need to speak with 'the manager', you may find her underneath the fridge or nestled between bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos.
Bodegas, or small grocery shops, being managed by the cats that live in them is part of a 'big running joke among a lot of New Yorkers', said Drew Rosenthal, creative producer of Shop Cats, a web show that recently found a large audience on TikTok for its feel-good feline coverage.
When Rosenthal, 35, moved to Brooklyn eight years ago, he was surprised by the ubiquity of semi-feral cats patrolling the city's bodegas and delis. Even more so by the scarcity of online bodega cat registries documenting their addresses and personal updates, given their beloved role in the city's ecosystem.
Last summer, working for Mad Realities – a media company with ambitions of becoming 'the MTV of the internet', according to its chief executive and founder Alice Ma – Rosenthal addressed this gap in the kitty catalogue by pitching a bodega cat talk show he characterised as 'Cribs meets Steve Irwin'. It was greenlit almost immediately.
The pilot of Shop Cats featured Rosenthal's local bodega cat in Crown Heights, a cuddly but capricious grey and white tabby named Kiki, who sleeps behind a display of corn chips.
In the 1½-minute episode, Michelladonna, the flamboyant host of Shop Cats, interviews the whiskered bodega manager – who introduces herself by hissing into the microphone – and the locals who take care of her.
The interview culminates in a test of Kiki's hunting skills via her ability (or desire, rather) to chase a feathered toy. The hunt was set to a zany, Looney Tunes-style soundtrack, a signature of the show.
In developing Shop Cats, Rosenthal wanted to create a 'very New York' show, which meant he needed a New Yorker to host it.
Michelladonna, nee Michelle Reiss, with her comedy background and irresistibly thick Queens accent, fit the bill. Reiss, 26, hosts the show with a familiar, early-aughts VJ energy, occasionally functioning as a cultural liaison between immigrant bodega owners and the Gen Z audiences meeting them on TikTok.
'I know how to talk their language, uncle to uncle,' she joked. The instantly chummy, New Yorker-to-New Yorker rapport Reiss establishes with bodega owners devolves into a cooing gush fest once the boss is brought up.
'Their faces change when they talk about their cats,' she said. 'It's my favourite thing to experience doing this show.'
Shop patrons are similarly quick to fawn over their local working kitten. Simcoe, a courteous, long-whiskered tuxedo cat who runs a brewery in East Williamsburg, has inspired T-shirts and tattoos.
'Simcoe is the best,' Yoko, a brewery regular who wears homemade earrings featuring Simcoe's face, says in the episode.
Reiss, too, tends to style herself in feline fashions, often sporting a long ponytail that shimmies behind her like a sassy cat tail. 'You've got to lean into that kitty fever,' she said. She also has a penchant for winged cat-eye liner.
Michelle Reiss, known online as Michelladonna, conducts 'interviews' with the feline occupants of New York's delis and bodegas in the Show Cats series.
PHOTO: JUTHARAT PINYODOONYACHET/NYTIMES
Since the debut of Shop Cats in September 2024, the show has garnered more than 740,000 followers on TikTok. It also took home the prestigious Webby Award for social media in May. The award is the leading international awards for excellence on the internet.
Unlike many places on the internet, the show's comment sections are consistently and overwhelmingly positive – an anomaly given TikTok's hot-and-cold user base – with several commenters claiming that Shop Cats is their 'preferred type of journalism'.
Ashley the bodega cat at Rodriguez Grocery & Deli in New York on June 2.
PHOTO: JUTHARAT PINYODOONYACHET/NYTIMES
One comment claimed that the show's use of Spanish subtitles had the potential to 'heal America'. The comment has more than 28,000 likes.
The decision to add Spanish subtitles came about when Reiss sent an unpublished episode to her mother, who lamented being unable to share Shop Cats with her Spanish-speaking friends.
After getting Mad Realities' approval, Reiss translated and transcribed the first few episodes herself. It felt compatible with the show's format, given that it is de facto multilingual, with Reiss usually approaching bodega owners in Spanish.
Many of the shop owners like to claim a cultural affinity with their cats. The adoptive caregivers of Rambo, a scrappy brown tomcat from the Bronx, for example, like to claim that he is Yemeni on his father's side and Dominican on his mother's side.
Charlie, the 15-year-old striped 'employee of the month' at Flowers by Giorgie in Queens, was lauded by his owner for being 'the best Ecuadorian cat in New York'.
And on a recent sunny afternoon in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, the Shop Cats team had the pleasure of meeting Jamal – a puckish tabby whose name means 'beauty' in Arabic.
Jamal was the team's fourth attempted interview of the day – some of the cats are unwilling to participate, which can create challenges for the three-person crew. However, Mr Ali Mohammed, Jamal's owner, was tickled by the concept of his cat being interviewed, as were his store's patrons and staff.
At one point in the shoot, eight people – including two store employees, four giggly children under the age of nine, their father and a food supplier who had stopped by for a routine snack delivery, but stayed for the show – were recording Reiss as she interviewed Jamal and Mr Mohammed.
'They either want us out of their store immediately or they're so excited, they're FaceTiming their families back home,' Reiss said.
It should be noted that throughout the entire interaction, including while he was being interviewed on camera, Mr Mohammed was on a video call with his daughter, a veterinarian in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
As filming was about to wrap, Mr Mohammed's nephew walked into the store and made a beeline for Jamal. 'This is my girlfriend,' he deadpanned. NYTIMES
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In developing Shop Cats, Rosenthal wanted to create a 'very New York' show, which meant he needed a New Yorker to host it. Michelladonna, nee Michelle Reiss, with her comedy background and irresistibly thick Queens accent, fit the bill. Reiss, 26, hosts the show with a familiar, early-aughts VJ energy, occasionally functioning as a cultural liaison between immigrant bodega owners and the Gen Z audiences meeting them on TikTok. 'I know how to talk their language, uncle to uncle,' she joked. The instantly chummy, New Yorker-to-New Yorker rapport Reiss establishes with bodega owners devolves into a cooing gush fest once the boss is brought up. 'Their faces change when they talk about their cats,' she said. 'It's my favourite thing to experience doing this show.' Shop patrons are similarly quick to fawn over their local working kitten. Simcoe, a courteous, long-whiskered tuxedo cat who runs a brewery in East Williamsburg, has inspired T-shirts and tattoos. 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