[2] An invention of the Leo Burnett advertising company where Martwick worked, Morris was featured in 58 television commercials which aired from 1969 to 1978.

[6][7] The current Morris lives in Los Angeles with his handler, Rose Ordile.

He debuted in the Robert Altman film The Long Goodbye with Elliott Gould,[8] and appeared in the movie Shamus with Burt Reynolds and Dyan Cannon in 1973.

[2][5] He was quoted at the 1993 "end of year" edition of People magazine which noted deaths of 1993 to which he quoted a simple "Meow" in honor of the death of his friend, fellow advertising mascot, the dog Spuds MacKenzie.

When he first appeared in British television advertisements in the late 1970s, he was coincidentally voiced by Johnny Morris (then famous in the UK for his anthropomorphic character portrayals in the series Animal Magic), which led many British viewers, unaware of the character's origins, to wrongly suppose that the cat had been named after Morris himself.