Disneyland Remodeling "It's a Small World"
I know, I know, the song is an infectious earwig and you’re going to spend the rest of the day cursing me for even bringing it into your realm of thought. But bear with me.
photo by Stacy Conradt
The ride is currently under major renovations at Disneyland, and while I admit it’s not one of my favorite rides, I was disappointed that my sister-in-law didn’t get to experience it on her first-ever Disney trip last month. And now, she may never get to experience the original World’s Fair version that has resided in Fantasyland for the past 40 years.
Disney says that the main change is a change of boats, but according to insiders in the know, it’s actually going to be much more. We’ll get to that in a second.
The original IASW is based on the idea of world peace. No, really. Walt Disney attended a conference held by President Eisenhower in 1956 about promoting world peace and cultural understanding through world travel. Inspired, Disney recruited Mary Blair to design the attraction, Marc and Alice Davis to design the scenes and the doll outfits respectively, and Joyce Carlson to design the dolls. At first, the ride included the national anthems of all of the different nations represented, but Disney decided he needed one uniting song. Robert and Richard Sherman wrote the now-famous tune and that was that.
photo from feministJulie on Flickr
A couple of quick facts:
• The attraction debuted at the 1964-65 World’s Fair in New York.
• Major themes of the boat ride include Europe, Asia, Africa, Central/South America, South Pacific Islands, the Finale and the Good-bye Scene.
• Throughout your 10.5 minute boat ride, you’ll hear the repetitive song in Spanish, French, and Japanese, to name a few.
And now the changes: The changes are going to see the rainforest scene – a really detailed, colorful and innovative representation of Mary Blair’s artwork – replaced with a massive “Hooray for the U.S.A.” scene. Right now, the only American characters represented are a cowboy and an Eskimo. This might seem like the U.S. isn’t very well represented, but when you consider that the point of the ride is to explore other cultures, it makes sense.
Another big change is that Disney is going to stick its characters in scenes where they “belong”. So you might see the Hunchback of Notre Dame in the France section, Simba and Rafiki in the African section and Ariel with the gurgling mermaids at the beginning of the ride (at Disneyland, not Disneyworld). Commercialism at its worst, I guess. I get that it’s Disney and its bread and butter is its characters, but the original IASW was not designed to sell Disney product. Walt himself commissioned it with the idea of promoting global understanding, not global marketing.
photo from Re-Imagineering
I guess I’m torn – I can understand the need to update and improve the ride, but maybe not to the lengths they are going. Can’t they up the America factor by adding a few more characters instead of destroying an entire classic scene? And what about subtly putting Disney character references into the ride instead of the actual characters themselves, which won’t match the dolls in the rest of the ride? For instance, make one of the French dolls wear the simplistic blue-and-white Belle dress and carry a book. Give one of the mermaids red hair. I think it can be done in a way that doesn’t rip the integrity of the original design away.
What do you guys think? Horrible updates, or is Small World long overdue for some modernization?
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Six Attractions You'll Never See at Disneyland (unless you already did)
I’m going to Disneyland in two weeks! I’ve been there before; my husband hasn’t. We’re both Disney freaks – especially anything Haunted Mansion-related.
Some Disneyland attractions are classics and have been around forever – Dumbo, for instance, has been around almost since the beginning (the park opened on July 17, 1955 and Dumbo followed about a month later). Peter Pan’s Flight has been around since the beginning, and so has the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party (the teacups!) and Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.
Other rides haven’t really stood up to the test of time, unfortunately, and those are the ones we’re going to take a look at.
Holidayland
photo from A History of Disney Theme Parks
You’re probably familiar with the different sections of Disneyland these days – Tomorrowland, Frontierland and Fantasyland, to name a few. But Holidayland? Yep. It opened on June 16, 1957, and was a nine-acre picnic area that was for… well… frolicking, basically. There were playgrounds, horseshoes, a baseball field, volleyball and the “world’s largest candy-striped circus tent” which stood where the Haunted Mansion is today. Pirates of the Caribbean takes up the spot where the baseball field used to be. It only lasted a few years – Holidayland closed in 1961 because it just didn’t fit in with the rest of the park (among other things like lack of shade).
The Viewliner
This miniature train has the dubious honor of being one of the shortest-lived rides to ever exist at Disneyland. It opened in June of 1957 and promptly closed in September 1958 when construction started on the Matterhorn and Submarine Voyage. There were two trains – one for Fantasyland and one for Tomorrowland – and the track ran a figure-eight through both of those areas. The tiny, sleek (for that time) train was supposed to represent the future of train travel. Eventually the monorail filled the void left by the Viewliner.
Monsanto House of the Future
picture from Apartment Therapy
I love those old ads from the 1950s that show “futuristic” kitchens cooking the meals all by themselves with “space-age” technology. That’s kind of what the Monsanto House of the Future was like. It was in operation from 1957 to 1967 and was a tour of a house in the year 1986. It’s laughable now, but the MIT-built house featured technology such as microwaves, which obviously did end up being invented. Just about everything about the house – including the exterior – was made out of plastic. You can still see the support pillars of Monsanto’s House of the Future in Neptune’s Grotto – they were rated for earthquakes and proved to be so sturdy that they were just about impossible to remove. Monsanto, by the way, is an agricultural biotechnology company (meaning they make herbicides and pesticides and the like).
Captain EO
picture from AlteredDreams
In the more recent past, we have Captain EO, which I vaguely remember from EPCOT. Captain EO was a 3-D movie starring, of course, Michael Jackson. And if you’re looking for more credentials than that (keep in mind MJ was HUGE at this point in time), it was directed by Francis Ford Coppola and executive produced by George Lucas. They also co-wrote the script with Rusty Lemorande.
Here’s the plot: Captain EO and his team are piloting a spaceship to deliver a gift to the evil Supreme Leader (Anjelica Huston). One of his shipmates is named Hooter, which seems like a huge oversight to me. Hooter is an elephant, not an owl as you might suspect. Well, the Supreme Leader isn’t exactly thrilled with the crew and orders them to be tortured. EO charms the Queen by singing her a song, but as soon as the music stops the spell breaks and she orders the crew to be captured again. EO uses his music to transform the evil guards into dancers who line up to dance behind him Thriller-zombie-style. EO eventually uses his powers to turn the Supreme Leader and her entire planet into things of beauty.
The 17-minute film cost somewhere between $17 and $30 million to make. Sounds like a lot, but when you consider than it ran for more than 10 years at Disneyland (1986 to 1997), maybe it’s not so bad. Then MJ went weird and Disney decided to pull the attraction and replace it with “Honey, I Shrunk the Audience”.
America Sings!
picture from Yesterland
Looking for a collection of animatronic swamp critters singing old Dixieland favorites and old folk tunes? Too bad you missed America Sings! Had you been at Disneyland sometime between June of 1974 and April of 1988, you could have witnessed geese singing “Camptown Races”, a dog singing “Home on the Range” a pink singing “Won’t You Come Home Bill Bailey?” and a crane and a rooster singing “Shake, Rattle and Roll”. A decent number of the characters appeared to be either quite intoxicated or at least trying their hardest to get there. It’s one of the few Disney attractions with characters actually drinking alcohol (Pirates of the Caribbean also comes to mind… rum anyone?). The building was used for offices for a while and eventually became home to Innoventions, which I believe is still there today. The swamp creatures, however, befriended Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox and Brer Bear and now reside happily at Splash Mountain.
Flying Saucers
Picture from Yesterland
High school physics students who participated in Hovercraft competitions, this one is for you. Basically, the Flying Saucers ride was Disney’s answer to bumper cars. When the ride starts, air would shoot up under the saucer and lift it up off the floor (just a little… we’re not talking feet here). Riders would have to tilt their bodies the way they wanted the saucer to go and were encouraged to bump into other guests. Alas, the saucers only lasted about five years in the mid 60s.
Those are just a few of the rides that are now defunct – things at all of the Disney parks are always changing. Even the old favorites get little updates every now and then. Do you have a favorite ride that is no longer in operation? I know a lot of people were upset when the Magic Kingdom’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea met its maker.
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