Are You Experienced?

The next generation of theme park attraction has arrived, in more forms than one, and the playing field is broadening every single day.

Islands of Adventure's Wizarding World of Harry Potter - and particularly Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey - will be experiential to a level we have never seen. This isn't your stock interactive entertainment, built for giddy Generation Y playstation pumping teens. This is the next step of the master art form.

Down the road, Mickey tries not to get crushed. The new Fantasyland stands a valid chance of affirming its bragging rights in the new world of themed entertainment. These aren't just attractions - though with Ariel's Adventure (possibly renamed from DCA's version, "Ariel's Undersea Adventure") we will certainly have our fill of classic Disney experience with cutting edge technology, partnered with all the emotional gusto that came whirring out of those busy little trailers in Glendale twenty years ago.



The most interesting part about this concept painting, though, is how it separates the areas of Fantasyland into actual thematic pieces - a sort of master form of this concept that we've never seen before, expanding even further on the Disneyland idea and ranging closer and closer to the original Fantasyland concept:



Particularly the storybook village concept will be rooted in classic Disney - not just in the sense of the casting, but in the sense of the true experience of a place.

The next generation is supposed to be about bringing the fantastic worlds of our favorite characters to life in new, vibrant and relevant ways.

When the clock strikes midnight, we can only wait, watch and see who turns into the pumpkin. Time will tell.

The Double Edged Sword

THE VAULT

More than anything, Disneyland is simply a unique mode of experiential design.

Walt Disney was the chief purveyor of a concept still around today, known as Edutainment. Walt wanted to educate audiences without them knowing he was doing it: Disneyland was his story-based answer to many of the challenges he faced as his brands grew out of his own control and became internationally recognized social symbols (Mickey Mouse), popular media-related characters (Zorro, Peter Pan), and even his television writers' creations of concepts that were taking audiences places they may never go in reality (Tomorrowland).

With all these brands burgeoning out of Walt's control and into the control of society and his audiences, as well as media critics, he needed to create a place where all these ideas could "live", and where he could have chief control over how they were being used.

With Disneyland, Walt aimed to create a place where all these brands, concepts and names could live. No matter that sweetly innocent story about Daddy's Days at the Griffith Park Carrousel. It is undeniable that Walt loved his family, and that these events did occur - but just like everything else in the Disney Tradition, many times the realities make far less enticing stories than the myths the storytellers who experienced the realities created in their place.

Disneyland would be a place to hold the brands - and for Walt to control their usage in any way he saw fit. As much as it was a place for him and his Imagineers to dream and do, it was also a place to keep safe his decades of trying, difficult work in bringing first the medium of animation, then the medium of television, to startling life.

If Disneyland is a unique experiment in experiential design, its because Walt wanted a double-edged sword: not only would the park serve as his personal vault, a place to protect his creations in forms he alone could determine (largely because while film and television spawned many jealous copycats and thieves, if not simply interested parties for these brands, the idea of creating a place was brand new and prohibitively expensive - unless you were Walt Disney).


THE GUESTS

The other edge of the sword was that this place could be open to the people Walt loved the most: his audience. Not only could it be his protective place, it was a way to remove his brands, ideas and stories from the reach of the Mintz's of the world, yet still make them available to his audience -- and the last thing he wanted to do was make those people bored.

And so Disneyland, which could have easily become a San Simeon under less creative, innovative direction, became a dramatic departure from anything that had been done before in America. Walt's greatest challenge was movement - both in the physical sense of moving people through an experience and in the sense of the story. If we were going to place all these ideas in one space, a space they would have to share the way a family shares a house, it meant there had to be some kind of story structure - a system, a way for the guests to experience the story on the same level that Wonderful World of Color provided pieces of Edutainment.

Walt wanted his guests to experience the story, without them knowing they were experiencing it. John Hench said it best in his landmark article "Disneyland is Good for You", and the reason is because it places you in a three dimensional story environment and refuses time and again to beat you over the head with its own ideals.



Much is the problem with other destination-based entertainments. Six Flags is the most nefarious example. When you visit a six flags park, you are reminded time and again, often in very crass and avoidable marketing cliches, that you are IN a six flags park.

Walt trusted the guests. The early Imagineers all trusted the guests. They knew they were at Disneyland. They expected experiences here unlike anything they could find elsewhere in the world. It was another double-edged sword, though, because the Disney name was gold. Anything that said "Disney" came with the assumption that it would excel to the level of excellent entertainment (a statute Walt himself set in Animation, Television and Feature Films).

The Imagineers knew that giving guests an experience was their top priority. That experience needed (and needs today) to fit within the story being told. When it doesn't, in the same way as when it does, guests cannot put their finger on the issue, but they know deep down that something is wrong.

In the same way Disneyland can be good for you, it can also be bad for you if the story environment, the progression of experiences, the way each show fits into the next show and how they all relate to the space surrounding them - if these things are not considered (regardless of the reason being marketing, revenue, ego or "business need") the show is affected, the guest experience is affected, and ultimately down the line the revenue is affected.




THE ART OF CHARACTER

In the much maligned argument about adding too much "character" to the Disney experience, we must remember a few crucial cornerstones:

1. Disneyland of 1955 was heavily influenced and often based on entertainment properties.

Indeed, Zorro served as a mascot of Frontierland because Walt wanted the cross-population (note: not necessarily cross-promotion or syngery) of the guest experience. It was one thing to take the guests to the "Old West", but Walt had seen experiences in museums and recreations like this across the country, and even as far away as Europe and had come up with the same feeling as many others - there was nothing in that experience to relate to beyond the history. Walt was an educator, but above all he was a true showman, and an entertainer. By adding "character" to his park, he gave the guests a crucial stepping stone that allowed them to relate to the experiences based on properties, ideas and characters that they already recognized.



2. John Hench himself championed the art of character - after all, if Disneyland is a story place, one of the reasons we create stories is so that our characters have a place to live. Disneyland takes this concept and makes it immediate and real: This is, quite literally, the place where these characters live. Hench, in his book (bible) Designing Disney, writes:

"The art of character at the Disney theme parks lies in maintaining the identity of the forms and colors that express the essential personality traits of these beloved characters."

3. Should everything relate to Disney Characters?

The answer is no, but the problem is that the definition of a "Disney Character" is so often misconstrued. Indiana Jones is not considered a character at Disneyland, but is defined as one because he is an integral personality that plays a part in the guest experience. There is a lot to be said for listening to the guests...but there is also a lot to be said for a designer because that person understands the play space on a conscious level far greater than your typical day guest, for whom the experience is subconscious. Much the same, a film director understands his film on a level deeper than any member of his audience.

So, if we are too narrowly defining Disney "Characters", the solution to this conundrum perhaps lies in no more than very careful, detailed decision making:

1. Pick and Choose who lives where.



Characters do not often determine story. Story determines characters. The long shot paints the close up. There is danger in contradicting elements within any story, or any story place, and the same goes for contradictory characters. Stitch should not appear simultaneously in a Tomorrowland attraction and a stage show fifty feet away, and Frozone should not be parading down Main Street. These are contradictions because Frozone's environment (re: story) and Main Street's environment are inherently different.

That is not a bad thing. In fact, thats a very valuable thing.

The story has to be designed and created before it can be populated with character. Either that, or the characters must bring us the story. If a character has a story to tell, as designers we must make a conscious effort to fit that story within an environment that will be thematically correct from long shot to close up within the context of the overall storyspace (The Park).

It makes sense for Mickey and friends to live at the Magic Kingdom or in Disneyland. It also makes sense for Mickey and friends to appear and occupy space at California Adventure - but you cannot make the cost-cutting choice of making these one and the same. Mickey's appearance at DCA must make sense with the environment in which he has been placed. He must become a part of the story.

If we think of the character appearances in the parks, be it in attractions or as walk arounds, as being a part of the story, there is no reason that these characters cannot fit into those stories. Now, there is a clever piece of manipulation going on here from the marketing executives and the guest survey teams: The guests say "We want to see Mickey". The marketing teams take this and turn it into "We want to see THE SAME Mickey everywhere, THE SAME attractions everywhere, THE SAME 'Disney'. One Disney."

This is not the case. Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald and Pluto (among others) are universally adaptable personalities. Thats the beauty in their design. Their rich forms and colors (as mentioned by Hench) can be adapted to any situation. Stronger characters are inevitably more successful than week ones, so why not make the characters and stories in each space strong and relatable and part of a cohesive whole? This is what Hench meant when he said that Disneyland was good for us. It is good for us because its a living, breathing story, provided to us as the ultimate play space.

Former Imagineer Eddie Sotto (among others) has some excellent views on using the characters to deliver the content.

2. Don't Overplay the Angle

If the parks become nothing but character-based experiences, the guests will no longer be receiving the one real promise Disney makes to them: A unique experience. The answer is, use the characters to illustrate your story points. The oversight is that Mickey will still be there. The magic of "Disney" is that the audience - the guests - are going to take whatever we give them. That sounds like a very negative connotation, and it isn't meant to be, but its simply the truth. The Disney brand is a seal of excellence all by itself. Its that way because the company has been striving to provide excellence to its audiences since 1923. Once you've made the sale, stop selling. Switch to gently reminding instead.

3. The Choice

Now, that said, it leaves the choice in the hands of the design team. Its a personal journey as much as it is a shared one, because like any art form, we are creating something from nothing. If thats the case, it means we can either give them more of the same (and it won't affect the ratings/revenue/business) or we can give them an excellent, over the top, completely unique and unforgettable experience (which likely won't affect the ratings/revenue/business).

The point is, if we do it the second way, we are accomplishing the goals. If we do it the first way, the old way, the comfortable way, we are simply plodding along not accomplishing anything. We aren't being innovative and original, because we have taken the previous idea that the audience will take whatever we give them and put a negative spin on it to the effect that we no longer have to try.

*Please note that the phrase "We" in this article is hypothetical. This blog is in no way associated with The Walt Disney Company, and all views expressed belong solely to the individuals providing them.

Its an honest mistake: the idea can be interpreted one of two ways.



Here is the first way:

"I was doing a film title that required an eagle to fly into a lighted foreground and land on a rock while folding his wings. I was provided with an eagle that was too old to do the stunt, and stumbled on the rocks. We watched the dailies in a dark sweatbox. When the lights came on, I saw that one of the Studio executives was in the booth watching with us. I said "I'll do this over again. We'll get the eagle to land right, so that it looks like a conqueror." The executive said "No! We will use it. That's okay, the bastards won't know any different." That was his attitude toward the people for whom he was supposed to furnish entertainment. He didn't like them. He didn't care."

Here is the second way:

"Liking the guests is the key to everything we do."

"We have discovered that even our restrooms can fit into the themed environment....Just as guests taught us about good queue design, they also taught us about the elements needed for preshows."

If the guests are truly the ones who taught the art of the show to the original Imagineers, we owe it to them now to listen to what they are saying. Guests want to see Mickey. This is a fact. How they see Mickey can either be a good, enjoyable experience that cannot be placed within the confines of words, or it can be generic, one-for-all entertainment. Disney, as a brand, is unique. There is no rhyme or reason to the way the stories are created. They come because they come.



This notion makes anyone accustomed to formulas, spreadsheets, algorithms and survey results uncomfortable. One experience does not equate to the next. They cannot be rated. Disneyland cannot be compared to Magic Kingdom Park because they are teling different stories.

Liking the guests truly is the key to everything we do - but the decision on what we provide them, and whether what we provide them is unique and original, is entirely up to us as designers. Whether or not the so-called results of some so-called guest surveys that amount only to numbers on a paper or in an email reflect it or not, the fact is that guests love Disney. They do not, however, define what Disney is. That is a job left to the people creating the entertainment.

I hope the following words will change your life in the same way that they have changed mine: "If you settle for less than excellence, that's exactly what you will get." - Dr. Tim Lautzenheiser.

A New Era

Two recent developments have shown Foundations of Magic that there are still people within the organization that care, and that understand the original intention, far beyond the "One Disney" problem, and the false justification that the guests want "One Disney" wherever they go in the world.

What makes Disney themed entertainment so special? See below, and lets hope these men and their understanding can carry us through a difficult time of forced adaptation.




"And here is the view down Hollywood Boulevard towards the Chinese Theatre, which we think is a great icon. I liked this view a lot more when you could actually see it. With your support, we will bring it back!" - Bob Weis, original creative director, Disney-MGM Studio Tour (Walt Disney Imagineering).



"The easy part of Epcot is that you can do almost anything — and the hard part about Epcot is that you can do almost anything. I think it has to be more and more interactive. Guests want to be involved, they want to touch it, smell it and hear it. They want to do it together." - Dan Cockerell, recently given the Vice President title for Epcot.

Foundations: Pirates of the Caribbean

If The Haunted Mansion is archetypal in its themed design, and it set the standard for the themed show, then Pirates of the Caribbean was that in a more common, understandable form.

We enter what looks from the outside like a wax museum- an unassuming structure on the outside, set in the center of the road from Adventureland to New Orleans Square, and boldly announcing that guests are about to enter a new story environment, far different from the last one they encountered. Since the last element of Adventureland is the treehouse, there is a psychological connection made with a point of lookout, in this case over the Rivers of America. There are certain things in America that are associated with water- namely, boats, ships and all manner of mariners and seafarers, including pirates.

This house is situated in a way that not only overlooks the river, but it also could have been a manor house or governor's mansion in its previous life.

The building resembles a museum because that was exactly what it was intended to be. On one end of New Orleans Square, we have a Haunted Mansion, a giant, gothic structure pristine on the outside, but certainly amiss on the interior. Here, we have a building that boldly announces its intentions, but relates thematically to the Mansion because both present false fronts: Inside Pirates’ façade, we will find not a wax museum nor a provincial manor house, but the embarkation point of a live bayou.



Inside the Mansion, we will find not a charming gothic dinner party, but a haunted house filled with references that never pay off- so the theme of the false front is very important to New Orleans Square, a feature that was more or less irrellevant after Walt Disney learned what he did at the World’s Fair of 1964 and 1965.

Inside, we find ourselves immediately in belief of our surroundings. We are deep in a bayou, though we have just come from a quaint New Orleans riverfront sidewalk, and we are also stepping constantly back in time. The riverboats that take us into the bayou are old-fashioned enough, but unassuming. They lead us past fireflies and a shack where a banjo player picks “Deliverance” on his strings. We wind into what appears to be a back-street (Claude Coat’s concept of anonymous background really shines in the final scene before the first waterfall), and here we are presented with yet another shining contradiction.

A decorative skull, hung above a pitch-black archway, begins to speak directly to us. Until this point, the environment we have encountered within the show building has been seamless- now, there is something amiss. The skull serves much the same purpose as the narration in The Haunted Mansion, and combines the narration with the use of the fading portrait; however, where the Mansion sets up our journey through audio only, Pirates uses visual elements and audio to explain, in a thesis statement moment, what is about to occur.

Because of the lighting in this scene, the skull is a focal point that fades away into either blackness or the anonymity of brick surroundings, and we are focused intently on the piece and what it is telling us. These subtle methods of directing our attention have not been adhered to in later attractions there is an impression that the public cannot pay attention to anything that does not demand it. What must be given its due credit is that the skull IS demanding our attention: we simply are not aware that it is doing so, because we are being tricked by the lighting. If we only could pay attention to demanding sets and themes, guests today would not believe they are in the bayou after stepping THROUGH what was essentially an Eisensteinian cut- from a New Orleans sidewalk directly into the Bayou.



Montage has been prevalent in entertainment for so long that it has literally become our second nature, and we no longer notice it. That does not mean we are not paying attention to it, or affected by it being there- we simply accept it as normal and move on.

Down the waterfall we go, and we find ourselves in what amounts to the overture of the attraction. The montage effect shines in the caverns because we are being shown the aftermath of what we are about to experience. Here are the mounds of treasure and the skeletons of the pirates- the aftermath, indeed, of the sacking of the town, so that now we are effectively traveling backwards in time.



Davy Jones is a character invented entirely for cinematic purposes, but actually fits quite well into the structure of the attraction. He is timeless, because he is undead, and has survived an unspecified number of years waiting for his bride to return to him.



He appears in the caverns to tell us that, in fact, Dead Men DO tell tales, which is both in contradiction with what we have just seen in the caverns (the skeletons, NOT telling tales, but being dead) and in tune with what we are seeing because if we are moving backwards through time, then someone must be telling us that tale. That’s what stories do, isn’t it? The thesis of the attraction is that we are seeking “Salty Old Pirates”- the alive or dead piece of the puzzle going unspecified.



Now, we find ourselves in a terrible hurricane. Perhaps the thing that laid the pirates into the treasure caves where they expired, we now see a previous scene in reverse order: perfect anti-chronological montage.



For now, we will skip over a few “scenes” and immerse ourselves directly into a pirate battle, where, apparently, Barbossa is looking for Captain Jack. Not only do we move from the thematic ending to the story, we also jump back physically to the outskirts of the town. This is not a setting we have seen before, but it is one that must exist within the context of the story to give it an anchor.

Plot and story must be kept separate. When we use the word “story” in the context of themed entertainment, we refer to three things: Montage (Eisenstein), Surprise and Suspense (Hitchcock) and visual elements strung together with a common theme (John Ford). Combining these things with a basic through-line will give us our “story” in the context of themed design.

So, in order to anchor our story, our narrative structure, we need this physical place. The Mansion provides its own, because the structure it is housed in contains nearly the entire attraction and its narrative.

Pirates could not contain anything, because the building was designed to house an attraction that was modified heavily from its original intentions. Therefore, within the environment, we must allow several locations to act as coat hangars- places we can string along our narrative. This is where the believability factor really starts to play a key role.



We have come to see pirates. To see them, we must understand that they are no longer alive, and therefore must journey backwards to find them. We must “drop down” into their world, and once we are there, we are absorbed by a typical pirate event: the ransacking of a town. The archetype that makes everyone understand what is happening is the logic of the ransacking in a totally illogical sequence of events.

At home, to get to the kitchen we must walk through the dining room. To get to the dining room, we must enter the house. To enter the house, we must walk up the driveway and through the front door. These are logical sequences of events so built into our lives that we no longer consider them for any length of time.

In a themed environment, we have the ability, much as in film, to move from seemingly unconnected places and events to other places and totally different events without ever feeling as though we have been cheated of something in between. The audience only knows what we give them, and our minds, due to the conditioning of years and years of logical sequences and events fill in the gaps. That was why Claude Coates wanted to fill The Haunted Mansion with all that black nothingness. Our minds hold the possibility of all things, as does all that blackness, and just as with scene transitions in films, we are able to instantly fill in the gaps in a sequence. Because this feels natural to us, we believe that the experiences offered in a designed environment are only presented as linear- certainly they seem that way- but they cannot be linear.

Linear events are also held down by time: we know that pirates and ghosts do not exist in the world we occupy. Because subconsciously we associate linear forms with reality, these things cannot exist within reality, and neither can linear forms. If we started our boat journey at the edge of town and moved into the fort and saw a linear progression of scenes presented as chronological moments in time, we would not only be bored but we would be unable to comprehend what was happening. Here was reality, like a documentary in filmmaking terms, but pirates do not exist in reality.

Though our minds are powerful enough to grasp that we are seeing this happening and its not real, because its in a theme park, the upshot would be us not enjoying the experience for reasons we couldn’t understand, but that our subconscious could not place together into a montage of images. This is the essence of the themed design: we occupy a space but move through it as freely as a film that uses montage.



So, if you think of five places you would expect to find pirates (When they existed), perhaps you would come to similar conclusions: A Bay outside a Spanish town, the bayou, mysterious caverns, a prison and a treasure room. Each of these locations then serves a different thematic purpose within the context of the show, but the narrative structure is similar to that of the Mansion. The main difference being that the latter begins outside, while the narrative of pirates itself begins as soon as we have boarded our vessel.

We float through a bayou, expecting and wanting to see pirates. It seems the place itself has become aware of our intentions, and offers us the chance we seek in the form of a talking skull. We plunge into a dead man’s cavern, filled with pirate treasure and skeletons of passed seafarers. We are informed by Davy Jones that Dead Men DO tell tales, which is of course what we have come to see.

Next, we find ourselves in a bay- that promise immediately fulfilled (Pirates do not exist any longer. Here are pirates!), and the scalliwags are ransacking the town, apparently in search of Captain Jack Sparrow and “the key”- our MacGuffin. The pirates grow increasingly upset and end up burning the town- a tremendous contradiction because they may have burned the key. The surprise is that like the pirates, they key is already in the jail. If they had been more noble and attempted to expunge their own from the cells, they may have found what they wanted.



Now, there is a scene in which the abbreviated Walt Disney World version (more on that momentarily) lacks entirely, but is exceedingly vital in context. The pirates move to the distillery, and engage in a heated gun battle in which we are placed directly in the center. This scene is vital because, much as the hitchhiking ghosts in the mansion, there has yet to be a payoff to the never-ending succession of the narration.



So, we come wanting to see Pirates, we see pirates, and then the pirates place us directly in the center of a battle. The fact that these pirates may or may not have escaped from the prison and the first thing they wanted was rum, while the pirates ransacking the town were so full of rum that they only wanted the key, which was subsequently in the jail with the pirates that wanted the rum- is a wonderful circular gag.

Now, using our montage, we make a jump to a possibly related event: Captain Jack in the treasure room. Now, did the key unlock the treasure room? Or was the key to a box that contained the treasure and Jack has gone off to find it with the key? Are there, in fact, two separate keys: one that Jack holds, with the treasure map, and the other with the dog in the jail*? We may never know, because all are irrelevant. What matters is that the succession has paid off: Captain Jack has gotten the treasure. There is an ironic twist here, too, in that we have already seen what happens to similar treasure rooms, and the visuals from the caverns and the final scene now connect in our minds to form a circle. Jack may have his treasure, but for the narrative to continue endlessly, he must die, in order for there to be a cavern, where dead men like him tell tales, so that the tale of his finding the treasure can be told, so that he can die, and on and on forever.

*In Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, the dog actually holds the key in its mouth to the Pirata Codex, being the code of the pirates. Its an interesting though unanswered connection that the reason the pirates may want the key is not to unlock the cell, but to open the book and prove their innocence using the law that they have come to despise due to the actions of the enemy.

And so the narrative of Pirates weaves its web. We are moved with montage through the story in reverse, first seeing the aftermath of the events we will witness later, and the ending actually is the beginning, so that the black space between the end and start of the attraction holds all the answers, much as the void of the mansion holds its answers.



It is interesting to note that between the beginning of the attraction and its end in the original Disneyland version of the show, we actually are given a physical object that does, indeed, hold the answers: a treasure map. This is also the first actual show piece in the attraction, viewed as guests are entering the indoor queue area, which is also the last piece we see.

The metaphoric value of the treasure map is two fold: The first and last image of the attraction are the same, but we see it as the last piece with new knowledge and new experience. This, in many ways, is what prepares us for the next experience within the narrative structure of the entire park: we see an object, experience a story and then see the same object again but with its meaning changed.

The second value of the treasure map is the image itself: what would a pirate story be without one?



Pirates and The Mansion hold the keys to designing such experiences. Interestingly, both play on archetypes of America, which is what Disneyland is really about, and that both employ the same basics as any carnival spookhouse: Come! See the ghosts! Come! See real pirates!

The hook that so many search for in vein is that these radical visions actually exist inside each of the attractions, and that you can actually see them. What isn’t revealed is that you are going to be put through a narrative, much like watching a film, and then you will interact with the very elements you have come to see.

The methods of motion are also vitally important. While it wouldn’t make too much sense to put the mansion on the water or pirates on an omni-mover, it makes sense that both are constant flowing motion-based feelings, and that both have the ability to direct your attention wherever they see fit.

The idea of contradiction is also apparent in both The Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean- and it is what drives our narratives in place of a traditional “plot”, as would be found in film. The contradiction in Pirates being that pirates do not exist any longer- to our child’s mind, they are much as dinosaurs. They are relics of a past long forgotten, and yet here they are, right there in front of us. Some show elements- the water being spit out by the magistrate in the first scene after we enter the town, and the fire during the ransacking- are there because without them, we might believe that we are seeing an illusion. These elements bring us back to the reality of the scene- fire and water, no matter what else is happening around them, are elements and are therefore perceived by us as real regardless of the context.

In The Haunted Mansion, the idea of ghosts strikes us much the same as pirates. A skeptic might scoff “Sure, but no one has actually seen a ghost”. True, they have not. They have not seen a dinosaur, a pirate, a ghost, a concert put on by Mickey Mouse, or the inside of a spaceship- yet all of these things, thanks to techniques brought from the cinema, are there and available for us to see. The Mansion’s “Fire & Water” is the house itself: we are all immediately familiar with it, because we understand the idea of an old house as an archetype on the cultural level. We get that the house is real, because it appears real: the set designers have designed it to appear to be a real old house, and (next door) a real Spanish-colonial styled village, or a real cavern, or a real jail of the period. What happens inside leaves room for the fantastic, because if we believe the setting, we can more easily place the events there, no matter how fantastic.

The set design is, in itself, a massive contradiction: WHY on Earth would be believe that ghosts would occupy a house simply due to its appearance or its purported age? Because stories about just such places have become ingrained in our very DNA. The contradiction in place of plot is what drives our story forward through each section of the narrative within these settings.

We come expecting to see Pirates, but pirates do not exist- so, we must travel backwards (by way of a waterborne vessel, which can only travel forwards with the current of the water) to find the pirates. We are moving forward, with the current, but backwards in the sense of time and story. We are riding inside a complete contradiction of natural laws, and yet there it is before us. The idea of elements confirms the contradiction: “But, there’s fire and water there, so it must be real!”, we shout, though the entire thing is nothing more than an illusion, just like all of entertainment.

Walt Disney liked his guests. John Hench, often called the “guru of Disney Design”, remarked, “Liking the guests is the key to everything we do.” Because of the somewhat frightening nature of the pirates show, there was another element that the designers wove into the web of story in order to soften the idea of traveling back in time to witness something as frightening as the sacking of the town.

The treasure, we are told from the very beginning of our experience, is cursed. For some reason, the pirates that have sailed these treacherous waters before us have not made it out, where we pass by. We are observers to their participation, although we are participating ourselves (floating through the middle of the battle between Barbossa’s Wicked Wench and the fort). We are told three times that the treasure is cursed, first upon our entry to the bayou (in the queue, on the sandbar), secondly by the visuals in the ghostly grottos and third (and through audio) in the transition tunnel before the waterfall.
By including all these warnings of cursed treasure, we gain an advantage: Walt and his talented designers have given us information the pirates we are about to see are not yet privy to. They are after the treasure, which (we know, but they do not) will ultimately lead to their demise. It makes us fun for the guests to watch, as the show progresses, the pirates coming increasingly closer to their watery graves- and we have already witnessed their fates. This is perhaps the element that moves the show from merely entertaining to real fun.

The Mansion offers a similar contradiction: We move through a house onboard a carriage? *



*At Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion, the narration of Paul Frees as the Ghost Host makes it apparent that the “Doom Buggies” are “Carriages”, approaching “To take us into the boundless realm of the supernatural”. At the Magic Kingdom Park in Florida, no such mention is made, and thus the contradiction must become apparent without aide from the attraction itself.

That is impossible, or at the least a very rare occurrence, and yet here it is, happening, not around us, but actually involving us in it!

In this way, the movement itself- the actual method of transportation- becomes the thing that moves us forward through the story, at once a practical solution to hourly capacity for these major-draw attractions and an indispensable story device!



The idea of the contradiction in these thesis shows is perhaps better titled an “opposite conclusion.” Where reality would make a left, Disneyland makes a right, and combines things that the logical mind would dismiss as being uncombinable. In short, Imagineers often make the “opposite conclusion” of what their logical minds would tell them to do, thus providing a unique experience through allowing the viewer to think as though in a fantasy, or, as it is commonly referred to, “through the eyes of a child.”

"Which way does one....Go?"

So, you want to be an Imagineer.

Like Alice, its a journey down the rabbit hole. It takes a long, long, long time.

Where do you start?

The only answer is, you have to teach yourself. You have to experience it every single day and look and study and listen in the actual places that are the result of the talent and hard work of the many who have come before.



And trust me, there are going to be some Chesire Cats in this forest. More than a few.

Roots of the Future

If we look back at the global concept of "the future" throughout the last century in America, we will likely find that Spaceship Earth is not the only part of EPCOT tied implicitly to the ideologies of the World's Fair.

In the 1939/1940 New York World's Fair, we find the roots for the entire concept of EPCOT center. Here, the fair had the unique attribute of being "themed", and the "theme" was strikingly similar to that of Future World: "Building the World of Tomorrow".



The icons for this momentous occasion were none other than the Trylon & Perisphere, designed by Wallace Harrison (exterior) and Henry Dreyfuss (interior show, called "Democracity"). This giant white spike and accompanying globe stood where the Unisphere has stood since the 1964/65 World's Fair, in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens, New York.

Before Spaceship Earth started taking travelers through the pre-modern futuristic concepts provided by Ray Bradbury and Buckminster Fuller, the Democracity exhibit and the striking image of the Trylon & Perisphere provided the basis for the concept of a space- be that space a city or not- that provided guests and visitors with a view of what the future would actually be like.

The Unisphere, Icon of the 1964/65 World's Fair. 

It's strange today just how transparent the history of the 1939 fair has become. The Trylon stood at a magnificent 700 feet tall, the Perisphere 200 feet, and the fair itself ended its second season with attendance levels topping 25 million people from April 1939 until October 1939, and from April 1940 until October of that year.

If you do the math, thats a total of 12 months. In contrast, today's Epcot takes in between 12 and 16 million guests a year.

In the New York World's Fairs, we see many of the concepts that would later shape EPCOT Center (the theme park) begin to develop.

The 1939 fair featured "zones" (lands, anyone?) fifteen years before Disneyland was a reflection in Walt Disney's eye. The zones featured themes of their own, all of which related back to the central idea of "Building the World of Tomorrow". In the transportation zone, guests could experience "Futurama", an attraction designed by a Hollywood set designer named Norman Bel Geddes. Guests traveled in seats suspended from the ceiling that took them through a series of miniatures depicting the cities of the future, and specifically their options for transportation.

As the show progressed, the models got larger and larger until guests found themselves in a full sized city block with automobiles whirring around them. And to think, all of this preceeded World of Motion by just over 40 years!

Now, none of this is to take away from the credibility or creative ingenuity of EPCOT's talented team of designers. They were the ones who organized these ideas into a cohesive whole- and the ones who took the concepts presented at the fair forty years earlier as essentially a very expensive science fair, and made them fun and family-friendly.

EPCOT was and is the single most innovative concept that exists in themed entertainment today, and we cannot thank Wallace Harrison, Henry Dreyfuss, Buckminster Fuller or even Ray Bradbury for that.



But we can thank them for presenting the first physical place that provided an optimistic view of the future and caused the public to take an interest in Building the World of Tomorrow.

26 years ago today, The Walt Disney Company opened the doors of EPCOT Center and changed the way we view a Disney themed show or experience forever.

While some of the changes have been positive and others have not been in the best interest of Epcot, we can thank Robert Moses, Buckminster Fuller, Ray Bradbury, Wallace Harrison, Henry Dreyfuss, Gilmore D. Clarke, Walt Disney, John Hench, Marty Sklar, Rick Rothschild, Barry Braverman, Tony Baxter, Marc Davis, Bob Zalk, Eric Goodman, Ken Neville and the many other talented and passionate people that have been building the world of tomorrow since before we could imagine the year 1982.


Happy 26th Anniversary, EPCOT.

We've Just Begun to Dream.

Enhancing Reality

In fifty five years since its inception, the idea of themed entertainment has grown to become the single biggest and most encompassing business in the world. The Walt Disney Company is the second largest in existence, second only to Lockheed Martin.

Certainly, as we are all aware, there have been missteps. There have been poor decisions and bad promotions. There have been people put in charge that have no roots in story. There have been people let go that were true geniuses of their times, their achievements forgotten and sucked into the vacuum of "Global Identity", as executives with MBAs and closed minds continue to strip our most compelling places of their individuality.

You have to like the guest. "Liking the guest is the key to everything we do." It is still true today, and its still true today that they like the guest. It's just that they got a little too specific, and now they like the guests' dollar.



In order to sort through what is a truly poor addition/removal and what was actually conceived to enhance the stories of the parks, we must remember that times change. There are still, and will always be, a company-wide enthusiasm for creating wonderful entertainment that no amount of Mendenhall styled branding can possibly destroy.

Look, for example, at the Sorcerer's Hat. The hat was added for a number of reasons, but the official publicly acknowledged reason was to honor the 100th anniversary of Walt Disney's birth. When one observes the prototype model of the modern theme park that is Disneyland, we begin to understand the hat with a bit more compassion.

Both the Sorcerer's Hat and Grauman's Chinese Theatre, which one provided the beautiful end piece to Hollywood Boulevard, share the same purpose. Hench, and subsequently Imagineering theory, calls this purpose "Enhancing Reality."

As we approach the toll plaza of the Hollywood Studios park, the architecture and color scheme begs some sort of vague familiarity in our collective consciousness. It is the gates of the Pan Pacific Auditorium in Los Angeles, which burned to the ground on May 24, 1989. Just three weeks prior, on May 1, the Disney-MGM Studios in Lake Buena Vista, Florida had opened to the public with the architecture of the famed entrance to the auditorium also providing the entrance to the park.



It is strange and bittersweet that it happened the way it did. The Pan Pacific was designed by Wurdeman & Becket- a southern California architecture firm whose other notable (and Disney-related) achievements include the towering "Theme Building" at LAX. Because our experience at the Studios park is based on a Hollywood that "Never was...and always will be", immediately the architecture of the Pan Pacific entrance sets up our experience: we are no longer in a world that exists, but one that can now only exist in our memories, and one that (for the most part) never existed at all.

Hollywood as we collectively "remember" it, and as it is portrayed at the Studios, never actually existed. It is the result of clever advertising campaigns and fantasy worlds created by Hollywood set designers and filmmakers- and Disney Imagineers.

As we enter the park, we encounter a highly stylized version of Hollywood Boulevard that never actually existed, either. Here, we find a classic portrayal of many famous Los Angeles landmarks, all condensed onto one street.



Now, imagine entering the park in May 1989, and at the far end of Hollywood Boulevard towers a glimmering replica of Grauman's famous Chinese Theatre. As designers, we may ask ourselves many questions to start:

Q: What end-of-this-experience icon would we expect to see at the end of an idealized Hollywood Boulevard?
A: A "movie palace" .

Q: What movie palaces have a famous enough architectural statement to communicate immediately with all of our guests?
A: The Chinese Theatre.

Now, we must address an issue that postdates the Magic Kingdoms in favor of EPCOT- the thesis attraction.

Q: What central experience can we provide that will allow our guests an overview of the ideas found in the rest of the park/story?
A: Movies!

This is where Hench's enhanced reality starts to come into play.

Q: In the normal, everyday world, our guests might expect to see a movie palace at the end of a street. What makes this one different? What enhances the reality and takes the experience from a normal one to a Disney one?
A: Inside this movie palace, we aren't going to watch movies. We are going to journey into them.

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Now, flash forward to 2001, as we begin to gear up to celebrate what would have been Walt Disney's 100th birthday. If there was ever an endearing symbol for The Walt Disney Company as a whole, the sorcerer's hat would have to take the top honor. Fantasia was a film that was very close to Walt's own heart, and though it failed considerably at the box office and wasn't well recieved by the audience or the critics either, the film did provide a very early form of Imagineering in that Walt developed new technologies and set new precedents with what could be done in many different types of entertainment.



More than it was a film, Fantasia was an experience: the first time Disney had ever truly attempted to bring the picture off the screen. He created a system called FantaSound, which was in essence the very first version of surround sound. Walt even wanted a form of "Smell-O-Vision" to be installed in all the theaters that were to play Fantasia, but couldn't secure the financing to create something that elaborate at the time.

The Sorcerer has always been the symbol of Walt Disney Imagineering, post WED Enterprises. The idea of Mickey as the apprentice to the must older and wiser Yensid pertains to everything WDI does. It makes Imagineers constant apprentices: to the art form, to themselves and to one another. Instead of being the experts, they are a team, always learning and trying new things and moving in the only direction their heirs have ever known how to move in: forward.

It was also fitting that at the beginning of the 21st century, the entire concept behind the Studios park was evolving: it was no longer just a place about Hollywood and filmmaking, it was now a place about the entire world of entertainment: "Where Showbiz Is".

It was under these conditions that Imagineers decided to place the Sorcerer Hat in front of the Chinese Theatre.

What this did to the vantage from the far, Pan-Pacific end of the Studios entrance plaza (more on this space in a later post) was created a juxtaposed image. Previously, we enhanced our reality and used the thesis attraction to set the stage for the show to follow by taking the idea of a movie palace one step farther and allowing guests a level of interaction that they simply cannot attain while watching a film.

Now, "The Hat" moves the story closer in line with what Disneyland's model projects with Sleeping Beauty Castle. We do not expect to find a fairy-tale castle at the end of a turn of the century Main Street, USA- but there it is. Our reality, by simply viewing an image placed carefully before us and detailed to a high level of realism, has therefore become enhanced.

The Sorcerer Hat does the same. It provides a large central icon that can be seen from all areas of the park, and it provides a juxtaposed image. We do not expect to see a gigantic Sorcerer's Hat at the far end of an idealized 1940s Hollywood Boulevard- but there it is.

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Now, the problem. The Payoff. The entire idea of an "Icon", as defined in our first Icon-O-Class, comes from that old carnival term, "wienie". The guests are instinctively drawn to a Disney icon the way a dog is drawn to a hot dog. When they get there, there needs to be a payoff. In Henchian terms, the long shot needs to match with the close-up.


When it does not, we experience the conundrum of contradiction. Contradictions destroy a story environment and bring us back into the real world. On the two dimensional motion picture screen, we are given various cues and patterns to help us "suspension of disbelief". As designers, our goal is to get the guest to accept instead an "Enhanced Reality." We cannot do this if the previous reality has not been suspended. This is the purpose of the separation of the Magic Kingdom by the Seven Seas Lagoon, of the straight and simple lines EPCOT's entrance plaza, and of the Pan Pacific facade at the Studios.

Here, our reality has been suspended, but since we have yet to reach any thesis attraction to show us what this show is going to be all about in specific detail, there is still the chance that our suspension of disbelief will be broken.

Unfortunately, a beautiful and aesthetically pleasing icon such as the Sorcerer's Hat cannot fulfill its obligations to the rest of the image of Hollywood Boulevard because the long shot does not match with the close up. When guests reach the hat, the payoff, the suspension of disbelief, is a cart and cashier selling generic Disney pins and High School Musical merchandise.



The beautiful replica courtyard of the Chinese Theatre lies some distance behind, and certainly guests still find their way there and experience the aging Great Movie Ride, but as a guest you expect there to be something incredible either just beneath or inside that central icon- and unfortunately in an effort to make a fast dollar, the money men provide us not with any sort of enhanced reality but instead with another opportunity to purchase more Mickey-related Schlock.

"Icon-O-Class"......Our Spaceship Earth

Perhaps The Walt Disney Company is the finest example of a truly American major corporation that continues to exist and prosper today.

After Walt Disney passed away in late 1966, the heirs to his throne were left saddened and confused, and weren't even sure things could continue. It was in a sketch recovered from a trash can in Walt's office that a new dream was born, but it wasn't long before it was determined impossible. If Walt Disney hadn't been there to guide Walt Disney's dreams, rest assured the men of lesser conviction that surrounded the entertainment industry during the first half of the twentieth century would have been eager to shut them down. There would be no animated feature film, no theme parks, no television as we know it today.

Often referenced in the literature as "Walt's Last Dream", the city called EPCOT would have transformed central Florida and the entire world. It went far beyond "forward". It was to be a new example and a way for Walt to transform his audience into the community of tomorrow. In short, what was being attempted was to transform society itself. Walt clearly thought he had the right ideas about the future, and certainly he had the track record to prove it.

In the end, EPCOT would never happen. The logistics overwhelmed those left behind to achieve the dream, in every respect of the word. That isn't meant as a negative comment: they had overwhelmed Walt Disney himself, as his numerous nervous breakdowns and physical ailments and constant stress treatments (provided by the Studio nurse, Hazel George, at the end of each day) can attest.

Yet, something had to be done. The ring leaders of the next great dream, more so than any of the other equally talented Imagineers, were John Hench and Marty Sklar. They understood what Walt had wanted to do with EPCOT, but they also knew that without him the entire company was failing and faltering in ways that had never been expected. They didn't have the creative ability, the logistical ability, or the finances to go about creating a massive city in the heart of Central Florida.

What they did have was the ability to translate the ideas and concepts into a new concept in themed entertainment.

Or was it so new?

Here enters our story the strange and wonderful personages of two visionaries of the early-mid twentieth century that helped shape the project that was to revolutionize Disney as a brand, and themed entertainment as an art form.

First, we have Ray Bradbury. This science fiction writer, responsible for the creation of Farenheit 451, came onto the EPCOT project even before some of the in-house designers were placed. He created what was to become a prototype script for Spaceship Earth.

Spaceship Earth is EPCOT Center's "Thesis" attraction. This was the first time a single attraction in a themed environment had been used to set the stage for every other piece of the story the guests would experience once they moved into the park itself.

While Bradbury created the metaphors and concepts that played out inside Spaceship Earth, the name itself and the exterior came primarily from the works of architect and visionary Richard Buckminster Fuller. Fuller was a man of broad and engaging concepts. In his lifetime, he created such far reaching concepts as Fuel Efficient cars, the energy independent house, and most importantly to our story today, the Geodesic Dome.

Fuller also wrote two heavily influential works on the future of humanity and the planet, and our overuse of resources. The first was entitled The World Game, and was released in 1961. Fuller's definition was:

"make the world work for 100% of humanity in the shortest possible time through spontaneous cooperation without ecological damage or disadvantage to anyone."

The second work was titled An Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth, and described the Earth as a vessel in motion in outerspace. The vessel has a finite collection of resources that cannot be restocked. The book also makes the point that a spaceship is a mechanical entity, and if we fail to provide it maintenance it will break down and suffer.

Both of these concepts played into the creation of Spaceship Earth, though not before they influenced the place that was a prototype of EPCOT Center: The 1939 New York World's Fair in Flushing Meadows, New York.

EPCOT Center, the original theme park incarnation of what has become Epcot, was a park founded on big ideas. Here, guests were going to immerse themselves not in the world of fantasy, but in a world of science and reality. Epcot of today is the saddest example we have of Walt Disney World's growing management issues. Imagineers seem to be far away creatures, and their wonderful creative leadership seems to have less control over what happens in and around Walt Disney World than ever before.

So, as Fuller was responsible for the exterior and Bradbury planted the seed for the show inside, it was legendary Imagineer and color expert John Hench that solved the pavilion's biggest problem. Up until 1979, no one had ever attempted to construct a building as a full sphere. The engineers told Hench and his team that doing such a thing would be impossible. Hench solved the problem by treating the sphere as two separate but unequal halves.

The upper 3/4 of Spaceship Earth itself thereby sits on a table, the legs of which extend down and out of the sphere as the iconic structural supports. The lower quarter of the pavilion is actually suspended from the bottom of this table. This creates an equal distribution of weight.

With the pavilion's design problems solved, it was only a matter of time before the entire EPCOT Center project would push themed entertainment forward into a new era.

The major difference between EPCOT and the parks that came before it is essentially the "Spokes of the Wheel" model. EPCOT was the first theme park to be designed as an open, free-flowing experience. Much like an American World's Fair, the park spans out from a central object but it does not follow a pattern.

For that matter, it also does not follow any sort of thematic map. We are introduced instead to a prototype model of the world, where we experience different varieties of science, imagination, industry and nature in a free flow format that takes us through gardens and across visually simple yet stunning structures to the next experience. The story being told is that of the world, so Epcot was originally allowed to occupy space in the real world, and the separation Walt and his team so sought with Disneyland and, later, his predecessors sought with Magic Kingdom Park, here that separation was given a rest.



Spaceship Earth still stands sentinel over an optimistic vision of the future of our world. Today, we also continue our journey aboard (and inside) Spaceship Earth, albeit in a somewhat altered form from its original incarnation.

Designing in Form

Firstly, a congratulations: To all the talented young men and women who sweated away their blood and tears this summer as participants in Drum Corps International's "Summer Music Games". All the corps did an absolutely astounding job with their shows on both of the occasions we had the pleasure of seeing them.

Hats off especially to Phantom Regiment, who took their first ever World Championship title (in full) and garnered the "Spirit of Disney" Award for their 2008 program entitled Spartacus. The thing we can all admire about this cherised activity is that the focus is where it belongs: on the audience, the show, the music and, most importantly, the lessons and friendships learned and obtained through participating.

While viewing The Cadets 2008 program, entitled The Pursuit of Happiness, some interesting thoughts came to mind in regards to the activity and its relation to other types of entertainment.

After the Cadets performed their Quarterfinals show on Thursday evening, corps director and program coordinator George Hopkins had a brief conversation with one of the hosts of the event: "I think there is definitely still potential for voiceover narration in this art form."

The Cadets show this year, I should explain, was a source of much controversy in the Drum Corps community. Having been astounded at the Corps' previous performances, I was disappointed not with the talent and expertise of the corps members, nor with their performance, but with the material itself.

The show is an original production that garners its title from the Thomas Jefferson quote that opened the Declaration of Independence:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

From there, we listen to an NPR Radio broadcast about a woman called Sarah Jones, and we follow her through her life and her Pursuit of Happiness.

With key pieces of narration, I could see such a concept working. As it was performed at the DCI Quarterfinals in Bloomington, the show was actually even tolerable. Previously, as when the show was performed in Orlando, The Cadets were still being covered over by voices through most of the more complex musical moments and forming giant smiley faces on the field.

All of this strange spectacle brought to mind a lesson that designers in many different companies in Themed Entertainment have failed to learn: the idea that we must all design within a form.

When we look at The Cadets show compared to the shows of other corps, particularly Phantom Regiment's Spartacus, a much clearer picture begins to emerge. While Hopkin's idea of narration has yet to find its place in the form or its audience, there may still be potential for it in the future.

The fact still remains that what The Cadets said in nearly twelve minutes of narration and music, Phantom Regiment said in twelve minutes and three single words: "I Am Spartacus."

In other words, they let the music tell the story. For Drum Corps, letting the music tell the story is what I'd call designing within the form. The Cadets' program from this year suffered not because of a lack of musicianship or performance quality. In fact, the brass and percussion arrangements and the guard work were all very well arranged, but the reason the show suffered in the end was because of the removal of the narration.

The designers depended far too heavily on something that wasn't within the form to carry the show, and as a result the removal of that element left the music to provide only half of the equation where it should have been providing a solid base on which the rest of the program could grow.

There are foundations in every art form. Calling them rules isn't something I find terribly attractive, because that implies that they must always be followed. Foundations, though, merely implies that things will be easier to build if they are used.

In Drum Corps, the main foundation is the arrangement and/or composition of the music. Next comes the visual impact, which owes to the drill (i.e. the forms the band creates visually on the field by marching in different lines and patterns), and the colorguard. These two elements combine to create what the judges call "General Effect"- in short, how did the audience react to the show?

In Themed Entertainment, the first foundation is story. If an attraction or experience doesn't have story, it may just as well not exist. From story comes character(s), which makes the experience relate to the audience, and sensation & mood, which are what link the experience with the others around it and eventually form a themed environment.

The key to both forms, to any form, really, is story. Its simply the method of relating that story that changes. In Corps, it is done first through music and secondly through visuals. In experiential design it is done through any number of methods: Movement, Sound, Music, Color, Architecture and Action are just a few examples.

All of these things relate directly back to the story.



Stitch's Great Escape. Perhaps the most mentioned failure of Walt Disney World's recent history. Where did things go so terribly wrong?

One of the mainstay ideas behind design in any form is that you must play within certain guidelines. They aren't rules, because they can be broken. The key, as with many arts, is to break them for maximum effect. Stitch's Great Escape is a fabulous example of a show that doesn't play within the guidelines at all the wrong moments. There are shows that utilize audio as a supremely effective story-telling tool (See: The Haunted Mansion, just across the ailing Liberty Square Bridge at Florida's Magic Kingdom Park). Stitch attempts to do exactly that, and fails in a less than spectacular fashion.

The entire last half of the show is audio. We are shown the gorgeous, reality-enhancing Stitch AA figure and it is then abruptly removed from our field of vision, cast out into the audience as a wave-length that relies on multi-dimensional sound. The show that Stitch replaced, Alien Encounter, used audio to maximum effect. The guideline, you see, is that audio should never be used alone because it frightens and confuses the guests, and even more so when it is used in dark and enclosed spaces.

Alien Encounter used its audio tracks in dark and enclosed spaces to do exactly that: frighten the guest. It worked better in that show than it had in any since the original incarnation of The Haunted Mansion at Disneyland.



Another productive tool in the designer's toolbox is smell. Soarin' (Over California or not) uses this tool to its maximum effect- and it doesn't break the rules. Interestingly, the smell guidelines have been broken before, namely in the retrofit of Journey into Imagination at the lower-case Epcot, where we are forced to sit through the smell of a skunk.



Stitch decides to run along a similar line and force us to smell his burped up chili dog- not that chili dogs have the faintest thing to do with the mythology of the character, or made any mention or appearance in the film, but then we are talking about breaking all the guidelines at the wrong times, aren't we?

In a nutshell, Stitch's Great Escape and Journey into Imagination do something to the guest that completely pulls a 180 from the original concept of themed show design: these are attractions that place the audience in unpleasant situations without giving them a payoff.

Observe several more successful attractions:



Indiana Jones Adventure: Guests are menaced by snakes, rats, bugs and a giant boulder.
Payoff: Guests escape the boulder and get to live the moment as Indiana does in Raiders of the Lost Ark.



The Seas with Nemo & Friends: Guests are menaced by a forest of Jellyfish and a scary Angler fish.
Payoff: They get to surf the EAC with Crush and....they find Nemo!

Expedition Everest: Guests are menaced by a Yeti high on the Forbidden Mountain, and are thrown backwards through the tunnels and caverns.
Payoff: Guests escape with their lives after a fantastic view of the Yeti and have gained a new understanding of the creature as the protector of the forest.

In short, themed design is all about putting our guests in highly emotional and unexpected situations, perhaps related to the content or characters of their favorite films or television shows, and seeing just how far we can take things before we have to follow the natural story arc and give them the payoff they've been waiting for.

This is the only way the story moves forward. If the Magic Kingdom were filled with lackluster pieces like Stitch's Great Escape, the Magic Kingdom's story arc would not arc at all. It would be a flat line on a boring blank piece of paper.

And we all know how scary those can be!


In the same way that The Cadets didn't design The Pursuit of Happiness within the form, the designers of Stitch's Great Escape neglected to supply their story with the proper foundations. There is a term at WDI that is used more and more often, and to less and less effect. When an attraction is removed, there is often times a war that goes on between different factions of the Disney elite- Creative Entertainment, which sucks up valuable real estate and installs wonderful productions that very rarely fit with their surroundings or have any significance to the story (Finding Nemo: The Musical, anyone?). Walt Disney Imagineering itself, which still puts a great deal more thought into what it places where, and Park Management, which usually makes even further ill-advised decisions because they aren't designers.

It's really a three way street. A theme park is an extremely complex mechanism that couldn't operate without all of these working parts. At the same time, it is impossible to make everybody down the totem pole happy. If you're going to please marketing or park management, good luck pleasing the Imagineers, and if the Imagineers are happy, marketing generally is upset with the outcome.

The term used when an attraction is removed but a new show is placed in the old show space is "Retrofit." Stitch's Great Escape was retro-fitted from "Alien Encounter", which in itself really didn't jive with Tomorrowland or the Magic Kingdom, and really didn't have a place at the Magic Kingdom.

There are lots of different views in regards to what should go where. Certainly, Stitch in Tomorrowland should make sense....but certainly, placing Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor there made no sense at all, because it has no relation to Tomorrowland or its central story. Never mind that, though, because obviously our guests want Monsters. They don't care where we put them. It isn't important.

Well, there is a simple and unfortunate fact that designers and management alike tend to overlook. Our guests are going to enjoy whatever we give them, almost. The meaning of this is not that our guests are stupid. Far from it, actually. It's a fact of human nature that once you've established a name in any entertainment field, there are always expectations, but there are also reverse expectations: the kind that mean audiences will pay to see a film just because it says "Disney".



The "almost" comes in often when classic and beloved shows are ripped out in favor of something new. Throughout history, it has often been the case that guests become extremely upset when a show is removed. The current situation with Pleasure Island is no exception. Many claim to be extremely devoted to the enterprise of saving Pleasure Island. The problem is, they aren't here to show Disney. They cannot make good on their claim. However, if they don't come back because Pleasure Island is closed, and maybe they choose to visit somewhere new and exciting and fresh like Dubai on their next vacation...well, Disney just lost business.

Themed Entertainment isn't a business where business results are immediate, yet most of the current big cheeses think and act the way any MBA would think and act: we want low cost, high-profit, immediate return solutions. Sooner or later, I think they will have no choice but to realize that by retro-fitting attractions or shows into places they don't belong they are not only upsetting and losing their best designers, they are upsetting their paying public, and just because they aren't there to show their support doesn't mean they will forget it and choose to return to a Disney park for their next vacation.

The very essence, the thing that separates a Disney themed show from a standard Six Flags ride, is that we tell stories. It's been banged into the heads of anyone over the age of three that The Walt Disney Company is and always has been in the business of telling stories. Our guests are going to take whatever stories we give them. The very first Imagineers knew this, and they chose to look at the situation in a positive light and used this fact as inspiration to do their absolute best.

This relates directly back to John Hench's experience with a film director from another motion picture studio who commented that his audience "wouldn't know the difference, anyway". It relates directly to the fact that once they are in the gates, we already have their money. This relates directly to the entire concept of Imagineering:

There are two ways to look at a blank sheet of paper. It can be the scariest thing in the world, because no one has put anything on it yet, or it can be the greatest opportunity in the world because no one has put anything on it yet.

If we think of our guests' experience as a blank sheet of paper, we can either choose to view it as the scariest thing in the world (or the most unimportant thing) and not do our best work and provide them with the best show, or we can choose to take it as an opportunity and give them more than they expect. Even, sometimes, more than they can comprehend.

There is a whole new world of Designing within the form waiting. It is the choice of the designer to tell the best story that can be told, or to simply give in to the marketing and management teams that attempt to shoehorn their ideals into a business that has, for nearly 55 years, chosen to disregard them as standard business practices because the goal was the creation of a brand new standard.



Drum Corps is also an activity where storytelling is paramount. Lets not forget that one of the most esteemed titles is the Spirit of Disney award (Phantom Regiment won the Spirit of Disney award for their 2008 program, "Spartacus", pictured above).

Regardless of the form, if we don't stay within the guidelines we risk losing our audience (or our guests). The Cadets risked it this year, and it didn't pay off. Stitch's Great Escape, Journey into Imagination (Redux) and The Enchanted Tiki Room: Under New Management have all risked it in the past and it didn't pay off.

There is only one other thing more terrifying than a blank sheet of paper, and thats a show that breaks the form in the wrong places and provides our guests with experiences they'd rather not remember.