Sunday, 6th February 2011
So you’ve just booked an amazing dream holiday to Disneyland Paris and what’s the first thing you don’t do? Tell your kids. Disney have cottoned on to this slightly sadistic parenting trend with a new website contest, Disneymotion, last month requesting parents send in video footage of the moment they finally tell their children they’re off to meet Mickey Mouse — or any fun “moments” they filmed whilst in the parks. It’ll all come together with (in the United Kingdom at least) a joint campaign for both Disneyland Paris and Walt Disney World launching a week today, 13th February, with the taglines “When are you going to tell them?” and “2 Destinations, one single emotion”. This is a separate campaign to the dedicated, though similarly themed, Magical Moments Festival ads which will follow, and is one of the few times Disney has pushed these two resorts together in joint marketing.
For now, the brief teaser trailer above, intended only as a rough promo video, gives an idea of the theme Disneyland Paris hopes to play on to bring visitors to the resort this year. For 2011, the emotion of childhood is being heaped on heavily, with the main tagline “The magic begins the moment you tell them” aiming to strike a chord with parents. Ever since the 15th Anniversary they’ve sought to bring more families with young children to the resort, attempting to defy the idea that parents should “wait until their kids are a bit older” with offers such as Kids Under 7 Stay & Play Free and more attractions for younger children, whilst the annual stream of limited-time “theme years” tries to give another reason for us to visit now, rather than wait.
Friday, 4th February 2011
Just a couple of weeks ago we were celebrating the concrete core of Disney Village’s new Earl of Sandwich restaurant reaching its full height, and now the roof is already on! From high above on PanoraMagique, fan “manuchao” snapped this shot showing the simple rectangular steel structure already in place on site, showing the full dimensions of the future counter service deli. Curved pieces of steel for the circular corner section are also in place, as is the floor of the indoor mezzanine level, which will cover only a portion of the floorspace to leave a more open and airy entrance.
In other fast food news at the Village, admin Mouetto on Disney Central Plaza forum shares that a 10% discount is now offered for Annual Passport holders at both Starbucks Coffee and McDonald’s — although hardly advertised, as Disney naturally fear it will impact on their own business. Apparently, the same reduction has also been possible for a while at outside-run King Ludwig’s Castle and Rainforest Cafe. Saving euro cents on your Big Mac and Frappuccino — another AP perk! Now, will the Earl offer the same on a toasted Full Montagu?
Thursday, 3rd February 2011
It’s a big year for renewals at Disneyland Paris, as the resort heads towards its 20th Anniversary and the time comes to start refreshing some of those original developments — particularly the hotels. Undergoing a huge renovation project of its 1,011 rooms is Disney’s Sequoia Lodge, where the changes go a little further than just new flatscreen, digital TVs to replace the positively ancient old tube boxes. The sedate, Antoine Grumbach-designed hotel is being “Disneyfied” with a lightly-spread new theme: Bambi. The 1942 Disney classic can now be seen in the wallpaper border and animation art on the walls, perfectly complementing the existing light fittings with their deer motifs.
These photos posted on the official Disneyland Paris Twitter feed show the makeover to be a warm and inviting refresh, with crisp white bedspreads and “Disney” additions that are inoffensive to the American national parks theme, in the same restrained style as the Disney touches over at Disneyland Hotel. The new television cabinets have been specially designed for the hotel while green and gold tones bring a more earthy, organic look compared to the old rooms.
With Pixar Animation Studios’ Cars continuing to be featured in similar touches at Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe next door, where will the “Disneyfication” of the Disney Hotels be seen next? Back in 1992, then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner was keen for the six main hotels to be seen as architectural statements as much as magical, “Disney” places to stay. Now, 20 years on, the resort is seeing the need to add characters here and there and — probably more crucially — update the décor and room services to compete with partner hotels and help to justify the leap in price up to a more “Disney” Disney Hotel.
Tuesday, 25th January 2011
Over the next year, the plaza at the heart of Disneyland Paris will be transformed in its biggest way since the opening of Walt Disney Studios Park — and here’s the first floor! Steel supports have now been pieced together to lay out the footprint of World of Disney, a new flagship store at the entrance of Disney Village, after the temporary top soil on the site was scraped off and trees replanted. This isn’t your average building site, either: the store is being built right on top of the high speed TGV train lines, on the huge concrete box built over the tracks during the resort’s construction, adding some unique challenges and complications.
These steel ground floor supports are very different to the method over at Earl of Sandwich, for example, and that huge box tower looming over the site is a ventilation shaft for the platforms below. The floor plan of the store narrowly avoids a second ventilation duct in the photo, above.
Final concept art for the store emerged last Spring, showing a slightly revised exterior which appears to reference a more Californian Art Deco — rather similar in style to the Franklin Department Store façade not far away on the Studios’ Hollywood Boulevard and very, very different to the existing World of Disney stores in Orlando and Anaheim.
It is expected the store, anchored by a huge blue globe topped by Tinkerbell and due to open in 2012, will completely replace the existing Disney Store in Disney Village, possibly triggering a series of refurbishments and replacements along the Village’s main thoroughfare.
Friday, 21st January 2011
Our third “theme year” in a row doesn’t actually have any definable theme like the current New Generation, but Disney Magical Moments Festival beginning 6th April will bring to the parks a new trend of character “happenings”, as they’re awkwardly translated. According to Character Central Blog, even Disney’s Once Upon a Dream Parade won’t be free from a little Magical Moments “plussing”, with six new costumes including a swarm of bees behind the Winnie the Pooh unit and a new interactive show stop which will invite children to step up and don small costumes to dance with the characters (or for Toy Story, run around with stick horses resembling Bullseye) — a similar idea to that which greeted the launch of The Wonderful World of Disney Parade in 1998.
Replacing the rather good Disney Showtime Spectacular on Central Plaza Stage will be another creation of the random Disney show name generator, Mickey’s Magical Celebration, this year said to feature a more classic range of characters such as Merlin, the Fairy Godmother, the Three Good Fairies and Mickey in two different costumes (surely including that Sorcerer outfit, rarely seen in Paris), with just one performance daily each evening. Interestingly the Genie will apparently appear as a real “face” character, something only seen before at the Disney California Adventure stage musical. More conventional will be the fourth (yes, really) reworking of the park’s Casey Jr. parade train, to this year be known as Disney Dance Express and exclusively feature the VIP team of Mickey, Minnie and friends. Rather than stopping for meet ‘n’ greets, however, the train is this year said to be stopping for a live show in the middle of Main Street akin to Magic Kingdom’s “Move It! Shake It!! Celebrate It!!! Street Party” — with fewer exclamation marks but still a live human host, dancers and possibly imported music.
On the subject of those “happenings”, Character Central has no word on the Peter Pan event but does report that a Jungle Book event will feature the park’s long-running African Tam Tams group alongside King Louie and Baloo. This is apparently in addition to new static figurines of these characters, similar to those of WALL-E and EVE which arrived in Discoveryland late last year. A new, live meet ‘n’ greet for Aladdin is also said to arrive near the back of Adventureland Bazaar, while Rapunzel and Flynn from Disney’s Tangled could be given a more permanent home near The Old Mill.
Friday, 21st January 2011
A great surprise was awaiting fans in Storybook Land at the back of Fantasyland in late December, and not just that Le Pays des Contes de Fées, the Storybookland Canal Boats, was open in the middle of Winter. No, the attraction has finally got Tangled up in a 21st Century Disney tale — both the studio’s first computer-animated and 3D fairytale, which finally hits cinemas in the UK exactly a week from now after already proving a big hit in both the US and France (where at Disneyland Paris guests have been able to meet the live characters since November).
The canal has always had a Rapzunel tower, but now the old landmark has been completely replaced with a brand new model, faithful to the Disney animator’s final design from the new film. The new tower stands much taller on the miniaturised cliffside than the original, which had a more whimsically home-made look, bringing in a vibrant indigo roof and more intricate, colourful detailing. The smaller-scaled tangle of Rapunzel’s hair hanging down from the tower even has a tiny model of hero Flynn Rider climbing up to save the damsel. Tangled is now by far the most recent Disney film featured in the attraction and, in fact, the whole land, its closest contender being 1992’s Aladdin.
Thursday, 20th January 2011
Notes from a Shareholders roundtable meeting at Disney’s Hotel New York back in December suggest some changes to the Passeport Annuel programme could be on the way this year. The first has already taken place: the launch of an official fourth ticket, the Passeport Annuel Classic. Primarily given away free via other companies a promotional tool (to “convert a new population to annual passports”, as the roundtable notes put it), the ticket offers 277 days of park access within each year (that’s 88 blockout dates). Where this gets interesting is that the ticket reportedly went on general sale at the parks on 17th December, costing €98. That’s just one Euro less than the freely-available Passeport Annuel Francilien, which offers a full 300 days in the parks. Confused? Though the Classic has yet to be listed on the official AP pages, the price point and the offering would make it a likely successor to the Francilien, whose name causes confusion (it’s not just for those in the Paris region) and whose advantages are arguably just a little too generous for the price, compared to regular tickets. Discontinuing the Francilien in favour of the Classic would even-up the benefits of each pass. We’ll see…
At the other end of the scale, the Passeport Annuel Dream already gives holders some fantastic discounts and year-round access, but has jumped in price a little lately to €199 after several years at €179. This is still a real steal compared to similar APs at other Disney resorts — and even Paris’ own top-level tickets in years gone by — but the roundtable notes (PDF) reveal that an even more “prestigious” and interestingly, “personalised”, pass could be developed, offering even more benefits. What benefits those may be exactly is unclear — the return of that Disney Hotel parking privilege is unlikely.
Finally, and what could be the biggest change of all: subscription payments. At the moment, each Annual Passport is sold as a one-off ticket, and though the holder should receive an offer to renew at the end of their pass, it’s a considerable hassle for the customer (particularly if you don’t speak French or don’t live in France) and must present quite a drop-off of potential on-going customers for Disney. The meeting notes state that a number of improvements are being studied regarding customer relations, which could lead to “development of tailor-made offers, loyalty programmes and payment by monthly instalments”.
This same idea is currently being discussed quite actively for the American parks, and would mean that an Annual Passport effectively becomes an open-ended ticket to the parks, paid directly from your bank account each month with no need to queue at the Passeport Annuel Bureau each year or send off any renewal forms. Presumably passholders would still need to pay for, say, their first 12 months up-front or be locked into something resembling a phone contract, but in the long term this would surely be very popular for most frequent visitors and fans. Your thoughts, passholders?
Wednesday, 19th January 2011
British newspaper the Portsmouth News has reported a distressing incident which took place with a local visitor on the walkway between the main Disneyland Paris parking lot and the Disney Parks. Going back to his car during the day, the 39-year old man was twice pestered by a “ticket tout” for his park tickets, presumably so that they could be sold on by the tout for profit. Upon refusing a second time, returning to the parks, the visitor was apparently punched repeatedly in the face and left needing emergency surgery to remove two teeth and a piece of his jawbone.
Fans will be well-aware that this area and all around the resort’s train station is officially classified as public land, outside the control of Disneyland Paris. It’s through this “loophole” that the area immediately outside Disney Village is almost always filled with unpleasant vendors, selling cheap gifts such as wind-up kittens, plastic models of the Eiffel Tower and even potentially dangerous laser pens. Will this attack on a guest finally convince Disney and the French government that something needs to be worked out with the security and status of this incredibly busy, sensitive spot of land?
According to the article, a Disney spokesperson said: “This incident took place on public land, which Disneyland Paris security is not permitted to police. We continue to work closely with the authorities to ensure an incident like this does not happen again.
Those authorities should be aware that, even on a good day, cheap vendors don’t sell a great image of France to millions of international visitors. Being punched in the face is an altogether different league. It could happen anywhere, but it shouldn’t happen at Disneyland.
Wednesday, 19th January 2011
Could one of the main attractions advertised for this year’s Magical Moments Festival not actually see its doors open until the 20th Anniversary? Reports originating on Disney Central Plaza forum suggest that Disney Princesses: A Royal Invitation is now due to open in 2012, rather than April of this year. The “attraction” replaces the former World Chorus post-show of “it’s a small world”, which closed last August to prepare for this invasion of tiaras and dresses. A small walk-through area, originally part of France Télécom’s sponsorship, it featured national landmarks with small animations playing in their windows, depicting children around the world uniting through technology.
While it will be sad to lose that delightful Paris exclusive, the new attraction doesn’t sound all bad. As Kristof on magicforum shared, it’s designed by Walt Disney Imagineering — rather than the park’s own Entertainment department — “and the area will be open even when there are no Princesses inside, since there will be interactive elements all over the place.” In fact, the concept seems to share much similarity with an attraction announced just today for Walt Disney World’s New Fantasyland project.
To quote the press release, “In Princess Fairytale Hall, Aurora, Cinderella and other Disney princesses, such as Tiana and Rapunzel, will greet guests in their new home, an elegant royal court.” This new addition in Florida will have a much bigger footprint, as it takes over the current Snow White’s Scary Adventures dark ride, and arrives in place of the several separate princess encounters originally announced, but is due to open in late 2012. A connection, or just coincidence?
Tuesday, 18th January 2011
Disneyland Paris really knows how to get a reaction from its fans, launching this fantastically cute photo onto its official Twitter feed of a special assistance guide dog meeting Pluto himself in the parks. And around the world, the collective “Awww!” reaches a pitch that, well, only dogs can hear. Shhh: the photo actually comes from Walt Disney World, taken by Gina on DisBoards.
Social media sites were finally discovered by Disneyland Paris last year, with their inherited Facebook page just having topped 1 million fans. Actual postings are often a little cold compared to their American cousins, perhaps language and the lack of a utility such as the great Disney Parks Blog making it difficult to share worthwhile news and content. There are two Twitter accounts, in French and English (which posted the photo above), but also a third main account (which didn’t). The best so far is probably their YouTube account, hosting some great “making of” and history videos.
