Director Tom Hooper hadn’t fully finished Cats when it was time to duplicate prints, so he completed the job a few days later. And now Universal is sending out DCPs and satellite feeds of the corrected version (i.e., one in which Judi Dench has cat paws instead of human hands) to theatres.

“An unheard-of move for a finished film already in release,” THR‘s Pamela McClintock derisively snorted. But if you were in Hooper’s shoes wouldn’t you do the same?

I stayed awake throughout last week’s all-media screening of Cats, and I didn’t notice Dench’s naked hand, much less her wedding ring. Or maybe I noticed it and shrugged it off. (HE in 12th row at Chinese plex: “Dench has a human hand…aahh, whatevs.”)

Many films haven’t really been finished (at least in the minds of their directors) until after their commercial opening. Steven Spielberg‘s Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Oliver Stone‘s Alexander, etc.