Catbird seat
"The catbird seat" is an idiomatic phrase used to describe an enviable position, such as having the upper hand or greater advantage in any type of dealing among parties. It derives from the secluded perch on which the gray catbird makes mocking calls.
Use in popular entertainment
- 1948: Season 1, Episode 5 of the Actors Studio was titled "The Catbird Seat"
- 1958: P. G. Wodehouse's 1958 novel Cocktail Time used the phrase: "I get you. If we swing it, we'll be sitting pretty, ‘in the catbird seat’."
- 1978: The original television series Dallas featured J.R. Ewing using this phrase quite often.
- 1987: Raising Arizona included John Goodman saying "you and I'll be sittin' in the fabled catbird seat."
- 1988: William L. Marbury Jr. called his memoirs In the Catbird Seat
- 1997: In the Simpsons episode Homer vs. the Eighteenth Amendment the narrator says "With rum-running hoodlums in the catbird seat..."
- 2003: On the 14th episode of the sixth season of Survivor: The Amazon, host Jeff Probst asks "How does it feel to be in the catbird seat?" to immunity winner, Jenna Morasca.
- 2006: Series 3, Episode 11 of the HBO western drama, Deadwood was titled "The Catbird Seat."
- 2009: Steve Forbert digitally released an album, Loose Change, that included a song he wrote called "The Catbird Seat"
- 2010: Darlingside released EP 1, which features a song called "The Catbird Seat."
- 2010: On season 2 of the Starz TV series Party Down, the fictional writer A.F. Gordon Theodore is seen sitting between two beautiful women when he says, “I am in the seat named for the proverbial catbird.”
- 2014: In the TV series Manhattan, the phrase was used in multiple episodes as an American idiom
- 2018: In the TV series Barry Season 1 Episode 4, Fuches uses the phrase "So, now we are in the catbird seat."
- 2018–present: Shannon Sharpe uses this phrase on Skip and Shannon: Undisputed while debating with Skip Bayless, Sharpe uses the phrase often to explain who has the upper hand in the sport example "Patrick Mahomeboy is in the catbird seat for MVP".
- 2019-Present: Used in the "Warlords of New York" expansion for the video game, Tom Clancy's Division 2. Used by an ally of the main character about a rogue enemy agent.
- 2021: In the HBO TV series Succession Season 3 Episode 7, the phrase is used by Shiv Roy to describe Roman and Logan Roy’s close relationship while holding an advantaged strategic position in a contract negotiation.
- 2022: In the online short form show Corrections by Seth Meyers, Meyers used the phrase "pretty catbird seat to me" to describe the timing of his soup delivery to late night host Jimmy Kimmel, who had just fallen ill with COVID-19 a second time.