Warner Bros. to release new “Tom and Jerry” next December

“Tom and Jerry” is coming to the big screen sooner than scheduled.

Warner Bros. has moved its live-action hybrid comedy “Tom and Jerry” forward by four months to Dec. 23, 2020, The Hollywood Reporter, reports.

The cat and mouse film directed by Tim Story was initially slated for release on April 16, 2021. The studio said Friday that it will fill that slot with a yet-to-be-titled “event” film.

“Tom and Jerry” stars Chloe Grace Moretz, Michael Pena, Ken Jeong, Jordan Bolger and Pallavi Sharda. The story centers on Tom the cat and Jerry the mouse getting kicked out of their home and relocating to a fancy New York hotel where Moretz’s character is an employee who will lose her job if she can’t evict Jerry.

Tom and Jerry began life as a series of long-running shorts created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera in 1940. They centered on the exploits of house cat Tom and his never-ending battle with mouse Jerry.

Seven of the shorts, released by MGM, won Oscars from 1943 to 1953. The animated pair have remained in the pop culture consciousness over the years, first getting their own full-length theatrical film with 1993’s Tom and Jerry: The Movie.