News / Disneyland Park

That awkward moment when… your shareholders’ Annual General Meeting is interrupted by a gang of 14 Disney characters and 10 dancers, jumping along to the latest high-energy parade number. Well, it has almost become an annual tradition! And so it was the shareholders, attending Friday’s meeting at the Disney’s Newport Bay Club Convention Centre, who got the very first listen to “Magic Everywhere!” — the new theme song for Disney Magic on Parade! and the 20th Anniversary as a whole.

Beginning “Yeah yeah yeah, celebrate the magic!”, the song, produced by Disneyland Paris music impresario Vasile Sirli, combines all the essential elements of a perfect Disney parade anthem. Rhyming couplets, references to storybooks, twinkly “pixie dust” sounds, it’s all there. The song also makes specific reference to “celebrating 20 years of joy and laughter”. Luckily for those unable to attend the meeting, the first play was captured on video (embedded below). What are your first impressions?

Accompanying the song, the small show also gave the audience a first look at the new “sorcerer”-themed costumes for Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Chip, Dale, Goofy and Pluto, as well as the new Blue Fairy who will help open the refreshed parade.

Video featuring “Magic Everywhere!” and full lyrics follow… Read More…

If you follow @DLRPToday on Twitter, you might have got an early look when the site briefly went live on Wednesday, but now it’s here to stay: Disneyland Paris has launched its official 20th Anniversary web pages! This new mini-site, designed as a separate section of the main website, is notably more compact than previous efforts, but that has only to be applauded: if Disneyland Paris are going to put effort and money into their online activity, it needs to be put into the inadequate main website itself. There are no useless mini-games, no disjointed attempts at “social” interaction, just the main 20th Anniversary events laid out in simple and appealing pages. Check them out here.

Pages for Disney Dreams!, Disney Magic on Parade! and Meet Mickey Mouse feature video clips spliced from the full-length promo video already available on YouTube, while Disney’s 20th Anniversary Celebration Train and the 20th Anniversary Extended Hours are also featured. The final page, “Videos & Live Posts”, simply features a YouTube video and a Facebook plugin. Simple and effective.

Surprisingly, after several years moving away from the increasingly unpopular format (last year’s Magical Moments Festival mini-site appeared to make a point of being entirely non-Flash based), these new pages still arrive fairly heavy in Flash animations, at least for desktop users. But switch to an iPad or iPhone, which notably snub the processor-hogging medium, and there’s a second surprise: the pages still work! Yes, a static version of the main menu has also been produced, for web browsers without Flash to fall back to. Even the videos have been encoded in iOS-friendly formats.

The extent of the Disneyland Paris website on an Apple iOS device; sales totalling 250 million+

All of which makes it even more absurd that, if you jump back to the main Disneyland Paris homepage — or indeed, any page on the rest of the website — you’ll be simply provided with a “Flash Plugin Required” message, and no back-up page at all. No links are even provided for the resort’s separate ticket or package booking systems, which don’t require Flash, potentially losing “armchair” visitors who would like to browse the site or book without firing up their PC.

• Look out for DLRP Magic!‘s own complete guide to the 20th Anniversary, launching soon!

The Disney Dreams! are well on their way, and the most anticipated element of this all-new nighttime spectacular surely has to be: the fountains. A show made of jumping water in the castle moat once seemed a thing of fantasy but, as these latest photos from DisneyGazette.fr confirm, it’s fast becoming a reality. Technical equipment low litters the entire moat of Sleeping Beauty Castle, dotting its length with mysterious brown boxes and running a ring of water jets around its perimeter.

Even as rainwater has frozen solid on the drained bed, work hurries ahead to install the piece of this 20th Anniversary spectacular. So what exactly are we looking at? As expected, it’s a more modest array of wet effects than the enormous (and almost entirely water-based) World of Color, and the fountains installed so far can roughly be grouped into three types of kit…

First up: those long, rectangular boxes, with a bronze spout poking out one end, will be the show’s main fountains. Creating a vertical wall of water running across the width of Central Plaza, extending all the way from the entrance to La Tanière du Dragon to the wishing well and Le Théâtre du Château, they will likely be illuminated from below using a ring of colour-changing LED lights fixed around the spout. There’s a chance some of these 40-or-so fountains will have different capabilities, perhaps the ability to move, as their set-up seems to slightly differ in one or two places.

Meanwhile the moat, usually a protective ring around its neighbouring fortress itself, has been encircled by curious and very long rods of smaller spouts. Connected via a single pipe and tube, there are three of these installations with two on the left side of the drawbridge (either side of the Dragon’s bridge) and one larger array on the right (seen in the first photo above).

Likely to be much lower powered, these spouts will probably be used to add “bulk” to the base of the water display, either as jets of water or more likely a mist effect. Rather than a line of solitary fountains shooting up from the castle moat, this should create a more magical haze of water coming to life in the moat, which can itself be illuminated to add dramatic effect.

Finally, two huge brown boxes at the far ends, either side of the display, are easiest to decipher. These high-powered jets come in two sets of six fountains, their workings specially enclosed as one complete unit. Apparently capable of shooting at least as high as the castle itself (!) we’re guessing thanks to compressed air, another technique brought in from World of Color, they are arranged as five fountains around a central, tallest jet. These incredible fountains were highlight in pink on the show scene model, below, revealed in the recent promo video.

Again, rather than having the castle stand solitary, these tall jets matching its height will help to “bulk out” the spectacle, making it a far more impressive and immersive experience.

A major point of difference with World of Color is that all these fountains have been fixed directly to the concrete bed of the moat. In California, the vast expanse of fountains is laid out across two platforms capable of being lifted out of the water for maintenance, rather than having to drain the entire Paradise Bay lagoon. In Paris, luckily, draining a smaller, shallower fairytale moat is much less daunting task.

If only the same could be said for the challenge now: correctly wiring up and testing each of these new fountains, in time for April 1st!

MORE PHOTOS DisneyGazette.fr

We’re dedicating this week on DLRP Today to Disney Dreams!, the main event of the 20th Anniversary that is set to transform the end of your day in the parks from 1st April 2012. But this hotly-anticipated new nighttime spectacular, from master of the artform Steve Davison, has already created a surprise or two in Disneyland Park. Following several months of mysterious ground works, leading a trail across Central Plaza, trees were completely cleared from a wooded area on the Frontierland side of Main Street, U.S.A. in mid September last year. By December, all was revealed: or was it?

On Wednesday 7th, a sharp, square building suddenly appeared on the plot, in a not-too-fetching shade of green to match the construction walls around it. “Quelle horreur!” we wailed — but only for 24 hours. In a spark of pre-fabricated Imagineering magic, the building — a grand new show control centre for Disney Dreams! — had taken on a whole new look the very next day. Just compare the two photos below by @InsideDLParis:

Now wood-panelled in green with crisp burgundy details, it certainly stands out but looks perfectly at home here on the fringes of Main Street. Capturing all the classic motifs of the street’s turn-of-the-20th-Century architecture, it has the elaborately-framed windows, porch awning and a curved copper roof, complete with spiky ironwork and bulbous flairs cut into its carpentry.

Though perfectly functional — check out that bank of seven huge windows on the front, giving an unparalleled view over the Disney Dreams! “arena” — this beauty has more than enough details to make it a decorative addition to the plaza, too. The circular window nestled in the roof is a delicate finishing touch, and the cabin could look even better in the warmer months ahead if softened up with flowers or more greenery. It’s certainly a huge upgrade in the former show control booth for Central Plaza Stage (pictured below), which has been blocking the pavement for several years. Removing this uninspired obstruction will free up even more space to watch the new show.

But how does it fit into the “story”? With its wooden trellis arch and location right in the middle of Main Street’s Central Plaza park, perhaps we could imagine it’s the gardener’s lodge — rather than a high-tech show control booth soon to be sending fountains, fireworks and lasers soaring.

It has already had the chance to test some elements of Disney Dreams!, at least. The still below, from last month’s promo video, shows a technician lining up the numerous projectors which will map HD video onto the towers and turrets of Sleeping Beauty Castle using the state-of-the-art “Hippotizer” system.

Come April 1st, the tension inside will surely belie the gentile appearance, as it will all rest on this unsuspecting little park lodge to launch Disney Dreams! off without hitch…

MORE PHOTOS Disney Dreams! Control Booth (Photos Magiques)

Want to get an early look at the reborn Disney’s Once Upon a Dream Parade, due to officially premiere 1st April 2012? Those brave enough to visit in the late March transition period will be duly rewarded: the new Disney Magic on Parade! is reportedly scheduled to begin performances from Monday, 26th March. This is, of course, unconfirmed by Disneyland Paris, but similar events in recent years have also had a “soft opening” or bedding-in period in the week prior to their launch. Radically redesigned opening and closing floats will be seen for the first time, while the new theme song will make its park debut.

Titled “Magic Everywhere!”, the tune is around four minutes long and was apparently put together by a team who have previously worked on several Disney Channel hits. Along with the brighter floats and costumes, this certainly suggests the revitalised parade will be aiming for a punchier style than the more refined Once Upon a Dream Parade, which originally launched for the 15th Anniversary in 2007.

Meanwhile, though concept art revealed in a promo video showed two of the new princess carriages being designed to carry Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella and Snow White, it has now been confirmed that modern favourite Belle, of Beauty and the Beast, will join them on a carriage of her own. Quite right, too! Less popular will be the decision to cut the current “Dreams of Power” villain unit completely, its last performance being 25th March. There is suggestion it could be added back as a Halloween extra but, as one of the most impressive floats of the original parade, it will be sorely missed.

VIA @InsideDLParis (Twitter)

That’s “Disney Dreams!” to you and me. Spain got a first look at the new 20th Anniversary commercials this week, with a 30-second TV spot featuring Mickey Mouse guiding a family from the streets around the Eiffel Tower to Disneyland Paris. Where, with Sleeping Beauty Castle illuminated and characters flying through the skies, they’re duly treated to an “eyeful” of the park’s new nighttime spectacular.

With much artistic licence, we see Captain Hook duelling with Peter Pan around the castle’s spire, then Crush and a group of Finding Nemo sea turtles “swimming” across the sky. The new “Second Star to the Right” effect, shining brightly from the top window of the castle, is featured throughout. Like most adverts in recent years, the park scenes appear to have been shot on a Main Street looking suspiciously like that of California or Hong Kong. But here, the lights of the buildings appear to glow that bit brighter — perhaps a clue to the enigmatic Main Street, U.S.A. Celebrates event advertised in brochures?

If your español is patchy, or you’d just like to see this on your own television screen, we can confirm that the resort’s 20th Anniversary TV campaign will begin in the UK around 24th February and continue right through to 24th June. Initially, this will be in the form of 10-second “tactical” adverts, designed to create word of mouth. With Mickey seen in this advert near the Eiffel Tower, there’s some suggestion the Disney characters could be pictured at landmarks across Europe, “gathering up” guests for the impending anniversary, to give the continent-spanning campaign a true sense of its own scale.

Video of the first 30-second commercial follows below… Read More…

“Everything neat and pretty?” Well, not quite. Although some of the wraps came down from Fantasy Festival Stage last week, revealing the former show venue’s new colour palette, it is emerging that its new purpose as a permanent Mickey Mouse meet ‘n’ greet won’t begin right at the launch of the 20th Anniversary as expected. Instead, according to @InsideDLParis, Mickey will don his magician’s cape ready for an opening on 17th May 2012. This is unconfirmed, publicly, by Disneyland Paris.

However, murmurs that the new “attraction” might be delayed were compounded by the curious, vague “Opening Spring 2012” notation added to the recent 20th Anniversary promo video. A mid-May opening places it, conveniently, right in the middle of that timeframe (and puts the pressure on Disney Dreams!, more than ever, to impress on April 1st). And what for the Mouse in the meantime? A “provisional” version of the meet ‘n’ greet could take place at Woody’s Roundup Village, reports admin Mouetto of Disney Central Plaza. This would be similar — but surely better — than the cheap temporary tent which was the Princess Pavilion, in all but name, for six months of the Magical Moments Festival.

The exterior transformation of the stage hasn’t been too dramatic thus far, with just the old “Fantasy Festival Stage” signage removed and new colours on the awnings notable in this photo by Max Fan (see how it used to look here). A bold “Mickey Mouse” red has replaced the green around the sides, while an interesting pastel shade has been used on the old show control booth in the middle.

VIA Max Fan (DCP), @InsideDLParis (Twitter), Mouetto (DCP)

With a workforce of over 14,500 employed at the resort and even more certified Cast Members beyond, it’s no wonder this new design for Disneyland Paris’ 20th Anniversary name tags has quickly done the rounds online. Every single member of the “cast” will soon be switching their Magical Moments Festival name tag for this new 2012 design, neatly fitting the hemisphere of the 20th logo into its standard lapel design. It’s just one of endless pieces of miscellanea which will be taking on a special look for the upcoming birthday year, just as we saw for the 15th Anniversary.

For fans (including those on the Disney payroll!), these all create perfect “souvenirs” to chart the changing styles and aspirations of the resort across the years. On our sister site Euro Souvenirland, you can already find examples of the 5th Anniversary name tags from 1997 and the millennium name tags from 2000. There are numerous more variations to be found that we’d love to put into a “name tag timeline”, but we need your help! If you can provide photographs or scans of old name tags in your collection, send them over to contributions@eurosouvenirland.com!

PHOTO Jean-Louis Gold VIA Dlrp Express (Facebook)