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News Disneyland Paris Updates & Features
Friday, 6th June 2014
Redesigned Ratatouille attraction entrance marquee signage revealed today
Like any great recipe, it needs a little refinement: A new, redesigned Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy entrance marquee has been installed at Walt Disney Studios Park this morning, pictured above by DisneylandBerry. The final signage design features just the blue ellipse of the movie’s logo with the subtitle included, far more subtly, inside.
This replaces the original design of the entrance marquee, which was installed some time ago only to disappear again shortly after, leaving an empty space. A giant copper cooking pot was designed to hold the lengthy subtitle, L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy, with the Ratatouille logo above.
But once this appeared on La Place de Rémy, many fans were immediately honest that it just wasn’t quite they expected. Wasn’t the pot going to be 3D? And isn’t it all a bit ostentatious and yet, dare it be said, “cheap-looking” for such a classy new mini-land? It seems between the Imagineers and management, someone agreed.
Tom Fitzgerald introduces the original marquee at the Shareholders preview presentation
Original entrance marquee (Photo: InsideDLParis)
The compromise on the new marquee is to drop the 2D cooking pot altogether, losing some of the city advertisement billboard aesthetic which jarred with the decoration around it. The subtitle is now placed somewhat awkwardly on the logo itself, but the general impression is better and seems more in-keeping with the surroundings.
Close-up, the marquee still has a glitzy, LED “popcorn” light display to light up the square at night, reminiscent of Meet Mickey Mouse. On the whole, it’s remarkably similar to the very first concept art we saw. Sometimes, the first ideas are the best.
• More photos — DLP Welcome: New sign on Ratatouille and more
PHOTOS @DisneylandBerry, @InsideDLParis, DLP Welcome
Friday, 6th June 2014
‘New Century Notions – Flora’s Unique Boutique’ to replace Town Square Photography
Have you heard the gossip on Main Street, U.S.A.? There’s a new shopkeeper in town: the classic Town Square Photography is due to be replaced soon by New Century Notions – Flora’s Unique Boutique, a store with a very Parisian, Victorian flair.
Disneyland Paris shared the very first photos (above and below, bottom) from inside the repurposed merchandise location on the corner of Town Square yesterday, revealing crisp new stained glass and a much brighter, more feminine interior.
After some months of rumour, Town Square Photography officially closed back on 18th January 2014. The store was regarded by many as the richest and most intricately designed on the whole street, overflowing with sumptuous and unusual period design touches and filled with a genuine character of its own.
Lending much of its brilliance to Imagineer Eddie Sotto, show producer of the land, the shop’s favourite feature was often the photographer’s back office, which Sotto put together himself, spending a night sitting at the desk arranging the papers and artefacts as if he were the shopkeeper.
• See more Town Square Photography photos at Photos Magiques
Alas, after one hundred years, the purpose of this store finally fell into complete irrelevance.
Where once the rich wooden shelves behind the counters would be filled with Kodak films, flying off the shelves every time guests took more than 36 photos each (the thought!), the displays had more recently become home to an assortment of souvenirs and accessories as disorganised as the photographer’s desk. Paris souvenirs here, photo albums there, and everything else between — no distinction and ultimately, no character.
Kodak’s financial problems were the final nail, as the store lost its sponsor.
Named after Walt Disney’s mother, Flora Call Disney, the new store was originally rumoured as simply “Flora’s Boutique”, disappointingly similar to the lazily-named Lily’s Boutique across the street. Without doubt, New Century Notions is much more original and fun.
Expected to now specialise in the resort’s range of Paris-branded souvenirs, it’s surely no coincidence that teams are working on this boutique at the same time as the truly Parisian Chez Marianne Souvenirs de Paris over in La Place de Rémy, announced to open in the autumn. A short blurb from the Backstage Cast Member magazine was shared by Nathan on Disney Central Plaza forum: (translated)
Flora was born in the United States to French parents who dreamed of giving their daughter the chance to live the American dream. In opening her own boutique, this refined woman has realised the dream of her parents. Fascinated by the Victorian aesthetic, she decorates the interior with mouldings and woodwork, and turns down floral themes. This is the story created by the teams of WDI Creative for the new boutique on Main Street, U.S.A. And to make the illusion perfect, they worked on all the details. The stained glass windows, designed by Stéphanie Bohnhoff then realised on American glass by a stained glass artisan, reveal talents outside the ordinary.
On first glance, the store appears to be seeing the same fate The Emporium did some years back, when the rich, “masculine”, dark woods were painted in bright creams to lighten the environment. Could Main Street’s original plan of alternating “masculine/feminine” locations along each side of the street, to keep guests’ interest engaged, be in further doubt? Or will Flora surprise us with a “New Century” spin on such gender-based themes?
According to Disneyland Paris, eleven different trades are currently working on the store.
No opening date for the new boutique has been announced besides “this summer” and no work to the exterior has been spotted besides the removal of previous signage. When it opens, let’s hope Flora’s Unique Boutique has at least a notion of what made Town Square Photography brilliant.
VIA @Disney_ParisEN (Twitter), Photos Magiques
Friday, 6th June 2014
Listen in: First Ratatouille background area music loop tested on Place de Rémy
Residents of La Place de Rémy — and a few fans peeking over the construction walls — heard the first sounds of the new mini-land’s background area music loop a few weeks ago. Radio Disney Club captured it on video, above.
This will be conclusion of Michael Giacchino’s scoring of the new attraction and its environs. The composer, who of course composed the original Ratatouille film soundtrack, shared numerous photos and snippets of the new music in production on his personal Instagram account earlier this year, while recording at Capitol Records in Hollywood.
• Previously — Michael Giacchino shares more Ratatouille ride soundtrack previews, first audio, Director Brad Bird tweets from Michael Giacchino’s Ratatouille ride scoring session
Comprising familiar themes and instrumentation from the movie, on first listen the music sounds just as you’d hope and expect: calmer and warmer but richer, and fuller, too.
Filling the space outside Ratatouille: L’Adventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy, Bistrot Chez Rémy and Chez Marianne Souvenirs de Paris, these pleasing sounds only make you want to be there more; sitting on a bench, soaking up the atmosphere.
We now have perhaps the first genuinely immersive, escapist area of Walt Disney Studios Park… and the irony is, it’s themed to Paris!
VIA Radio Disney Club (YouTube)
Thursday, 5th June 2014
Disneyland Paris “keeps the magic alive” in perfect new resort video trailer
Over the years we’ve seen countless Disneyland Paris trailers cut from the vast archive of footage covering the resort’s attractions, but this one might just be the best.
Simply titled “Disneyland Paris – Faire vivre la magie pour nos visiteurs”, the video appeared without fanfare on the resort’s YouTube channel on Tuesday 3rd June. Running at just 2 minutes 14 seconds, it probably does a better job of selling the destination than any single one of the account’s other 581 videos.
Much of, if not all, the footage is recycled and not filmed especially for the trailer, some of it dating back decades and some of it — such as the swooping fly-over of Disney Magic on Parade! — relatively new.
Footage of the resort’s Cast Members and artisans putting finishing touches to the “magic” begins the video, before it’s all shown in action. It ends, of course, with the official footage from Disney Dreams!, which never fails to impress.
Music is “Fly High (Trailer Music)” from The Amazing Hero: Caped Avengers Fanfares.
Place a Disneyland Paris logo and a call to action at the end and it’d make a perfect trailer for wider release — especially in cinemas, as @CafeFantasia suggested.
It’s certainly a world apart from the Disneyland Paris commercial currently gracing TV screens.
Named “Magical Answers”, this 30-second spot (below) follows three children discovering they can, amazingly, actually have fun at Disneyland; with an odd and almost disturbing tone of cynicism about the world around them, given their ages.
Normally, the narrative in commercials and newspaper articles is of a cynical adult realising they too can enjoy a Disney theme park; this advert however shows us a mournful young boy sitting alone in a plush mansion, looking skeptically into the eyes of a Buzz Lightyear action figure, before saluting the real thing — still bizarrely on his own.
Continuing the trend of advertising only to this specific bracket of families with very young children, it all feels oddly sombre and pessimistic, and features precisely three seconds of footage of an actual attraction. Filmed at Disneyland in California, the French Sleeping Beauty Castle was simply spliced into the shots.
It’s enough to put a vast swathe of the audience off wanting to visit Disneyland Paris altogether. Let’s hope those potential visitors at least make it as far as the resort’s YouTube, and watch the fantastic new trailer above instead.
VIA Disneyland Paris (YouTube)
Wednesday, 4th June 2014
Studio Tram Tour: Behind the Magic updated at last… with four new trams
It would be fair to say the last thing which needed changing to improve Studio Tram Tour: Behind the Magic from a guest’s point of view was the trams themselves. But here we are, with Disneyland Paris sharing photos of the new driving trucks which recently replaced the former twelve year old-plus vehicles.
Boasting more spacious cab areas, more fuel capacity and new sensors making them easier to manoeuvre, the four new trucks are now pulling the same original six-carriage trams through the attraction’s (almost literally) “backstage” route.
Along the way, guests can still discover action-packed sets including Catastrophe Canyon, Reign of Fire and, er, that’s about it. The (not particularly missed) Costuming workshop loop was removed during the construction of Toy Story Playland and is now occupied by La Place de Rémy, while the tour has had no genuine additions whatsoever since opening in 2002, despite several park masterplans in that time calling for improvement and expansion.
The Studio Backlot Tour at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida is similarly disappointing.
In fact, it might have been sensible to assume Disney would retire the attraction, ending the pretence that Walt Disney Studios Park is in any way a real working studio. The purchase of four new trucks would now seem to disprove that, at least for the foreseeable future.
Starting with the utterly pointless Dinotopia set and ending with Jeremy Irons’ ageing video commentary, come back next week for an article titled “100 Things Any Fan Would Change About Studio Tram Tour Before Replacing the Trucks”…
• Watch a complete on-ride video of Studio Tram Tour: Behind the Magic here
VIA @Disney_ParisEN (Twitter)
Wednesday, 4th June 2014
Ratatouille preview and pre-opening dates confirmed: The Adventure begins here
If you’re a Shareholder or an Annual Passholder, no doubt you’ve been going “Totalement Toquée” for a few weeks now, waiting to hear exactly when you’ll get your first chance to experience Ratatouille: The Adventure.
Putting an end to what, unsurprisingly, sounds like an onslaught of requests for information, Disneyland Paris has confirmed today the all-important dates.
In a brief notice, Annual Passport previews for 26th – 29th June 2014 are confirmed:
Due to a lot of requests, please note that there will indeed be Ratatouille previews for Annual Passholders (Dream, Fantasy, Francilien) from June 26 to 29.
More information about the registration process will be sent soon by the teams in charge.
Meanwhile, members of the Shareholders Club for Euro Disney S.C.A. were sent their full registration details this morning, with the “Actionnaires” event taking place on 28th June.
If you’re a member of the club, you should have received an email with the full details, though these are also available on the club’s official website under “Your Personal Space”.
Online registration for this event is mandatory, on a first-come-first-served basis, and must be completed no later than Monday, 23rd June 2014.
On the date, Saturday, 28th June, attendees will be able to check in from 9.30am at the entrance of Walt Disney Studios Park, with both the attraction and Bistrot Chez Rémy reserved for shareholders between 10am and 2.30pm (thanks to @Jorienvh_ for these details).
So, let’s recap all the Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy dates in full:
- 17th June 2014 onwards — Cast Member previews
- 21st – 22nd June 2014 — Grand Opening / Press Event weekend
- 26th – 29th June 2014 — Annual Passholder previews
- 28th June 2014 — Shareholders Club preview
- 10th July 2014 — Official Public Opening Date
All of which leaves a mighty space to fill of almost a fortnight between the last preview on 29th June and the official 10th July opening, during which we can surely expect some wider public “soft openings” — when regular park guests are invited to unofficially ride the attraction, allowing a final test and adjust phase before opening.
It can’t be stated so confidently that Bistrot Chez Rémy would be included in this, although you’d think Disneyland Paris would want to continue trialling that too — it’s spectacularly important that they get this restaurant right, first time, and the general public can often behave and react to concepts very differently than invited guests and Disney fans.
Regarding the release of preview dates, hopefully the teams involved at Disneyland Paris have learnt a lesson that guests prefer this information sooner, rather than later — say, a month in advance at the very least — especially when complicated travel plans and accommodation bookings from outside France have to be made.
So there we go, folks — now tell us below, when will your first “Ratmobile” ride be?
Tuesday, 3rd June 2014
Disneyland Paris Pin Trading May & June 2014 releases – Rats everywhere!
This month’s Disneyland Paris Pin Trading releases have an infestation of — you guessed it — rats. Beginning on 21st June with an “In 1 Month” pin, the tie-ins for Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy continue with three more open edition pins, a booster set and a lanyard on 28th June ahead of the 10th July opening.
There’s also the traditional Summer pin featuring The Little Mermaid, another new Disney Dreams! open edition, a limited Lady and the Tramp “Paris” dangler and a new entry in the now brilliantly huge “Attractions” series for Blanche-Neige et les Sept Nains.
Since last month’s releases were missed, see below for a May 2014 catch-up! Read More…
Tuesday, 3rd June 2014
Disneyland Paris Pin Trading May & June 2014 releases – Rats everywhere!
This month’s Disneyland Paris Pin Trading releases have an infestation of — you guessed it — rats. Beginning on 21st June with an “In 1 Month” pin, the tie-ins for Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy continue with three more open edition pins, a booster set and a lanyard on 28th June ahead of the 10th July opening.
There’s also the traditional Summer pin featuring The Little Mermaid, another new Disney Dreams! open edition, a limited Lady and the Tramp “Paris” dangler and a new entry in the now brilliantly huge “Attractions” series for Blanche-Neige et les Sept Nains.
Since last month’s releases were missed, see below for a May 2014 catch-up! Read More…
Monday, 2nd June 2014
Cast Member costumes for Ratatouille attraction and restaurant unveiled
Disneyland Paris formally unveiled the new Cast Member costumes for Ratatouille: The Adventure last week, resplendent with a rich style to make them perhaps the most luxurious in the whole of Walt Disney Studios Park.
Naturally, considering the theme of Ratatouille: L’Aventure Totalement Toquée de Rémy, the costumes of the Toon Studio attraction are closely matched to those of its adjoining restaurant, Bistrot Chez Rémy, with sumptuous gold and burgundy colours, bow ties and short-cut jackets for both ride operators and restaurant waiters alike.
Despite taking inspiration from swanky Parisian restaurant uniforms, the designs retain an important touch of whimsy with the cut of the jackets, the eccentric placement of buttons and those fun bow ties around everyone’s neck — a hint to the shape of Rémy’s whiskers, perhaps?
Disneyland Paris Ambassadors Antonella and Jonathan joined fellow Cast Members to model the new outfits.
One final fun detail, even here on the costumes: Ratatouille buttons!
