Sure, a full show with singers and dancers and comedians would be even better, but given that DL, WDW, and DLP haven't had anything like that for years (not sure about TDL...do they even have a saloon?) I think this is a good substitute. It's not a big flashy show, but it's something unique and appears to be more-or-less themed to the land. Although the Billy Hill act at DL had its rabid fans, I never found them to be more than a pleasant diversion; certainly not special enough to have such a large venue dedicated for their performances
I may be wrong on that, but in recent years, at least from my point of view, TWDC changed a lot when it came to family friendly entertainment. It got more conservative and unfortunately in Paris too, which surprises me, because France is one of the most liberal countries in the world. Maybe these can can dancers with their outfits aren't appropriate for Disney anymore, which is a shame.
I don't think that's what ended it, though it could have been a factor. When the US parks did their Limited Time Magic promotion a couple years ago (which ended up being mostly meet & greets with rare characters, and very little worthwhile) one fo the first 'events' was a month-long revival of the Golden Horseshoe Review in DL. It was a smaller production than the original, but still included some can-can dancers, so it seems unlikely that they were a major factor in ending the show. More likely, it used a pretty large cast and crew for the audience that could fit in the venue. Back when the show had a full band, I would guess that it needed about half the manpower of Aladdin in DCA, with about 1/10 the capacity. Given how many decisions today are based purely on budget, that seems like an easy thing to cut
The Villages Nature is coming along nicely. http://disneyandmore.blogspot.co.at/2016/06/disneyland-paris-villages-nature.html
I hope that aerial photo wasn't recent, it looks like the lakes were party frozen! I know it's warmer in the US than Europe, but that seems a little extreme!
Interesting Forbes article about DLP's financial impact on the French economy. The Magic Behind Disney's $60 Billion Boost To France's Economy
Does that mean that 6.2% of all the money that foreigners spend in France is at DLP? If so, that's very impressive! It's numbers like that, and others in the article, that really show how big DLP is. Even though it's always struggled financially, it's always been a major tourist destination with huge attendance when compared to other tourist locations in Europe. It's crazy to think about how much bigger of a share it would have if it had the attendance to fully support itself
New road signs for DLP New road signs for Disneyland Paris Interview with the show director of Mickey & The Magician Mickey and the Magician : meet the associate show director
I'm neither an accountant nor an economic expert, but I would read it in the same way. The nummbers are indeed quite impressive. I wonder how the resort would look like today, if TWDC would have done their homework back in the 80ies. Europe just isn't the US and so they should have never compared a continent that is made up of many different countries and cultures with the USA. Unlike WDW, DLP will never be a vacation destination for most people. You go to DLP for a couple of days, but for the most it's not the main vacation like WDW is for many Americans. Additionally they opened with far too many rooms during the recession. DLP got all the bad luck over the years. WDSP opened right with the tourism crisis aftter 9/11. I think TWDC should have stepped in many years earlier to take over the resort.
With only 2 parks (and only 1 park initially), I don't think that it was ever quite intended to be a WDW-level destination. I think it makes a great quick getaway or a multi-day stop as part of another trip, similar to DLR, but it just doesn't have the size and variety of activities that WDW does. Although they've reduced a lot of them in recent years, it's fairly easy to spend a weeklong vacation in WDW without ever entering a theme park, since there are just so many supplemental activities and options DLP's theoretical advantage is that most Europeans get more vacation time than Americans. Most American visitors to WDW are maxed-out on the time they're willing to spend there (as seen by how DAK's early attendance cannibalized the other parks, rather than extending stays), but Europeans tend to be more willing to take leisurely vacations and add some days on. Then again, it seems like Europe has more competing vacation destinations than the US, so it can be hard to convince people to go in the first place
I'm not sure, if DLP would become a bigger destination for Europeans with four parks. Currently a big summer holiday at the beach is still the most popular across Europe. DLP has to focus to get people for short vacations. I guess that's why during the Easter Holidays and the fall holidays DLP is very packed. How much vacation time does the average American get? Tim Delaney himslef said that they used the wrong numbers for DLP. Back then they thought the DLP might get hit y the same number of visitors like WDW. That's why they built so many rooms. Disney also expected that Europeans would spend as much as Americans do, but apparently we don't. Do Americans get an extra salary for vacation? Is that so much higher than over here?
I think most people get around 10-15 days of vacation a year, in addition to about 10 government holidays (Memorial Day, July 4, Christmas day, etc). I've always heard that Europeans tend to get 4-6 weeks of vacation a year, which is roughly double what's considered normal over here. And some European countries have shorter work weeks than we do (I think France is around 30-35 hours, compared to our 40) Among salaried employees, most get the same pay for vacation time as a normal work day; is that different from what Europeans have? Additionally, a lot of people in service sector/hourly jobs don't have paid vacation at all, so they can technically have as much time as they want. Of course that creates another set of issues with cashflow during a vacation, but at least there's some flexibility with timing
WDW recently added the new head for Mickey and Minnie in the new castle stage show. I think it's interesting that they're rolling them out slowly, rather than replacing them all at the same time like they've done with other updated character costumes through the years. It seems like it could be confusing to see one design, and then a completely different one a few hours later
I don't get that either. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think in Paris the new Mickey will only be used for the new Mickey & The Magician show. With all the the different languages the talking Mickey doesn't make so much sense for meet & greets. He can only be used for shows.
My work week consists of 38.5 hours from Monday to Friday. Friday is shorter, that's why we got 38.5 hours. If I have to work on a Saturday, which happens once or twice per year I can either choose from double free time (e.g. 4 hours of work on a Saturday equal 8 hours free time) or 1.5 times the salary for that day. Like everyone in Austria I have 25 days of paid vacation and additionally 13 official holidays including government holidays and Catholic holidays. Good friday (the friday before Easter), Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve are half days. Sunday is not a workday and all shops are closed. I was talking about the 13th and 14th salary. I can only speak for Austria, but here people get an extra salary in summer and an extra salary for Christmas. Even not all employees in Germany get that. Thanks to the so called social partnership between the chamber of commerce (represents the employers), the union and the government, we have these things. I'm not sure if we have that possibily over here. Either you have to be employed full or part time, but you can't be employeed just for several hours. The reason for that is social security insurance. Over here health insurance is mandatory and paid by taxes on our salary. However if you are employeed part time, that ranges from10 hours, 15 hours, 20 hours, 25 hours or 30 hours per week. Sometimes you can choose when you want to work within the workweek, but you have to work for that amount of time per week and not 5 hours this week and ten hours next week.
The French Disney Gazette did another update on DLP. La Gazette : Disney & Pixar arrivent à Discoveryland Theater
There's also a non-talking version of the new head that is being used in Shanghai that looks the same. I realize that there is a certain expense with changing out the design (especially for a character that shows up so frequently across all the parks), but it just seems like bad show to have different versions out at the same time. Why should he look one way in one show, but a different way in other shows and parades? Personally, I don't like the new look. Maybe it's because I'm so used to the old one, but it looks a little too cartoony and goofy. He also looks crosseyed, but that could be easily fixed without changing the entire design, just by moving the pupils (and maybe making them smaller) within the eye space
I know they're doing it in phases which makes it take longer, but I'm surprised that the Fantasia Gardens repaving is still going on. It seems like that's been in progress forever And it's disappointing to see the Short Films Festival is running in DLP too. When they first announced it for Epcot, I hoped that it was a temporary attraction to increase capacity over the busy Christmas peak season, but it's still running without any signs of being replaced. I understand that 3D films aren't as novel as they were 30 years ago, and make for difficult theme park attractions, but this just seems sloppy and lazy. Putting it in DLP seems to indicate that they don't have any real longterm plans for those theaters
