Progress City, U.S.A.

While I continue to futz around working on some story ideas, the tubed interwebs thankfully continue to produce stories of interest and worthy of linkage. Here are a few for your late-weekend perusal.

First, I’m glad to report that EPCOT Central seems to be up and blogging again. These folks are die-hard EPCOT traditionalists like myself, and I’m glad that there are people out there keeping Disney’s feet to the fire concerning the park’s current lack of unifying purpose. A few recent pieces of note:

- A story about management dropping the ball on EPCOT’s 25th anniversary last year. I was fortunate to be able to make it down for the celebration and, while the fan organizers did a magnificent job setting things up, they shouldn’t have had to. I’ve been planning a series for the site entitled “Why Won’t Disney Take My Money?” and one of the first of these will be about EPCOT’s 25th. It’s shocking to me that, as a fanbase, Disney fans practically have to beg corporate to be recognized and catered to. It has to be a fairly unique situation - rabid, dedicated fans that are sneered at by the company they seek to celebrate. It’s reached the stage of an abusive relationship and Disney really needs to get their act together on this front.

- A story about the necessity of criticism and the need to hold management’s feet to the fire concerning the revitalization of EPCOT. I link to this post because it makes almost verbatim an argument I’ve been making for years:

Disney is a company that needs to make money. It’s a for-profit company. It needs to grow revenue and income. Those are also common explanations. To that, I counter that only by offering something truly revolutionary, truly out of the ordinary, can a company grow for the long term. Walt Disney knew that, that’s why he was never content to continue doing what had made him successful. An artistically driven company like Disney has to take risks, and if that turns the stomach of its top managers, why did they get into this game in the first place.

Disney is filled these days with people who got into it for one key reason: to make money for themselves. That’s not a bad motivator, I have no qualm with that. But they wanted to make money fast, to do it the easy way. With projects like ABC’s flagging ratings, the theme-park design fiascoes and the death of traditional animation, they’re learning the lesson the hard way. It’s not about the quick buck, it’s about the long haul. It’s about doing what’s right.

People forget that Walt did things the right way and made a lot of money. You don’t have to sell your soul for a profitable company, but you might have to obsess a little less about the quarterly reports. The Disney Frontier blog agrees.

- A story about the fact that despite the departure of Eisner, Pressler and Stainton, all is not well at Disney. While I mostly approve of Iger’s moves lately, he’s still a corporate guy with no real Disney allegiance. The Disney loyalists in the company, like Lasseter, are mostly Disneyland-obsessed and so the Florida property continues to be ignored and looted and - even worse - sold off piecemeal. No one seems to grasp the philosophy under which the Florida property was purchased and organized and so, slowly, irreparable damage is being done. More interestingly, the author suggests EPCOT as a new branding strategy for Disney to reach audiences immune to the charms of Hannah Montana and I think it’s a brilliant idea. If someone at Team Disney had an ounce of gumption they’d look into this ASAP.

More from this great blog in future updates.

A few interesting facts about Adventureland.

Euro Disney continues its economic turnaround as it announces a twenty percent increase in first quarter revenues. The resort, which hasn’t operated at a profit since 2001, has had seven consecutive quarters of revenue growth. The increase in attendance, hotel occupancy, and per-guest spending is attributed - shockingly! - to the addition of new attractions (gasp!). This will presumably only continue as the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror opens at Disney Studios Paris this month. Hopefully this innovative new strategy of “adding new things” will continue, making the Disney Studios worth visiting and refreshing the long-stagnant Disneyland Paris itself.

Apparently actress Suzanne Pleshette died last weekend while I was off in the mountains and “off the grid”. I learn this from Isn’t Life Terrible, which posted a tribute to Pleshette last week. While the she had a large body of work, I of course grew up knowing her from her work at Disney.

Pleshette starred in four live-action films for Disney over the years; these included The Ugly Dachshund, Blackbeard’s Ghost, The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin, and The Shaggy D.A.. While two of these I never saw as a child, and even as a kid I knew The Shaggy D.A. wasn’t very good, I was an enormous fan of The Ugly Dachshund. My brother and I were fairly obsessed with the film, watching it over and over as only fanboy kids can. Pleshette starred, as she would in two of her other Disney films, opposite Dean Jones - himself another childhood obsession. Jones, alongside Han Solo and Cary Grant, made up a weird childhood trifecta of male role models and embodied all that was cool, mod and hip and provided a worthy subject for emulation. Pairing Jones with the ultra-foxy Pleshette provided a Disney power couple par excellence.

Check out the tribute via the link for some interesting facts about Pleshette’s career and time at Disney, as well as some words about her role in 40 Pounds of Trouble. This film is definitely an oddity - a Universal picture featuring extensive footage shot within Disneyland itself. Definitely surreal, and a great time capsule of Disneyland itself.

Finally, wrapping things up, is my dear and beloved Tina Fey. Have a great Sunday!

Today in 2000 Bob Iger was promoted to President of the Walt Disney Company. At the time, I yawned and declared him to be quite the yes man Eisner underling, but he’s given me a nice meal of crow to eat. Thank God it wasn’t Paul Pressler.

Yes Iger’s done great by me, his case made stronger by the day, especially now that I have found out that he was the suit at ABC championing the broadcast of Twin Peaks. But that’s neither here nor there. By the way, he’s also celebrating another anniversary today - 2 years since the announcement of the Pixar merger, which I cannot believe. It is truly amazing to see how much Disney corporate culture has changed so quickly since Lassater and Co were annexed.

Could this really have been “cool” in 1962? I suppose the Beatles had not landed yet and American culture was still a little Pat Booneish. Still, I believe that Disney used to be better at forcing their “hip” agenda instead of falling in line with pale imitations of the biggest fads of two years previous.

The oddest contemporary example of this is the “Pirates of the Caribean” phenomenon. First, Disney is so down on the business prospect of a Pirate movie and another attraction-based flop that they almost make a direct-to-video sequel, then when the movie hits big they follow the trend they themselves created by oversaturating all their properties with Pirates merchandise.

But I digress. Pirates was a victory for this cause: you get the best creative talent available, and you work on a story that will grab people. You don’t worry about if you can get Barenaked Ladies (out of date Chix Little creators) to sing an opening theme, or how many celebs you can get to make wacky pop culture references for commercials (post record scratch of course).

John Lasseter, Brad Bird, and Andrew Stanton know what I’m talking about. The Pixar films (even though Toy Story is a little guilty) do not bother themselves with staying current. Far from it, Ratatouille could have been released in the 60’s, and it is fairly hard aside from the digital technology to pin down when this movie was made.

Hopefully this will translate more into theme park attractions. Disney is at its best when it does not worry about trends. They can never EVER be hip by formal definition. Disney is anti-hip (save the tweens and the Disney Channel). Their hipness comes merely from folks who think like Walt did, and worry about being creative on their own terms. I think the attention to detail in Expedition Everest is much “cooler” than the Laugh Floor Comedy Club, and I don’t remember the Yeti being edgy.

You can tell Bob Iger does not bother himself with much posturing, or worry about being cool. He’s kind of a square really. I like that. I hope more random and uncool attractions are on the way - like The Hoop Dee Doo Revue, El Rio de Tiempo, and The Tiki Room (which was SO much more hip under old management).

Recently, Bob Iger and Co. unveiled plans for an extensive overhaul of Disney’s California Adventure. Nestled among the plans including blockbuster attractions in Carsland and a complete redo of the opening plaza was a long-shelved attraction based on The Little Mermaid. Disney followers will know that this was originally planned for EuroDisney, and can even virtually ride through the planned attraction on the Special Edition Little Mermaid DVD.

This excites me, not only because it is clear that the new regime at WDI is dusting off plans for fifteen year old rides, but because the scene shown in all press releases is the “Kiss The Girl” scene. In addition, there’s a wonderful “Under the Sea” scene on the version of the ride shown on the DVD. One way or another, you know that with a Little Mermaid attraction you are going to get good songs. These Alan Menken and Howard Ashman ditties have stood the test of time, even surviving 80’s musical production values.

Expect DCA visitors to be spotted later in the day in queue for Grizzly Soak’n Wet Wild Ride or lounging in the new Beergarten to still be humming along or outright singing these songs hours later. It is an art that until recently I thought lost to Disney theme parks. In the age of Test Tracks, Mission Spaces, and even the wonderful Tower of Terror, you do not get many songs for your buck anymore.

True, the Mermaid attraction is in a way cheating, because these songs are already well known and were paid for years ago. It’s a step in the right direction. All the heavy hitting attractions of Walt’s later years have wonderful songs written just for them: “Yo Ho (A Pirate’s Life For Me)” for Pirates, “Grim Grinning Ghosts” for Haunted Mansion, and the most polarizing and infectious, “It’s A Small World,” on which the entire attraction hinges.

Even less blockbuster attractions recieved their due in musical attention. “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” and later “Now Is The Time” for Carousel of Progress, all the wonderful music involved in the Enchanted Tiki Room and the Country Bear Jamboree. “Miracles in Molecules” for Disneyland’s Tomorrowland, and “Meet Me Down On Main Street.” I challenge a man to walk out of Carousel of Progress or It’s a Small World not at least humming, even if it makes them feel foolish.

There’s merit in this. After all, part of the “Disney Difference” in corporatespeak is to “Preserve the Magical Guest Experience.” Listening to these songs on record at home had a very transportative property that would put me back at WDW, just as much as a strange sulfurlike smell would make me think that Rome was burning.

Speaking of which, this song argument is one that I would throw to the wolves to argue the greatness of EPCOT in its early years pre-Epcot 95 identity crisis. Every attraction had great music to back it up, and I weep for the younger generation growing up without these songs. “Fun to Be Free,” “Listen To The Land,” “Tomorrow’s Child,” “New Horizons,” both Energy songs (not to mention the infectious song from El Rio de Tiempo) - these are all lost to us now, except from downloadable devices. At least “One Little Spark,” one of the Sherman Brothers classics survives in revised and weakened form. Consider it a lesson learned, WDI.

I believe they have considered it of late, actually. Two examples in recent EPCOT work leads me to believe all is not lost. Though at the expense of the previously mentioned song, the new El Rio De Tiempo, The Gran Fiesta Tour, showcases an even older theme from The Three Cabalieros.

Even more exciting news is over at The Seas with Nemo and Friends, as well as Finding Nemo The Musical. There Avenue Q composer Robert Lopez and his wife, Kristen Anderson-Lopez were commissioned to write all new numbers AFTER the movie came out, including the wonderful “(In The) Big Blue World.” Immediately, the humming and post ride singing returns to EPCOT - and, for a moment, all appears to be on track.

Until next time, this is Beacon Joe signing off.