|
Epcot's Silver Anniversary Epcot
turned a quarter century old on Monday. Disney originally said there would be no
celebration of the event, then later announced a re-dedication ceremony. Fan
speculation ran high: would there be other surprises? Special merchandise? Maybe
a soft opening of Spaceship Earth? As nice as it would have been to get
Spaceship Earth up and running on the 25th birthday - it is the icon, after all
- that wasn't in the cards. There was special merchandise, but not a lot of it.
And there were essentially no other surprises, save for a special fireworks
show. On the whole, the event was somewhat underwhelming. On the one hand, that
was to be expected; they didn't market a special event any way. On the other
hand, though, this was a shame worth crying over. Epcot will never again turn
25, so a single chance at a blowout event was missed.
The day started promisingly enough with area music at the front entrance
time-warped back to the '80s: I heard 'Makin' Memories' and 'Food Rocks' among
others - in terms of the music, it was EPCOT CENTER all over again! Not that any
signs said EPCOT CENTER. There had been rumors of special signage, and maybe a
one-day makeover back to EPCOT Center, but there was no sign of that.
Offered for sale, in very limited quantities, were several special pins,
released only on the anniversary, a watch, a t-shirt, and a Figment plush. The
watch didn't catch my eye overly, and the pins seemed to generate excitement
among the pin traders (certainly there were long lines), but they too didn't
make me giddy. The t-shirt was the original 1982 design of Spaceship Earth with
a monorail going around it, and came in dark blue, with lettering to announce
the 25th anniversary. The Figment plush was special for being individually
numbered - only 1982 were made - and because his blue vest had the original
Future World pavilion symbols on it. Everything sold out quickly. There were
merchandise tables set up in the Future World middle zone, but Mouse Gear was
the shop with everything.
Many folks bolted not for the merchandise, but to get a good view of the
stage behind the Fountain of Nations, where poles and ropes demarcated a viewing
area. Just about everyone here had cameras or videocameras, or both, and
questions from the presenters later left little doubt that the area was crowded
with several hundred enthusiasts and Disney boosters, not standard guests.
People around like-minded individuals meant a low-level sense of community
even among strangers. The area music here too was from the '80s, and it was an
enchanting experience, perhaps something even to engender a chill down the
spine, to witness dozens of people spontaneously deciding to sing along to the
chorus of 'Energy (You Make the World Go Round)'. It was unplanned and nothing
built up to it, which made the moment all the more unusual. It goes without
saying that Epcot and its rides really mean something to these people.
It was a nice perk for CMs to be involved.
The show kicked off with current WDW Ambassador Michael, who introduced Tracy
Wu and didn't say anything else about her (turns out she's a front-line
performer at Disney-MGM Studios, where she is one of the hosts of Lights Motors
Action). She brought out a few Future World CMs to represent their pavilions,
and then Jim McPhee (VP at Epcot) and Erin Wallace (Senior VP of Operations at
WDW) joined her on stage.
Erin and Jim at the re-dedication.
They then brought out Marty Sklar (former head of WDI), the only person to be
present at the opening of all eleven Disney parks worldwide (a neat statistic,
if you ask me). Marty talked up the park and the resort, noting that a typical
day at WDW might see 300,000 people and 60,000 Cast Members - big numbers
indeed.
Marty is now a 'WDI Ambassador,' helping to spread the word.
Some representatives from World Showcase pavilions then came out, each
carrying water in containers common to their homelands, and they held water
meant to represent their home countries (note: they didn't say the water came
from there, so it's a safe bet we're just dealing with Florida tapwater here).
CMs clutching water containers.
That water was tossed into the Fountain of Nations to 'help turn it back on'
and the re-dedication went into celebration mode, with some mild confetti and a
few daytime fireworks on the buildings to either side of the stage. There was no
signing or dancing, and as productions go, this one was pretty low-key. There
was surprisingly little meat, or tugging on heartstrings, with this event.
Mickey and Minnie helped celebrate too.
Nor was there a whole lot to do that was special for the day. The park maps
handed out were in fact specially created, and on the inside, included a
reproduction of the opening day park map (a nice touch presumably borrowed from
Disneyland's 50th anniversary guidemap in 2005), but as the Show Guide pointed
out, the only special events were the re-dedication, speeches by Marty Sklar in
the Circle of Life theater, and a gallery. I didn't make to Marty's talks, which
seem to have required an advance ticket, perhaps akin to a FastPass.
The Epcot Anniversary Gallery, though, was a delight.
Lines were very short.
Open from 9 to 9 that day, and for the next 90 days to boot (I think they
were going for 9s for some reason), the gallery is housed in that temporary room
in what's sometimes called Innoventions West, but I think of it as the Concourse
- a largely-orphaned area opposite Mouse Gear and facing the Imagination
pavilion.
A timeline sketches the most significant events of the past.
The gallery was slapped together in 6 weeks, but you wouldn't know it. There
are large posters dedicated to each pavilion, showcasing a ton of conceptual
artwork not normally seen. Sprinkled around are a few scale models of pavilions
or attractions as well, and these are always a delight to witness up close.
To appreciate Disney scale models, you've got to get on one
knee and see them at the right level.
In short, it's a little bit like the Walt Disney Story at Disney-MGM Studios,
which is to say it's a little bit like having a slice of Walt Disney
Imagineering right there in the theme park. Big thumbs up from me.
Too bad this won't be around all year.
Cast Members around WDW began wearing a new button on Saturday. You'd think
it might be the Epcot-25 button, but no such button was created, not even for
the actual birthday on October 1st. Rather, their new button announces that WDW
is 36 years old! This is a major cop-out. WDW is not synonymous with the Magic
Kingdom. Undoubtedly, this has to do with the inherent tensions in the Year of a
Million Dreams promotion and the whole notion of an Epcot celebration. Epcot
didn't have a big splashy party and marketing promotion because someone
(presumably, Jay Rasulo himself) worried about detracting and distracting from
the Year of a Million Dreams. Thus, CMs celebrated being 36 this weekend, not
25.
|
