Catherine Miller is a character in Disney's 2021 live-action film Cruella. She was the former maid of Baroness Von Hellman and the adoptive mother of Estella.
Appearances[]
Cruella[]
Catherine used to work for the Baron and Baroness Von Hellman as a maid at Hellman Hall. When the Baroness became pregnant, she did not take her pregnancy with joy and decided to be rid of the baby. When the Baroness gave birth to Estella Von Hellman, she ordered her loyal valet and butler, John, to kill her daughter in secret while the Baroness made up a cover story about having a stillborn. However unbeknownst to her, John was unable to bring himself to murder the newborn baby and so gave Estella to Catherine who decided to raise Estella in secret as her adoptive daughter.
While growing up, Estella was considered an outcast due to being born with half-black and half-white hair and while she showed a gift for fashion at a young age, Catherine tried to get Estella to not work with a free-hand and work with a pattern instead. Estella would at times show mischievous side to her personality, which Catherine had nicknamed 'Cruella'. Catherine enrolled Estella in primary school where she urged her daughter to be Estella instead of Cruella, while Estella made one friend Anita Darling, she refused to fit into or be bullied by the other kids, who treated her as an outcast due to her half-black and half-white hair. At one point, the other students turned on Estella and threw her into a dumpster, where she met a stray dog she named Buddy, Estella then brings Buddy home with her where she and Catherine make him a member of the small family. in spite of Catherine's best attempts, Estella would go on to be a rule-breaking problem child, resulting in a school record with many blemishes to the point where the headmaster wanted to expel Estella. To keep her daughters record clean, Catherine had no choice but to withdraw Estella from school before she could be expelled.
After this Catherine decided to drive the small family to London in order to start a new life. Catherine then gave Estella a valuable necklace that once belonged to the Baroness. After arriving at Hellman Hall, Catherine parked the car outside one the the large gala's of her former boss, the Baroness. Catherine then covered Estella's hair and told her to stay inside the car while she left to find the Baroness. While at the gala, Catherine tried to ask her former boss, the Baroness, for money so that she and Estella could start a new life but during a commotion that Buddy and Cruella accidentally create, the Baroness uses her special whistle to command her three dalmatians to kill Catherine by chasing Buddy and Estella out of the gala and then chasing Catherine to a cliff before knocking her off, causing her to fall to her death.
Blaming herself for Catherine's death, Estella ran away to the Regents Park Fountain but lost the necklace Catherine gave her, which the Baroness found and reclaimed. Years later Estella discovers the truth surrounding Catherine's death and goes to Regents Park, where she made peace with her late adoptive mother and vowed to avenge her death by ruining the Baroness reputation. However, she is shocked when she discovers that Catherine was never her biological mother, and instead raised her due to the Baroness (Estella's true biological mother) wanting the child dead. Angry and upset with the revelation, Estella returns to Regents Park to lash out at Catherine for keeping this a secret, and deduces that the reason why Catherine wanted her to conceal her true nature was because she was afraid Estella would become like the Baroness. Having finally let her feelings out, Estella, now having made peace with the truth, embraces her new self as Cruella and carries on with her plans of revenge, finally avenging Catherine after she succeeds.
Trivia[]
- She is a brand-new character and has no animated counterpart.
