how did anita and cruella become friends?

[akhenaten]

i always wondered how and why..tell me urs. and suggest ur other theories

[Jules]

I voted or the science lab partner thingy. Just imagine Anita under the false impression that Cruella was preparing carbohydrate solutions of 0.5 molarity in her test-tubes, when in fact she was having a (dog) egg fertilised by a number of sperms collected from the village mixed breed mutt. Test-tube puppies!

[JiminyCrick91]

I too have always wondered... Hmmmmm... Is Dave Smith about?

[Lazario]

Actually... I don't think they were ever friends, merely acquaintances. I think Cruella never had any friends so she had to make some kind of nice with Anita. I'll bet Anita may have come from a family with some money but some kind of circumstance made the family poor or something and Cruella never noticed. Because, she had no friends. She had to pester somebody. Cruella lives the rich life and has to hob-knob in social settings. Then gets out and has no idea what to do, so she goes psycho. Which would account for her dreadful manners and etiquette while at Anita's house. And her short temper. And her rage at innocent pens.

Roger only says "your dearly-devoted old schoolmate." "Dearly-devoted" can mean a lot of things. It could be a sarcasm for Cruella being a bad student. Like she skipped out on a lot of classes but had her rich father pay off her instructors. The college deans and professors, etc. Or that she once was a goody-goody but money made her evil.


Personally, I don't know. I do however adore the idea that maybe Anita was once a "bad girl." That's hilarious. Can you picture that, even for a second?

[Prudence]

My thought was always "university roommates."

Great question, by the way!

[Flanger-Hanger]

My theory is that Cruella had no friends because she was just so revolting nobody wanted her. I assume she just picked Anita one day and proclaimed she was her friend even if it wasn't so, and Anita just put up with it.

Also there was no 60s revolution in the 1950s.

[SpringHeelJack]

I got the impression they knew each other in like... some sort of finishing / boarding school back when Cruella was only mildly unlikable and more eccentric. The after that, she just became all-out nuts.

Plus, there's something bizarrely enticing about Cruella... she's kind of charismatic despite her outbursts. I imagine she was pretty socially popular. It's not too hard to imagine her being the obnoxious rich girl who sort of made Anita hang out with her clique because Anita was attractive.

[gdSTUDent]

Well weren’t they supposed to be friends from school? They probably had just kept in contact over the years. I still talk to people from high school that I don’t really consider friends anymore but I do it out of kindness. I’m not going to ignore them.

[Super Aurora]

They were druggies and hippies together.

[UrsushH.Bear]

Laz is right. Just because they knew each other, never made them friends. Anita takes the supporting peer role with this schoolmate, because she knows people cant be that bad, and she's to sweet to think otherwise. . .until.

[Dudealadude]

Does Anita work for Cruella DeVille? That's what I've always assumed, and that's how they knew each other. I was unaware they knew each other in school...

[UrsushH.Bear]

It all depends on which version. In the animated version- Cruella is referred to as an old schoolmate; in the live action, Cruella is Anita's old boss (Anita quits to have get married). The live action seems to adjust the relationship to provide a greater motive for Cruella. In fact, everything within the live action movie seems to flesh out Cruella's character-she is the star.

[slave2moonlight]

The second choice always seemed like the dead obvious answer to me. Cruella manipulated (if not so much bullied) Anita into being her friend. Hung around her whether she was wanted or not. At least, I always got that impression, and I've had "friends" like that myself (when I was growing up).

[Siren]

Cruella was likely a snob in school. But from her overall looks and attitude, not likely the most popular girl in school.

Anita doesn't seem the type to me to be easily manipulated. Anita seems like she's a bit smarter than that. I think she was more so not wanting to be rude or impolite. Also remember, Cruella knew Anita got married, she knew what Roger did for work, she knew where they lived. Roger obviously met her before too. And they both allowed her in their home. Just maybe, Cruella and Anita WERE friends. Obviously Anita was open to tell Cruella all these things, including an idea of how much money they had. Anita even said she'd like a nice fur coat, so obviously, they had some things in common.

They weren't like best friends. But I feel they were friends at some time. Even feel like Cruella was invited to the wedding. As they both grew up though, they went seperate directions. Cruella was rich and vain. Anita was happily in love. They remained on friendly terms till the day Cruella pushed too hard about buying the puppies.

[JaceDisney91]

Well, those are all very plausible options but I'll go with the last one for now. The "sixties revolution" answer I can see that happening but "101 Dalmatians" was released in 1961 so that would have been way too early for that concept to be really true.