Cruella de Vil is a fictitious character in the 1956 novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians by British author Dodie Smith. A pampered and glamorous London heiress and fashion designer.
She appears in Walt Disney Productions’ 17th animated feature film, 101 Dalmatians (1961), voiced by Betty Lou Gerson; in Disney’s 101 Dalmatians II: Patch’s London Adventure (2002), voiced by Susanne Blakeslee; in Disney’s live-action 101 Dalmatians (1996) and 102 Dalmatians (2000), portrayed by Glenn Close; as well as Cruella (2021), portrayed by Emma Stone; and in many other Disney sequels and spin-offs.
What does Cruella de Vil mean in French?
Cruella de Vil’s name is a play on the words cruel and devil, and her English country castle is nicknamed ‘Hell Hall’ to highlight the allusion.
The name ‘de Vil’ is also a literary allusion to Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), in which the realty firm Mitchell, Sons & Candy writes a letter to Lord Godalming, alerting him that the purchaser of a mansion in Piccadilly, London is “a foreign nobleman, Count De Ville”.
Count De Ville, on the other hand, turns out to be a pseudonym for Count Dracula himself.
It is also thought that the name was inspired in 1939 when Dodie Smith purchased a new Rolls-Royce 25/30 “Sedanca de Ville” motorcar in which she and her pet Dalmatian “Pongo” frequently traveled, which also created the basis of the name which also formed the basis of the cartoon imagery of Cruella’s own motorcar.
