My Wish List: What I Want From Josh D’Amaro, Disney's New CEO

The man with the mega-watt smile and the infamous wardrobe is now CEO of the company we love and some of us love to hate. Fan of the parks and of Imagineering, "nice guy" Josh D'Amaro takes the helm of The Walt Disney Company today. An expanded Villains land aside, I'm not sure what he'll bring, but I know what I want. After giving the announcement some time to ruminate, here's my wish list as a theme park enthusiast.

Request: Return the Theme Parks and Resorts to Their Best Days

Reality Check: Josh will have much more on his plate than just theme parks and cruise lines. Still, this should be a priority as they are currently the biggest money makers for the company. This has nothing to do with the cast members and everything to do with providing real value for guests' hard earned dollars. Stop nickel and diming those who come to the properties for a relaxing, fun-filled vacation. Josh, you can pick and choose what changes, so think it through and take immediate action.

Recent Action Working Against Him: Do I really need to mention all the price increases??? If I do, this means the executives are even worse off than I thought when it comes to treating your paying customers as guests. 

Recipe for a Quick Win: Bring back some of the perks that have been taken away, and bring them back for free. In case the Company leaders have forgotten, that means at no additional charge to your customers already paying so much for a room at the resorts or for a park ticket. 

Bonus idea: Lower the cost of a character breakfast. Nothing says greed like this. Seeing Disney characters should be a perk of your park ticket and not an excuse to fleece the faithful flock. AND giving guests another choice or two for a quick service meal would help alleviate the frustration with the generally awful list of meals available at a fairly reasonable price.

Request: Let the Hard Core Disney Fans Know You're Listening

Reality Check: Josh has to listen to the Board and the investors as well. However, keeping the fans happy and keeping them coming back for more is something that just makes sense. It breeds long term success and not just short term gain.

Recent Action Working Against Him: Removing Rivers of America and taking the Muppets out and putting them back in where they do not belong.

Recipe for a Quick Win:  Two important steps here and one bonus idea. 1- Green light a new and exciting, thoroughly charming adventure with Figment and Dreamfinder. By doing this, Josh, you will instantly put lovers of the charming purple dragon and his mentor in a good mood and earn instant credibility with hard core Disney park fans (like me) that think the best Imagineering days are behind them. 2- Bite the bullet and give us a brand new Tomorrowland in Walt's park! It is a huge disgrace that original land of the future is a hollow shell of the great, big, beautiful 1967 version.  3- Follow it up by placing a version of Muppet*Vision 3D into the same courtyard as Rock 'n' Roller Coaster. It's all as easy as 1-2-3. I know, I know it's not, but you're the boss now, so make it happen.

Bonus idea: Bring back some of the entertainment that's been closed since pandemic times. You know, that big empty theater in Disney California Adventure? That'd be a good start.

Request: Encourage Imagineering to Tell Original Stories

Reality Check: Intellectual Property use will always be on the burner when it comes to theme park expansion and enhancements. Instead of bad films making poor choices for attractions, work the other direction and save a great concept for the park, then turn it into a film. Would this work? Hard to say. It's a gamble, but maybe it is one worth taking.

Recent Action Working Against Him: About every Pixar film in recent release. And some lackluster recent attractions. Want some help? Take a long, hard look at how the Company screwed up Tiana's Bayou Adventure and never let something like that happen again. Inviting in one of your greatest Imagineers, Tony Baxter, to coach the project team and then blow off his suggestions is a misfire if not an outright disgrace. The Princess and the Frog is a terrific film with incredible characters and great music! It should never have been wasted on such a poorly scripted plot for the attraction. Aside from the last scene, the entire execution feels off. Need more to consider as further evidence? How about dumping the original memorable trilogy film of Star Wars for something else for Galaxy's Edge? What was everyone thinking? Certainly, someone in the building had to say it to the team planning it all. Well, at least Disneyland is going to try to fix some of the mistakes. Do I need to talk about Avengers Campus?

Recipe for a Quick Win: None. Brainstorm, innovate, work at it until you get something very, very good. Can it be done? Walt did it. You probably can as well! By chance if the movie comes first, don't wait decades to come up with a park attraction built on it.

Audio-Animatronic Olaf Teaches Us to Draw at Disney's Hollywood Studios

Coming at the end of Summer this year, an Audio-Animatronic Olaf, the lovable snowman from Frozen, will be teaching guests of all ages how to draw animated characters. You'll find him inside the refreshed Magic of Disney Animation, the courtyard that was once home to Star Wars characters. This is a more fitting use of that space now that Galaxy's Edge is open. I can't tell you how happy this change makes me! In a season where the last couple of years Disney Imagineering- the executives actually- were reducing if not eliminating the number of Audio-Animatronic in the parks, I never thought I'd see a small attraction use one. Good job, Disney! Smart move in your part!

(Art copyright The Walt Disney Company.)

Notable and Quotable: Michael Eisner

“I'm not wild about the fact that it is so expensive now to go to Disneyland or Disney World.”

                 Michael Eisner, Former CEO of The Walt Disney Company

Neither are we, Michael. And this is only the beginning of what he has to say to Graham Bensinger of In Depth.  

Should we even care about what Eisner says? Yes, and incoming leader Josh D'Amaro should pat attention. Eisner's the man who brought a second golden age to Disney animation as well as theme parks. Think The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King. On the park/ themed entertainment side, he brought us Disney-MGM Studios, Disney's Animal Kingdom, Pleasure Island and Euro Disney aka Disneyland Paris. This all includes Splash Mountain, Star Tours, and the Indiana Jones Adventure attractions among many others. (Yes, he brought us Disney California Adventure, but I'll forgive him for that, since he also brought Tokyo DisneySea!)

Watch this segment of the interview below:

The Late Great Walt Disney Company 1923 - 2023

Greed, power plays, and a loss of great original content have killed The Walt Disney Company. But what a company it once was! From the creation of Mickey Mouse to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to modern classics like Tangled and Frozen, movie goers could count on consistently excellent films. The exceptions were few and far between, and even those such as Alice in Wonderland gained respect in the years following its initial release. 

Even the once wonderful Pixar has lost its way. What are we up to now, Toy Story 13? The acquisitions of Pixar, Lucasfilm, and Marvel may be wise business decisions, but the original imaginative and very compelling content from these companies has been traded in for movies designed to drive streaming subscriptions and merchandise sales - to the detriment of what made these franchises so beloved in the first place. Pixar used to be the modern pinnacle of creativity. Now, it's just another animated film company. Having "Marvel Fatigue" was something I never expected.

The theme parks are as crowded as ever, and the Company is right there to fleece the guests by demanding more money in order to have a full and satisfying park experience. Lightning Lane, Genie+, and its ilk exist to create a caste system of guests. Disney corporate can talk all they want about equity, but when it comes down to it, it's all about the bucks, and they are talking out of both sides of their mouth. 

It was once leaked that Disneyland research revealed guests felt they had a full day, a worth the money experience, if they got on nine or ten attractions. All you have to do is look at the vastly underdeveloped third (Disney's Hollywood Studios) and fourth (Disney's Animal Kingdom) parks at Walt Disney World to see the suits running the show are standing still behind this calculation. 

It's a very sad day when Tokyo Disney Resort- a company run by the Japanese- maintains higher quality show and more stellar attractions than the parks in the U.S.A.  (Today May 1 is the anniversary of the 1989 grand opening of Disney-MGM Studios. The largest post ever written on this blog looks at the park's history. Read it here.) It's an even sadder day when we see the Walt Disney Company kneeling before Mother China, a country known for vast human rights abuses, just to get a piece of the money pot via Shanghai Disneyland.

Disney Imagineering is hamstrung instead of released to create. The bungled Epcot revisioning tells the story clearly. Universal Creative is turning out better attractions more quickly. The coming Epic Universe will again show they can hold their own with the house Walt built... and guests can have a great theme park vacation without all the unnecessary pre-planning and add-ons that are required when visiting Walt Disney World. I'm not even mentioning the great resort hotels of all types for more than a third less than what you'll pay on Disney property.

Wherever you stand on the political spectrum, there are no winners when it comes to Disney getting involved. Robert Iger, Bob Chapek, and others like them think Disney fandom will get stronger when their choices divide their audience?! Foolish thinking at best. In house fighting is just as bad! Quit the showboating and get back to your original business. Give me the first ten Michael Eisner years any day.

So, Rest in Peace, Walt Disney Company. The one Walt Disney built is dead even if the name remains. I'll pick and choose where my dollars go instead of purchasing animated movie tickets for opening day, park memorabilia, and other experiences like the old days. And I'm not the only one.

Bob Out, Bob In

Well my phone lit up last night when the news of Bob Chapek being replaced by Robert Iger was announced. Beyond a temporary jump in stock price, what will this bring? From a theme park lover perspective, what we need is a man with the interests and skills and vision of a first decade Michael Eisner. The same hold true for Disney's live action film division. 

I have less hope for Disney animation as they've been churning out good but not great features for years now- both Disney branded and Pixar. Marvel's not much better and Star Wars seems to struggle as well. Creativity is what fuels the company, but that's been lost. 

Elsewhere, Imagineering needs freedom to create and a huge boost in morale. But the old second generation pros are mostly gone, leaving a team that needs much work to excel. Will Walt Disney World begin to be magical again? It better do something with Epic Universe on the way.  Disneyland remains the heart and soul of the parks. Honestly, Shanghai Disneyland was a vanity project that's now biting them where it hurts. Epcot's a mess, and California Adventure is moving backwards.

Next year should prove very interesting.

 

The Amazing Disappearing Disney Article II

Catch it while you can. This one article is bound to disappear soon as well, but judge for yourself...

Or read it below, written by Gary Snyder on Medium:

"Oh Mickey.
Just after midnight on March 20, 2019, rendered in perhaps his most famous role as The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, Mickey Mouse sat square in the middle of a new corporate landing page for the world to take in all that is now the Walt Disney Company. To his immediate left, the affable ambassador of not merely a corporate leviathan but of America itself was bordered by Marvel’s Deadpool. To his right, Lucasfilm’s Lando Calrissian. And just above the word “Disney,” over the ubiquitous mouse, was an image of Avatar’s Jake Sully and Neytiri.

The jarring juxtaposition of images aside, each story behind those three pieces of intellectual property — now part of the Disney vault — runs counter to the core mission of the company’s eponymous founder. Far from family entertainment, they arc from a degenerate mercenary drawn from the world of Marvel Comics to a human trafficker in the Star Wars canon to the architects of genocide as James Cameron’s Avatar took corporatocracy to the extreme of the sci-fi realm.

But, beyond the $244 billion media company that exists in its current form less as a product of creative ambition and more as the result of by-the-numbers acquisitions, there is the veneer of that name: Walt Disney. Still today, more than a half of a century after his death, it implies something. If it is Disney, it is quality. If it is Disney, it is family-friendly.

If it is Disney, it can be trusted.

Only, as the Walt Disney Company surveyed the cyber-scape of a post-September 11th world in the early aughts, its corporate overlords began to realize the company was poorly positioned as traditional media in a then-new click-to-publish atmosphere where anyone with an Internet connection had the potential to turn a carefully crafted public relations campaign into the current-day equivalent of a meme. And, for the first time, Disney found itself on the receiving end of searing criticism from its most loyal fans while, at the same time, roiling from the failed launch of a second theme park across from the original Disneyland.

Enter Al Lutz. An unremarkable, meek if passionate former recording industry executive who gained a following in the early days of online engagement with Usenet, Internet newsgroups where everyday folks could share and amplify their opinions without the glass ceilings and filters or credential-minded gatekeepers of major media’s domain.

Known for “The D-I-G,” or the Disneyland Information Guide, Lutz began his online life as a resource for individuals who were planning a trip to Anaheim, California. Often, where Disney had failed to make up-to-date information on the park available online, he would deliver a just-as-it-is breakdown of everything from park hours to attraction closings to dining and lodging options.
He also would post sometimes harsh criticism of the failings of Disney’s management with regard to the park and, while regularly mocked for mentioning matters as trivial to some as peeling paint and burned out light bulbs, Lutz had earned his bona fides among Disney’s most ardent fans of its theme parks and the company itself by being a reliable, and remarkably accurate, font of information.
This presented a problem for Team Disney Anaheim, where the feet-on-the-ground operations are based, and in the highest reaches of Burbank at the Walt Disney Company’s headquarters off Buena Vista Street. As Lutz had not only grabbed the cyber-tethers of the still nascent online fan community who would wait for an update from ‘their’ man in the field, he had increasingly become the turn-to critic mainstream journalists would go to for a quote on the company.

Complaining about chipped paint on the facade of a dressed-up carnival ride in Fantasyland was one thing, being cited as an authority by the Los Angeles Times was something entirely different.

As Disney’s California Adventure opened in February of 2001 to a less-than-enthusiastic response, Lutz became an entrenched voice of discontent. From behind the screen of his computer, he lashed out at executives like theme park chief Paul Pressler, the target of his online campaign “Promote Paul Pressler!,” with energy anew over the perceived neglect of what had become, to him and his followers, their Disneyland.

Except now, it was the Disneyland Resort. With a new resort hotel, a shopping and dining area, a massive parking structure and major infrastructure improvements in what had been named the Anaheim Resort District. And, aside from the significant expenditure by Disney, the reputation of the very company whose founder is credited as having invented the theme park found itself being held to account for what Burbank was having to admit was, in its best light, a missed opportunity with Disney’s California Adventure. More aptly framed, this was the failure of its long awaited expansion.

Among fans and Disney executives alike, there was no bigger name than Al Lutz. Soft as the exterior was, this almost first of his kind online personality hit hard. As Dave Gardetta wrote in Los Angeles Magazine of Disney’s most well-known blogger, “He’s its Walter Winchell.”

Enter George Kalogridis. A career employee of the company whose backstory was part of the corporate selling of tens of thousands of low-wage, dead-end jobs for employees Disney terms “cast members.” Kalogridis started at the opening of Walt Disney World in 1971, as a busboy at the Contemporary Resort, one of the resort hotels to open with the park.

Now, 30 years later, in late 2001, Kalogridis was second-in-command of the Disneyland Resort — a resort suddenly in trouble. Suddenly under tremendous scrutiny. But, the scrutiny was not coming from the local media or government, which had paid handsomely for the resort’s expansion. The scrutiny was coming from someone who may well have been the first influencer as these individuals would come to be known.

That was Al Lutz.

Although today the word ‘influencer’ produces positive images of polished Instagram posts and well-produced digital clips that work as de facto marketing arms of major companies, the idea of employing the influence of an online voice grew as a reactionary step by companies to online as well as real world critics. Kalogridis wanted to know how to blunt that criticism.

I know because I was one of the individuals he consulted. A few years earlier, I had met George Kalogridis when he was the vice president of Disney’s second park in Orlando — the former EPCOT Center — and I was a guest of corporate for the Walt Disney World Millennium Celebration on December 31, 1999.

When he was promoted to the job in Anaheim, I was one of the first people he told. When the Disneyland Resort had its debut in February of 2001, I was his personal guest. My personal host was another Disney employee, Andrew Hardy, who would become George’s husband.

So then it made sense, knowing my depth of knowledge of the industry and familiarity both with him and the growing online presence of Lutz and others, that he would ask.

And ask he did. Driving down from Los Angeles on a pleasant afternoon in late 2001, I met George for lunch at a sparsely attended Disney’s California Adventure. There, the prim-to-pretentious executive selected a quick-service dining location called Taste Pilots’ Grill in a wide step outside of the normal fine dining we would enjoy. We ordered salads, served in plastic containers and eaten outside just under the monorail beam. With the park so unpopular and the economy struck by the attacks of 9/11, however, we had not a single guest sharing the outside dining area with us.

It was clear both George and the new Disneyland Resort were in trouble.

George saw an abrupt end to his career. Disney saw its reputation as the world leader in themed entertainment heading for a potentially unrecoverable fall.

This was unacceptable. Most especially to Zenia Mucha.
Mucha earned her reputation as an off-with-their-heads but always-on-message political operative for then-New York Governor George Pataki who came to Disney’s ABC television network having been courted by Robert A. Iger. At the time, Mucha had turned her role as communications director and advisor to the governor to include, as the New York Times noted, “virtually every major decision made by the governor.”

Arriving on-scene in Burbank, the rise was swift and deliberate. By May of 2002, with longtime CEO Michael D. Eisner in a curiously choreographed media swiftboating, Mucha, who was known as “Director of Revenge” in her prior life as a politico and termed “Mickey Mouse’s Karl Rove” by journalist Matt Stoller, was promoted to director of corporate communications for ABC’s parent company — the Walt Disney Company. Replacing John Dreyer, a trusted and loyal keeper of the Disney brand, Mucha was a harsh turn from the almost family-like atmosphere Michael Eisner and Frank Wells, Disney’s former president, had fostered as part of their rise to the very top of the House of Mouse.

Indeed, Jody Dreyer, Eisner’s longtime personal assistant and herself a member of the corporate communications department, was married to John. Without delay, however, Mucha had arranged the chairs to position herself as the eyes and ears of the company’s most senior executives. As John Dreyer took time away to “pursue other opportunities,” it became apparent Mucha’s ‘eyes and ears’ (which is also the name of an intracompany publication) were not necessarily there for the benefit of the individual she, at least as her job description stated, reported to: Michael D. Eisner.

From within the company, there were continuing concerns its new communications director might well have been positioned in Eisner’s office to advance the interests, to fulfill the ambitions, of Robert Iger, then-president of Disney subsidiary ABC, who is widely cited as having been instrumental in her rapid rise once at Disney. After all, he brought her into the fold — and, it had long been rumored, held major political ambitions. Of course, being the head of a network when that network is a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Company under a celebrity-esque CEO who fashioned himself as a reanimated “Uncle Walt” does not get you much in the way of press.

That was Mucha’s domain. Enter the “Save Disney” campaign.


Within a year of moving into her office in the building held up by the Seven Dwarfs on the lot in Burbank, what had started as rumblings that Roy E. Disney and business partner Stanley Gold, who had drafted Eisner and Wells nearly 20 years prior, were becoming the eighth dwarf — Malcontent — became a full-bore mutiny. Suddenly dissatisfied with the direction of the company, Disney and Gold vocally called for the removal of Eisner. Labeling the Walt Disney Company under Eisner, and ironically given the company that now is, “a rapacious, soul-less conglomerate” void of a succession plan.

If an online campaign of any sort seems out of character for the nephew of the company’s founder, who was most known for the ouster of Ron Miller, Walt Disney’s son-in-law, as the head of Disney to allow for Eisner and Wells’ entry, that is likely because it could not have been more outside of his lane. After all, not only had Eisner built the company that was headed for a hostile takeover with accompanying break-up for parts and profit into a global media behemoth, in a move that led to what has been termed Disney’s second Golden Age in animation, he appointed Roy chairman of the animation department.

Now, if an online campaign by an individual sharing the name Disney sounds more like the move of a savvy political operative, you might be inclined to look over at the individual recruited by Eisner’s successor as CEO. You might want to look at the person brought over from Governor Pataki’s office: Zenia Mucha.
Oh, and the timid if intense fellow who once introduced a classical music take on some of Disney’s most beloved tunes. The former recording industry executive. Al Lutz.

Admittedly, it does seem like an odd pairing. And it is. Yet, on the homepage of SaveDisney.com, prominently featured, was a link to what was represented as Lutz’s latest and greatest hits on Disney and its leadership under Eisner. True to the reputation of the online enigma that Lutz had grown into, it was unforgiving.
It also was not Al Lutz proselytizing to his followers who might be planning a visit to Disneyland or might have visited one of the Disney parks.

Mucha had identified, early on, the power of the World Wide Web and the potential to employ a vast network of ‘volunteers’ to bring about a certain outcome. And, in what may well be the first example of online gaslighting and the launch of brand ambassadors or advocates — now termed influencers — Mucha’s department, and the corporate communications director for what is now the world’s largest media company and the home of a major news network, had set their sights on a proxy. That proxy? It was Al.
Except, the recording industry guy turned media company gadfly was hardly able to produce the content, the strategic strands of nouns and verbs, required. No problem. From behind a keyboard, as the world has learned, anyone can pretend to be anyone. So, it appears, she did.

Mucha’s Disney recruited a hungry-as-a-dog-before-dinner and needier-than-a-new-arrival-to-Sunset-Boulevard cast member. Even gave him an impressive title to use, Corporate Liaison for Imagineering & Operations (“CLIO”).

No, that would not be Al. That was Troy C. Porter.

Except, to everyone clicking on that link at SaveDisney.com and everyone reading the columns produced, they thought they were reading the thoughts, observations and ramblings of their ‘old friend’ from The D-I-G. Instead, they read carefully crafted copy to undermine the leadership of Disney CEO Michael Eisner.
To this day, while Al Lutz has been in the later stages of Parkinson’s disease, the antagonistic voice of the fan community that is grating and caustic at the same time as it is homespun in that dysfunctional and abusive manner has been maintained as his. It is not.

By December of 2002, the online personality known as “Al Lutz” left the Disney fan site he co-founded, MousePlanet, and started MiceAge (later to be hosted by MiceChat, whose placeholder was and remains a backseat-blazer wearing and Simonized-smile dressed character known as “Dusty Sage,” who is, in real life, an individual with dubious connections to the Walt Disney Company named Todd Regan).

Quickly redirecting Al’s followers, Porter was engaged and continuously employed to ferry the talking points that seemed to advance the position of Mucha and Iger while, at the same time, undermining the leadership of — and, more importantly, the faith of the financial community in — Eisner. All, apparently, using the faux voice of an early superfan as misappropriated by the very corporate communications office of the head of the entire company.
All using the company’s co-founder’s son as a dupe in the Save Disney puppet show which was, in appearance if not fact, a corporate ops stratagem of Mucha and Iger.

The goal being, of course, to replace one “Uncle Walt” with another. Here, replacing Eisner with Iger in, what then was thought to be, an effort to position the latter on a launching board to high-level political office. The bailiwick of none other than Zenia Mucha.

And, for nearly a generation, it stayed positioned just so. The facade, as meticulously as they had crafted it, stood. Then, as typically happens, they got sloppy. Stupid. Arrogant. Or, maybe they were always that and folks simply did not think to question it — to pull pack the curtain to see what lurked behind it.
Dating to the mid-1990s, when Troy Porter relocated from Oregon to Southern California to work for Disney, he began posting on the Usenet boards. His online moniker was TP2000. To this day, on fan sites, you can find this same poster under an assumed persona posting about the behind the scenes happenings at Disneyland and within the Walt Disney Company.

Presenting as an Orange County Log Cabin Republican with a penchant for spinning yarns about “the neighbor lady” and “things overheard about the goings-on at Disney,” he seemed near-pitch perfect to adopt the writing voice Mucha and the top tier of Disney’s corporate communications department thought would sell to this new if soon-to-be industry-of-its-own medium of passionate fans who devoted significant portions of each day following every move of the company.

So Troy Porter became Al Lutz. Or, as the fans would see it, Al Lutz became somehow different yet familiar. But the con was in. Set. And it has stayed in position for all of these years with Disney listening in on and eventually manipulating discussion boards into controlled focus groups lorded over like a corporate clubhouse hidden in the backroom of your local YMCA.

From a former partner of Regan’s and housemate of Al’s, “I cannot say that Al ever wrote a single column for MiceAge or MiceChat.” And, in fact, studying the writing voice and the spot-on information distilled in a manner at once disparaging and dispiriting and yet also weirdly complimentary, or strategically complimentary, the fingerprints are all there.

These works were cut-and-paste-and-forward writings that read as though precisely positioned by Disney’s Mucha & Co.
“It always seemed as though, while people thought Al had all of these sources, something he would do nothing to dissuade people from believing, he had only one — Troy Porter.”

Continuing on, another person familiar with the operations of the site that published ‘Al’s column,’ said, “When Al missed a week or two, it was because Troy hadn’t sent the copy to him.”

It appeared there was a not-so-small amount of narcissism at play among all involved, however. As, by early 2005, with the relentless attacks by ‘Al Lutz’ as promoted by SaveDisney.com, the shareholders held a no-confidence vote and Eisner was on his way out. Who was to succeed him? Well, despite an alleged corporate search, there was only one candidate — Zenia Mucha’s. Robert A. Iger.

The eventual undoing was vanity though. As Porter had become so accustomed to the feedback loop writing as Al presented, and posting on fan forums as TP2000, he continued writing. For years after the Save Disney campaign was little more than a Wikipedia entry, Porter wrote as Lutz.

With the recent, and highest profile of Iger’s tenure, failure of the massive Star Wars land expansion, Galaxy’s Edge, added cancer-like on the back of Walt’s hallowed Disneyland with a companion land coming to Walt Disney World in just a couple of weeks, Al has reappeared in a grand way. Make that, Troy Porter has reappeared.
The goal — the reason— could not be clearer. As Porter wrote here, directing folks to ‘Al’s column’ on MiceChat.com:
“I wonder does the current crop of Burbank execs and Bob Chapek even know how big a deal this is? Do they understand the weight that Lutz’s words have with the long-term West Coast fan community? If I were Mr. Chapek, I would be concerned that I did indeed cut things a bit too far and awakened the Tiki Gods and Al Lutz.”

So, it seems, the ‘once an operative always an operative’ Mucha reenlisted that crusty old influencer from days of yore. Now, the need was even more urgent, as Iger needed someone to take the fall, hard and fast, for the flailing and single largest expansion at Disneyland and anchor intellectual property for both domestic resorts. That would be Mr. Chapek, the as-if-stylized-by-Mr. Clean chairman of Disney’s Parks & Resorts division.

And that career employee of the Walt Disney Company who started as a busboy at Walt Disney World’s Contemporary Resort? George Kalogridis? Well, George might well have been Mucha’s only real conduit to Troy Porter. Where is George?

George Kalogridis is the president of Walt Disney World. The largest private single-site employer in America — marketed as the world’s top vacation destination.

According to the story, he started clearing tables. Now, he sits at the head of the table.

As for how this all came to be, this campaign that likely is the start of what is understood now as that of the influencer who grew out of something pure and passionate — a fan, it all came to be one fall day at the flailing theme park across from Walt’s original in Anaheim. Over lunch at Taste Pilots’ Grill.

When an executive from Florida, whose job with the company if not career was on the line, asked a friend who was an early participant in the online world of engagement and knowledgeable in advancing a brand or thwarting one how to counter the later named superfan.
“Control the message by controlling the messenger,” I said. “Acquire the voice.”
“You do not counter someone like Al. You cannot counter Al. You can, if done smartly, own that voice as your own — as a conduit of the Walt Disney Company.”
Now, you can grab the fresh-squeezed lemonade, add in some just brewed iced tea, even toss in a bit of an adult libation and ask ‘the neighbor lady’ if she knows anything about how a political operative came to script everyday Mouseketeers, a weatherman came to lead the world’s largest media company and a busboy came to run the world’s largest resort destination.

After being named the new president of the Walt Disney World Resort in January of 2013, the local newspaper ran a puff piece by Jason Garcia entitled, “George Kalogridis: From clearing tables to Disney World chief.” Garcia wrote, “Kalogridis’ star has soared since he took over as president of Disneyland, where attendance and spending have ballooned…”

Quoted just below that: Al Lutz. “I think he showed up at the right time.”

Reflecting on that meeting in late 2001, over a mediocre Cobb salad with a man of middling potential who was seeking a spot on the mainstage, I am not entirely sure who Lutz was referring to.
Author’s Note: The Walt Disney Company declined to comment on this column."

Going Soft

Part of having a Disney oriented blog involves being a fan of the product, and therefore, reading other sites for pure enjoyment. 

That said, is it just me or does it seem as if too many sites are going soft on the company? In the past, if a product was bad, it was spoken of as such. Now it seems even the most mediocre of things is praised endlessly. Everything from a fairly pleasing but not excellent Ariel's Undersea Adventure to a decent but much overrated song from a hit movie ("Let It Go") has bloggers all atwitter as they twitter. What happened to objective reporting?

Paid trips to Disney theme parks and cruises or Adventures by Disney and stuffing guests with expensive goodie bags has dulled (paid off) those who were at one time critical of what the Company produced. Or met the need of those writers willing to get freebies in exchange for good press. These are the same folks who will argue the New Fantasyland in Florida holds up well against what Universal Creative did with Harry Potter at Islands of Adventure and soon their Studio park, Tangled bathrooms and all.

No one who ever reads Insights and Sounds could accuse me of being a Mommy blogger or a paid agent for the Walt Disney Company. (I do look at the blog reader numbers, and I am highly critical of the company's output, praising only what is truly excellent.)  Maybe I am delusional, but in my mind I speak a hard truth when necessary and am also liberal with praise when earned. 

The sad part of it all is that "news" sites (and television news broadcasts by and large) have become entertainment or pieces of promotional fluff. The negative effect has several aspects. This new standard speaks down to the audience, making potential guests skeptical about investing their hard earned money. When everything is praised, nothing is special. When the company pulls in numbers due to social media success for an inferior product, there's no incentive to create truly spectacular works of art in any medium. The fans ultimately lose as well.

The same can be said of any industry or anything of value. It may be a small world after all, but it's becoming a very jaded one for those with a discerning spirit. 

Steve Jobs Passes Away

Steve Jobs has died. He offered an Apple, and he changed the world. May he rest in peace.

Think Big

A very wise friend of mine has the following quote on his Skype page: "You have to think anyway, so why not think big?" 

Brilliant! Wouldn't you just love to write this to those in charge of the Walt Disney Company and remind them that it is thinking like this that made Walt Disney a great man, one who changed the world?

Whether its the new Fantasyland or the original execution of California Adventure, wouldn't it be much better if "thinking big"replaced thinking of money?! Let's be honest here, it is not just corporate America or big business or even politicians that think small- we do it all the time as well.

What would happen if you started to think big? Just imagine the possibilities! Really- stop and think. You could be someone who changes the world, or just your world, for the better. All it takes is one little spark of inspiration.

Shanghai's Fantastic Fairytale Castle

Editor's Note: Come back tomorrow for a unique trip report. A Walt Disney World visit almost 20 years after the last one! Incredible!
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Really?! This is the name of the castle for Shanghai Disneyland?... "Fantastic Fairytale Castle". So generic. So unimaginative. So marketing driven. According to this article by the People's Daily, that is the name of the beautiful edifice soon to debut on Mainland China. It's about as charming as using "Mischievous Rodent" for the name of The Walt Disney Company icon.

(Art copyright The Walt Disney Company.)

Happy Belated Birthday!

And a Happy but Belated 56th Birthday to Disneyland! Sorry, but real life gets in the way sometimes...

Dreamworks, Disney, and Glen Keane

Could the wonderful Disney animator, Glen Keane, really be leaving Disney for Dreamworks? Blue Sky Disney thinks it is a possibility. Glen seems to be a good man as well as um, a "beast" of an animator. In fact, on animating the Beast for the film Beauty and the Beast, Disney animator Glen Keane says,

"This is the moment- this is what I was born for...
As I started animating it, for me it's really an expression of my spiritual life. There's a verse in the Bible that says 'If any man is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away and all things have become new...'

Because it is really about an inner spiritual transformation that's taking place with the Beast. I saw it as a parable of my life."

If you want to see Glen's great artwork in various forms, here's the place to go:The Art of Glen Keane . In the meantime, may God be with him wherever he goes!

Big Risks at the Mouse House

What's going on in Central Florida with all the changes to the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World? What impact has Harry Potter's Forbidden Journey had on the plans at the Mouse House? Why is Walt Disney World's 40th Anniversary so important at this time? Come back tomorrow for an in depth look.