Holy cat-tastrophe, Batman! As we loyal Bat-fans synchronize our Bat-watches in anticipation of the forthcoming “Batman Begins,” the only element that can damper our enthusiasm regarding that new Bat-tacular is the knowledge that Eartha Kitt won’t be playing the Catwoman. Yet fear not, Boy Wonders, the greatest of all catwomen is ensconced at the Cafe Carlyle for the entire month of June. Pow! Bam! Zonk!

Although the Caped Crusader’s most famous foe has also been embodied by such hubba-hubba honeys as Julie Newmar, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Halle Berry, Eartha Kitt was born to play the role, from the coincidence (or is it?) of her name to her feline stance and her singing style, often likened to a purr. At the Carlyle Ms. Kitt, she of the cutting consonants, rolled Rs, and beautiful kabuki face, entered snarling “I’m Still Here.” It’s a song that can seem merely anthem-like or self-congratulatory, but Ms. Kitt – using slight lyric alterations and sheer force of personality – makes it seem like Stephen Sondheim wrote it based exclusively on her life story.

Over the course of 75 minutes, Ms. Kitt sings everything expected of her (such as her major chart hit, “C’est Ci Bon”) and a whole lot more. She plays the role of husband-hunting gold-digger to the absolute hilt in songs like “Speaking of Love” and “Just an Old-Fashioned Girl.” In other songs, she embodies defiance. Where other divas sing torch songs, her arias of love and loss have a message of “screw you.” Most notably, she sings “I Will Survive,” the disco hit, as if it were an actual song. She carries the torch for nobody. In several cases, like “If You Go Away,” she switches between kitten and tiger within the same song.

There’s a side of Ms. Kitt that’s just plain silly and another that’s oh-so-sophisticated, particularly when she sings international music: Her interpretations of Jacques Brel and Edith Piaf are starkly dramatic. Much of the time, Ms. Kitt shows an abject refusal to take herself seriously – interacting hysterically with whatever hapless male happens to be sitting at the front tables in a manner that’s half lap dancer and half Don Rickles. (“I have so much fun with myself it’s ridiculous!” she tells us.) But when she gets serious, she’s spellbindingly moving.

At times the two modes converge, as when she offers “Come On-a My House” in phonetic Japanese. She does Alan Jay Lerner’s “How Could You Believe Me” in vaudeville cut-time and Ervin Drake’s “It Was a Very Good Year” over a Cuban montuno in a way that’s happy and sad, all at once. Too bad she doesn’t do any of her Yiddish favorites – that would be a real Bat Mitzvah.

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“This Love of Mine” (Highnote HCD 7140), the new album by Freddy Cole, reminds me of the old joke about the two hunters being chased by a hungry bear. To cut to the punchline, one hunter says to the other, “I don’t have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun you!” Likewise, as I put on Mr. Cole’s new album, I said to myself, “It doesn’t have to be his best record ever – just let it be better than his last album!”

That last album, “In the Name of Love,” was an unmitigated disaster, an attempt to market the venerable pianist-singer to smooth jazz channels. The very idea should have gotten somebody fired. Next they’ll be trying to make a rapper out of Shirley Horn.

Happily, “This Love of Mine” is one of Mr. Cole’s very best albums, and it whets the appetite perfectly for his performances at Le Jazz Au Bar, where he will be performing until June 12. Now reunited with Todd Barkan, the producer of his great string of CDs from the 1990s, Mr. Cole has come up with 10 exceptional songs and he sings them gloriously straight-ahead and swinging. The mood, appropriately, is halfway between his late brother Nat’s “After Midnight” and Sinatra’s “Wee Small Hours.” Mr. Cole includes the song “This Love of Mine,” the chairman’s own co-composition, and, as is his custom, he throws in one item from the book of his older brother, “The Continental.” He even makes a set of dance instructions sound warm and intimate.

The payoff track is Rube Bloom and Ted Koehler’s 1934 “Out in the Cold Again” – which, even though it has been done by several major R&B singers, hasn’t been heard nearly enough in jazz circles. Starting with the verse, which I’ve never heard before, Mr. Cole’s vocal is slow and deliberate, like a monologue addressed both to his object of desire and to himself. He has an air of resignation – bleak but with a sense of self-deprecating humor.

“Waiter, Ask the Man To Play the Blues” (GRP 000268902), one of Mr. Cole’s first albums, has been a rara avis for more than 40 years, but the new reissue by Universal Music shows that it was well worth looking for. Although the subtitle “Freddy Cole Sings and Plays Some Lonely Ballads” might lead one to expect saloon songs like “Angel Eyes,” the menu is primarily real, down-and-dirty, 12-bar blues from such roots composers as Big Bill Broonzy, Leroy Carr, and Memphis Slim, enhanced by the wailing R &B tenor star Sam “The Man” Taylor. Mr. Cole sings two of the great blues ballads, “Black Coffee” and Cecil Gant’s “I Wonder,” in a voice simultaneously smooth and rough, equal parts brother Nat King Cole, Ray Charles, and Charles Brown. The eloquent title song quite literally transplants the traditional blues into a sophisticated saloon setting.

Eartha Kitt until July 2 (35 E. 76th Street, between Madison and Park Avenues, 212-570-7189).

Freddy Cole until June 12 (41 E. 58th Street, between Park and Madison Avenues, 212-308-9455).