• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, 5 hours ago

The new Ricky Gervais cartoon cat show coming to Netflix is profane, pungent and unapologetically scatological.

But it is also uproarious. The show, “Alley Cats,” plays like an extended Gervais stand-up monologue on one subject: Cats.

Gervais, 65, is reportedly a long-time cat fancier. In recent interviews, he has said that his new show -- about a gang of homeless cats in an unidentified city -- was inspired by his observations about cat behavior.

In much of Episode One, which the TV Blog previewed on Thursday, the cats are seen as sedentary creatures content to do next to nothing.

As a result, much of the episode is taken up by conversations between the cats. In the hands of anyone else, such an approach might have turned out to be dull. 

But not here, due mainly to the show’s voice characterizations, starting with Gervais in the lead role of the gang’s leader, Gus (above photo).

Gervais is one of those stand-up comedians who succeeds, at least in part, on the tone of his voice. He has always been funny to listen to, whether or not the material is.

In “Alley Cats,” the material is spot-on, as the Brits say. Gervais wrote it and directed it, and it shows. 

Despite the fact that these cats possess the gift of speech, they never lose various cat-like traits, only here, they get to talk about them among themselves.

These characteristics include mischievous behavior done for no apparent reason such as, in one scene, deliberately jumping up on an outdoor windowsill and sending a flowerpot crashing to the ground.

Naturally, the cats discuss food and how to get it, but they go about it as lazily as possible. As Episode One opens, they are sitting on a beat up, discarded couch watching TV (also discarded) in the same manner as human couch potatoes. 

With little else to do, they argue. In this case, their conversation has to do with the shark documentary they happen to be watching, leading to a discussion aimed at determining what animal is the scariest on Earth.

Among the gang members is one who is not homeless, but lives in a lovely home with humans who provide his every need.

Compared to the alley-dwelling cats, he is an effete snob, who they constantly deride, even as he seems welcome in the group.

In Episode One of “Alley Cats,” the only plot line involves a stray house kitten who has wandered away from home and is now lost.

For all the bluster and veneer of toughness that Gus and the other streetwise members of the gang present to the world, their acceptance and care of this kitten reveals a softer side to them.

Perhaps this conforms also to what Gervais has observed about cats.

“Alley Cats” starts streaming on Friday, August 7 on Netflix.