Originally Posted By sjhym333 Another video I found very interesting to watch. How this park and the original vision have changed: <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBTsFHtJtg8">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...sFHtJtg8</a>
Originally Posted By Jim in Merced CA sjhym333 - very interesting -- including the host! Never seen him before or since. I'd like to see the video that was shown in the preview center -- it was a very fun movie.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip Ahhh... the good old days. I first saw the MGM Studios in 1994 and loved it. I know people claimed it was a half-day park at the time, but I loved it. Back then it knew what it wanted to be. Now it seems confused.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 It, like most of WDW, is confused because there doesn't seem to be anyone in place with a vision for each of the parks and the entire property in general.
Originally Posted By kennect The host was on Nicklelodeon at that time. Believe he was a game show host if I remember correctly.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros What a great video! While I don't think that it was quite a full-day park, it certainly knew what it was and did a good job with that. My family visited the park within a couple months of it opening, but I was far too young to remember it. My parents still occasionally talk about how different it was then; not necessarily good or bad, just very different from any other theme park experience. It sure seems like it's lacking a lot now that the working studio has been shut down for years; the backlot really used to be pretty incredible, but it's just kind of hokey these days. It was interesting to see how things originally operated, including the multi-part backstage tour as a single attraction. I don't think I ever did the animation tour (at least once I was old enough to remember), so it was neat to see all the scenes in there It was also nice to see Catastrophe Canyon without the soot marks covering everything. The props were all brightly painted, which is hard to believe today since they're all the same shade of rusty brown I was surprised to hear that they anticipated doing 10 shows of the Indy stunt show on the busiest days. It seems like they settled into about 5 or 6 in reality, but I'm impressed that they planned to run the show hourly (more or less). It would have been really unique to see the show after dark I also kind of wonder when exactly this video was made. It included the Indy stunt show, which opened a few months after the rest of the park, but didn't include Star Tours which opened shortly after that. Seems like odd timing for a national broadcast about the new park; I would have either done it right when the park opened or waited until all of the phase one stuff was operational They said that the host was one of the adults on the Mickey Mouse Club at the time
Originally Posted By 9oldmen >>very interesting -- including the host! Never seen him before or since.<< While you may not have SEEN him, you surely have HEARD Fred Newman. He was one of the main voices on the "Doug" cartoon, one of the weasels in "Roger Rabbit", and was sort of the "Jimmy Dodd" figure on the MMC that ran from 1989-1993, and featured a young Brittany Spears, Christina Aguillera, and other up and comers. That show shot at Disney/MGM(one of the early productions at the studio when they were really trying to turn it into a legit production facility). So Fred was probably already based in Florida, making him a convenient choice. You can look him up on imdb for more info.
Originally Posted By kennect I did Remember his name being "Fred". I also remember visiting the park for the first time but this video just reminded me how badly it lost its way. What year did the studio bit go down the drain? Even at a socalled half day experience I thought it was brilliant when it opened. I remember on thing in particular. One of the clothing shops on Hollywood Blvd. used an ultra exspensive wallpaper from F. Schumacher. A very cool art deco design from the Schumacher archives. Next visit it had been destroyed by guest wear and tear.
Originally Posted By 9oldmen I don't know exactly when the "production" aspect kind of evaporated, but they really tried to sort of "pitch" the place as a working studio. You had the MMC, "Adventures in Wonderland", and "Thunder in Paradise". That last one was really ,..sophisticated. I think it was a concept that came from the creator(s) of "Baywatch". There was one episode that took place in some "exotic" country, and all through the episode you saw: The Morocco pavilion in EPCOT and the set of the Indian Jones Stunt Spectacular standing in for this "country". There was also the late eighties/early nineties "Superboy" series, which used the studios, and other locations around the resort. I recently saw one of those "Profiles in History" movie memorabilia auction catalogues, where one of the lots was a "Superboy" costume. There was a picture with a detail of the tag in the costume that clearly said something like "made at Disney/MGM Studios". Then of course, there was the one division of the studio that actually made, or assisted with, feature films. That of course was the animation studio. I think that one of the last projects that they had a hand in was "Lilo and Stitch". Universal also tried to make their Florida park into a studio. I know of two features that shot there: the 1989 "Parenthood"(released before Universal Florida even opened as a tourist attraction), and "Matinee" with John Goodman.
Originally Posted By Fantasmicmagic82 9 old men I remember that episode. It was so funny to see that.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>I don't know exactly when the "production" aspect kind of evaporated, but they really tried to sort of "pitch" the place as a working studio.<< I'm not positive, but I believe it lasted until the early 00's. I think that the studio was shut down as a result of the 9/11 tourism slump when things were shuttered across WDW (many of which remain closed now). I think that the animation studio lasted slightly longer than the rest of production, but they closed around the same time, since Eisner decided to shut down the hand drawn animation division entirely. I think that they changed the park's name about 2-3 years after closing production, in an attempt to convey that it was no longer a working studion (and to no longer pay the MGM royalties) And similar to that Tunder in Paradise episode, the music video for Christina Agulera's Reflection from the Mulan soundtrack (the song that launched her career as we know it) was filmed all around the China pavilion at Epcot. And of course there's that old Werther's commercial that was filmed at the Germany pavilion about 15 years before Werther's decided to sponsor a bakery in the very same storefront
Originally Posted By Fantasmicmagic82 When I was there in 1990 they were doing a TV movie about Brown vs the Board of Education. 1 of the sets they were working on was the supreme court courtroom.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 The issues for the studios was never 9/11 but rather the fact that Disney had a hard time convincing anyone (even their own people) to shoot there. There were several problems right from the start including the head of the Studio not wanting to force anyone to shoot at Disney -MGM plus the supposed cost savings of shooting in the park were never realized. There was a real tussle between the production side and the theme park side. When the park first opened it was packed and the theme park side did not want to shut down any major part of the park making it difficult to shoot on Residential Street or NY street. Add to that the explosions for Cat Canyon could be heard on the soundstages making it difficult to shoot scenes. The theme park side did not want to bypass Cat Canyon and instead put a CM out there with a walkie talkie who stopped vehicles from entering until filming on the Soundstages was complete. This often backed up tram traffic which in turn caused delays of getting trams back to load which made lines longer. There were several times that the production companies did not want guests to see what was happening on the Soundstages which meant that curtains were hung and the soundstage was bypassed, kind of defeating the whole idea of the tour. I worked for Imagineering on the Studio project and then transitioned into the ops side when the park opened. It was a mess. The only sustainable production was the Mickey Mouse Club, which had a whole different host of issues.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>The issues for the studios was never 9/11 but rather the fact that Disney had a hard time convincing anyone (even their own people) to shoot there.<< Right, but I thought it was after 9/11, when they were making all sorts of cuts across property, that they finally decided to give of the charade of a working movie studio. If they couldn't afford to keep an entire hotel open (Riverside), why would they pay for movie/TV production that most guests wouldn't even get to see in action? The 9-5, Monday-Friday production hours rarely align with theme park hours, and even when there's something going on in a soundstage, it's hours of standing around for a few minutes of action; not exactly condusive to a new batch of guests wandering through every 3.5 minutes. It was an interesting concept, but it definitely had flaws for real-world application And I've heard of it before, but I think it's interesting that they had issues with hearing Catastrophe Canyon in the soundstages. I guess there's probably a lot of other ambient sound, but I've never really noticed it when I was wandering around that area of the park (unless I was pretty close to it). Don't they currently run Catastrophe Canyon during the LMA shows in the amphitheater next door?
Originally Posted By RoadTrip For me, the biggest loss was not losing live production and use of the Soundstages. You rarely actually saw a live shoot anyway... most of the time it was just empty sets that were being used for something currently in production. To me the loss was the animators. I know nothing about the business, but wonder why they couldn't have kept animators at the Studios even after closing hand-drawn animation... couldn't they have kept CGI animators there? As for the soundstages, they could have continued to display sets from recent productions there. Sure, there would have been the expense of shipping and re-assembling them in Florida, but it would have kept that part of the park alive. I also think it was a mistake to split up the tour... it seemed more meaningful when it was all one long continuous tour. I know there were complaints that it was too long and did not allow for restroom breaks etc, but couldn't they have put a 20-minute break in the tour (inside the Soundstage buildings) with restrooms, a snack bar, and perhaps a small gift shop? Seems like it would have been a good way to make additional revenue from a captive audience and give people a chance to take a brief rest during the tour. Those actions would have allowed the park to retain the feel of a working Studio, which to me was a big loss.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 The decision about the animators came from California and if I remember correctly it wasn't only the Florida group that was shut down but also the group in Europe (France?). To me it was the first signal that Disney had decided to take steps back from the amount of animation they were doing before that time. A lot of friends in Florida animation lost their jobs and it was terrible with some even losing their homes. If you are standing on the soundstages you can hear Cat Canyon doing off every 3 or 4 minutes. I have been on the soundstages during production and you could hear the explosions. I saw one director blow a fuse because it kept ruining its shot. The Disney-MGM Studios as a working studio and theme park is to me a great example of a company that is too big to be able to control everything. It was very much like herding cats. I remember asking a friend on the production side why Disney didn't force some of its own production to the Disney-MGM Studio soundstages and they said that there was no one at the Studio in California who cared enough to push the issue and had no desire to deal with both the production or talent side of the Studio to make it worth their time.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros I agree that it would have made sense to keep animators there. Most guests wouldn't have actually been able to see the lines they were drawing on the paper anyway, so it's odd that the guests wouldn't be allowed to watch them work on computers. I know there were several productions in the 90's that were split between various locations (including a studio in Paris for Hunchback and possibly others), so I don't see why they couldn't do it now; if anything, working on computers would make it even easier to do that today than 20 years ago And I don't know if there were any places to get food, but weren't there restrooms available near the tram loading area specifically intended for folks taking a break during the 2-hour tour? I believe they're still there, though awkward to get to today, but they may have been removed during the whole backlot reconfiguration for Lights, Motors, Action.
Originally Posted By sjhym333 As some one who worked the Studios for a couple of years after opening I cant begin to tell you the issues that connecting the two tours created. Lots and lots of complaints, people trying to bail out mid-tour. And remember in the early days if a guest wanted to leave the walking part of the tour they were backstage since the street between the Soundstages and the Great Movie Ride hadn't open to pedestrian traffic. And then there was the day that Pee Wee Herman got arrested and there were big meetings about what to do with his video during the tour. Those were fun days.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper I enjoyed it as a "working studio" the the extent it really was that but I did enjoye the vibe. It was never Universal Studios California but it was a pretty good representation. I agree that losing the Animation building was most discouraging. I also enjoyed the "Star for a Day" (had a nice conversation with Pierce Brosnan) and I may have been one of the few people who liked walking through the Soundstages and that part of the tour. Some friends of mine and I were pulled off the midway one day to serve as background characters for the New Mickey Mouse Club. We went through wardrobe and met the cast, many of whom went on to much bigger things.
Originally Posted By Jim in Merced CA I was working for Walt Disney World when The Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park opened, and I have to say, I was not entirely impressed. While the entrance and street leading to The Chinese Theatre was nicely done and well themed, the rest of the park was a real hodge-podge and honestly kind of a mess. Instead of a hub concept like Disneyland and even EPCOT Center, this one rambled all over the place, leaving guests confused and sort of irritated. The tram tour -- (wonder where they got THAT idea?) was odd and forced. Even 'The Great Movie Ride' which was the flagship attraction was, and is, just kind of a mess. Even after various things were added, and even today, it's not one of my favorite Disney theme parks.
