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 May 10 - 16, 2009 |
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| Friday May 15, 2009 |
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Thursday May 14, 2009 |
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The Walt Disney Company Launches Disney's Friends for Change Coming UP: New movie characters at Disney's Hollywood Studios First Poster for Disney's A Christmas Carol Pixar Unveils New ‘Toy Story 3′ Character in ‘Up’ - Can You Find It? Pixar raises the animation bar with buoyant "Up" Exclusive! Making A BUG'S LIFE! Top Disney Executive Urges Partnership Keep Nemo Company in Disney's Epcot Aquarium Road Rules for Disney with Kids Disney Urges Kids to Make Green Choices Disney catches comedy pass Coalition for the Homeless Receives Disney’s Top Grants Award Disney Surprises Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Florida With $50,000 Grant |
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The Walt Disney Company Launches Disney's Friends for Change Business Wire - The Walt Disney Company today announced Disney’s Friends for Change: Project Green (www.Disney.com), a multiplatform environmental initiative that will help kids help the planet. Disney stars Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, the Jonas Brothers and Demi Lovato are among the 29 young stars participating in outreach messages to debut on Disney Channel, Disney XD, Radio Disney and Disney.com. The Disney’s Friends for Change: Project Green initiative invites young people to join together to help the environment across four key areas: climate, water, waste and habitats. Kids will learn practical ways to preserve the planet, track their collective impact and have the opportunity to vote on how $1 million in donations from Disney will be divided and invested in various environmental causes over the course of a year. “With Disney’s Friends for Change, we’re empowering kids to tap into the potential that lies within each and every one of them to make a difference,” said Bob Iger, president, The Walt Disney Company. “Building on our recently announced environmental goals, this program highlights what is possible as we leverage Disney’s reach to educate and inspire environmental stewardship in others.” Beginning Friday, May 15, Disney Channel and Radio Disney will air the first in a year-long series of on-air messages that will feature Disney Channel stars challenging kids to join them in registering and pledging environmental stewardship by making small changes in their daily actions that can positively impact the world around them. “We were inspired by the outpouring of enthusiasm from our family of talent to enact real environmental change by connecting with other kids, fans and friends on an entirely new level,” said Rich Ross, president, Disney Channels Worldwide. “Friends for Change is about the power of friendship – when we all work together, anything is possible.” If 500,000 kids participate in Disney Friends for Change: Project Green events, together they can:
Kids can pledge to join online at Disney.com where they’ll commit to take simple everyday actions, such as turning off the lights and switching to reusable water bottles, and find out more about why these actions matter. Through the online community, kids will be able to invite friends to join, interact with one another and take pride in the results of their efforts as their collective impact on the planet is tallied and their votes determine the distribution of charitable contributions. Climate, water, waste and habitat will each be highlighted for three months, culminating in quarterly events where on a designated day, kids will be encouraged to act in unison on a single task such as adjusting home thermostats or reducing water usage. These events will be tracked online and on air as kids report back on their actions. Kids will also help determine how Disney will donate $1 million to environmental organizations over the course of a year to plant trees, preserve the rainforest, help endangered animals and support alternative energy among other causes. About The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company (NYSE:DIS), together with its subsidiaries and affiliates, is a leading diversified international family entertainment and media enterprise with five business segments: media networks, parks and resorts, studio entertainment, interactive media and consumer products. Disney is a Dow 30 company with revenues of nearly $38 billion in its most recent fiscal year. For more information about corporate responsibility at The Walt Disney Company, visit www.Disney.com/CRReport. |
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 Coming
UP: New movie characters at Disney's Hollywood StudiosTheme Park Rangers - Three characters from Disney-Pixar's UP will start making appearances at Disney's Hollywood Studios beginning Friday, May 15. Guests may see Russell, an 8-year-old Wilderness Explorer, Carl Fredricksen, a 78-year-old balloon salesman and/or Dug the dog. They'll be stationed inside DHS' "Magic of Disney Animation" attraction. UP hits theaters May 29. |
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 First
Poster for Disney's A Christmas Carol
CanMag - People over at Cannes got the first look at the teaser poster for Disney's A Christmas Carol and now it's our turn. Thanks to Yahoo! Movies, you can check out Jim Carrey as Ebeneezer Scrooge. Disney's A Christmas Carol Poster Disney's A Christmas Carol, a multi-sensory thrill ride re-envisioned by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Robert Zemeckis, captures the fantastical essence of the classic Dickens tale in a groundbreaking, performance-capture 3D motion picture event. Ebeneezer Scrooge (Jim Carrey) begins the holiday with his usual miserly contempt, barking at his faithful clerk (Gary Oldman) and his cheery nephew (Colin Firth). But when the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come take him on an eye-opening journey, revealing truths Old Scrooge is reluctant to face, he must open his heart to undo years of ill will before it's too late. |
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Pixar Unveils New ‘Toy Story 3′ Character in ‘Up’ - Can You Find
It? MTV - There are many, many reasons to love Pixar. First and foremost is that they’ve made nine consecutive instant classic films – a streak that will go to ten when the amazing “Up” opens later this month. But another is that they know what geeks want, and often insert Easter eggs and in-jokes for us fans. Now, we’ve got the scoop on a top-secret “Up” bonus for eagle-eyed viewers: Pixar’s first peek at a never-before-seen character from 2010’s “Toy Story 3.” “On ‘Monsters [Inc.]’, when Sulley is putting Boo back in her room, and he’s going to say goodbye to her, she hands him all these toys,” said Pete Docter, a director on “Up” and “Monsters,” and a writer on the “Toy Story” films. “One of them was this fish – which was Nemo – but nobody knew it at the time, because ‘[Finding] Nemo’ hadn’t come out yet. We have a similar thing [in ‘Up’].” And the toy glimpsed isn’t Woody, Buzz or even Barbie’s boyfriend Ken, but a whole new “Toy Story” character. “We’re showing a character from ‘Toy Story 3’ that nobody knows about,” Docter said. “That’s somewhere in there.” For more information, I went to Jonas Rivera, a producer on the heartwarming film about an old man named Carl who uses helium balloons to fly his house to South America. “Well, if you look very closely [you’ll see it],” Rivera said. “I won’t tell you who it is, but I’ll tell you where it is.” “There’s a shot where a little girl is in her room and the house goes by,” the producer said of a seemingly simple reaction scene near the beginning of the film, in which a young girl is surprised by the flying house soaring past her bedroom. “She’s playing with her toys. She’s playing with her little plane. She gets up, and she looks [out the window] – under her bed is one of the new stars of ‘Toy Story 3’.” “You have to look close,” he said. “It’s not [Ken], it’s someone new.’
I have now watched this shot 25 times, as well as a few dozen more viewings for a featurette on Disney’s site that also has the scene. All I can make out is some sort of shadow under the little girl’s bed that looks like bedroom slippers, and I think maybe a Cheeto. Can you see anything else under there? Could the new character be…the slippers? Stay tuned, as we’ll be sure to update this item as soon as we can. And if one of you loyal readers sees “Up” before everyone else and can spot the mystery “Toy Story 3” character, be sure to post it below! Take a look at the trailer – are your eyes better than mine? Can you tell what’s under that little girl’s bed? |
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Pixar
raises the animation bar with buoyant "Up" Reuters - Given the inherent three-dimensional quality evident in Pixar's cutting-edge output, the fact that the studio's 10th animated film is the first to be presented in digital 3-D wouldn't seem to be particularly groundbreaking in and of itself. But what gives "Up" such a joyously buoyant lift is the refreshingly nongimmicky way in which the process has been incorporated into the big picture -- and what a wonderful big picture it is. Winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever, the gorgeously rendered, high-flying adventure is a tidy 90-minute distillation of all the signature touches that came before it. It's also the ideal choice to serve as the first animated feature to open the Cannes Film Festival, considering the way it also pays fond homage to cinema's past, touching upon the works of Chaplin and Hitchcock, not to mention aspects of "It's a Wonderful Life," "The Wizard of Oz" and, more recently, "About Schmidt." Box-office-wise, the sky's the limit for "Up," which Walt Disney Studios releases stateside May 29. Even with its PG rating (the first non-G-rated Pixar picture since "The Incredibles"), there really is no demographic that won't respond to its many charms. The Chaplin-esque influence is certainly felt in the stirring prelude, tracing the formative years of the film's 78-year-old protagonist, recent widower Carl Fredricksen (terrifically voiced by Ed Asner). Borrowing "WALL-E's" poetic economy of dialogue and backed by composer Michael Giacchino's plaintive score, the nostalgic waltz between Carl and the love of his life, Ellie, effectively lays all the groundwork for the fun stuff to follow. Deciding it's better late than never, the retired balloon salesman depletes his inventory and takes to the skies (house included), determined to finally follow the path taken by his childhood hero, discredited world adventurer Charles F. Muntz (Christopher Plummer). But he soon discovers there's a stowaway hiding in his South America-bound home in the form of Russell, a persistent 8-year-old scout (scene-stealing young newcomer Jordan Nagai), and the pair prove to be one irresistible odd couple. Despite the innate sentimentality, director Pete Docter ("Monsters, Inc.") and co-director and writer Bob Peterson keep the laughs coming at an agreeably ticklish pace. Between that Carl/Russell dynamic and Muntz's pack of hunting dogs equipped with multilingual thought translation collars, "Up" ups the Pixar comedy ante considerably. Meanwhile, those attending theaters equipped with the Disney Digital 3-D technology will have the added bonus of experiencing a three-dimensional process that is less concerned with the usual "comin' at ya" razzle-dazzle than it is with creating exquisitely detailed textures and appropriately expansive depths of field. |
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Exclusive! Making A
BUG'S LIFE! Starlog - Back in summer 1994, before TOY STORY was completed, a trio of Pixar directors and writers pitched the basic concept of A BUG’S LIFE to Disney animation execs Tom Schumacher and Peter Schneider. Despite the fact that TOY STORY was proving to be more of a challenge than the CG scientists at Pixar had anticipated. Joe Ranft, Andrew Stanton and John Lasseter wanted an even bigger challenge: creating fantasy characters out of insects in a real-world, organic setting populated with a cast of thousands and filmed in widescreen CinemaScope in the grand style of a Hollywood epic. At that time, no one knew that TOY STORY would go on to become a worldwide phenomenon grossing more than $360 million, putting Pixar Animation Studios on the map and incidentally spawning a mini-industry of CG-animated films. But Disney gamely gave the go-ahead to Pixar’s “Epic of Miniature Proportions,” and so began a four-year production process that would lead to another beloved picture (debuting May 19 on Blu-ray from Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment, $39.99, $27.99 through Amazon).  Ranft
(who died in 2005) revealed that the story sprang from the old
Aesop’s fable of the grasshopper and the ants. While the
grasshopper fritters away spring, summer and fall, the ants work
relentlessly, accumulating a harvest for the long winter—when
the unprepared grasshopper will starve. “We began,” says Ranft,
“by asking the question: What if that grasshopper came back with
a gang to thump on the ants?”The grasshopper in question is Hopper (voiced by Kevin Spacey), who leads his legions against the industrious anthill. In a nod to the SEVEN SAMURAI/MAGNIFICENT SEVEN/THREE AMIGOS! tradition, Flik the ant (Dave Foley) hires members of P.T.’s Flea Circus as mercenary protectors. Thus, the film’s protagonists include male ladybug Francis (Denis Leary), walking stick Slim (David Hyde Pierce), black widow spider Rosie (Bonnie Hunt), praying mantis Manny (Jonathan Harris of LOST IN SPACE), moth Gypsy (Madeline Kahn), dung beetle Dim (Brad Garrett) and bulky caterpillar Heimlich (Ranft). Together, all these species represented a special challenge to Pixar. Stepping this deeply into the organic world would require co-directors Lasseter and Stanton and the Pixar artists and computer scientists to push their tools to a level of complexity far beyond TOY STORY. “John wanted plants with a translucency effect,” states Dr. William Reeves, one of the film’s technical directors. “And he wanted iridescent reflections off the hard insect exoskeletons, and many more complicated and unusual lighting effects. “The film was definitely a stretch. I’ve worked with John for 15 years now,” Reeves notes, “and he doesn’t let anyone sit back. He’s always pushing us to expand what is possible in CG filmmaking.” Director Lasseter, an Oscar winner for his work at Pixar, explains the unique blend of computer technology and art that has placed Pixar at the front rank of the CG revolution. “It’s true that Bill Reeves and Eben Ostby are two of the most brilliant computer scientists in the world working on computer animation,” he says, “but our approach at Pixar has always been that it is about story and characters.” Still, the production pipeline at Pixar differs markedly from the usual Disney method of organization in many respects. It all begins with a pencil. During the early stages of story development, storyboards are put up in the traditional manner. However, when the first story reels are created, the computer and video take over. Reeves outlines the process: “The storyboards get put up on video via an Avid system. As in traditional cel animation, the boards go to the layout department, and that’s the first time a scene is actually brought up on a computer. The layout department sets up the camera, but in a CG film, it is done in 3-D space. All of our sets and environments are 3-D models. So, in setting the scene, the layout department has to bring up all the models and environmental pieces that the modeling department has built. They lay out the positions of the characters and the camera in very basic form within the scene. “They put in the timing as determined by the editing department from the scratch dialogue and effects tracks. They basically block it out. If a character moves across the frame, they just drag the character’s image across the screen. Oftentimes that which seems to work perfectly in storyboard requires adjustments the first time that rough camera moves or character actions are attempted. The director approves the layouts, and individual scenes are sent to an animator.” And next is the first major departure from the traditional Disney model. Animators are assigned by scene rather than character; this means a scene is not passed around from one animator to another. Instead, each animator gets to do all of the characters in that assigned scene. On the plus side, this system can produce extremely detailed and subtle interactions between characters; on the other hand, a director has to watch very carefully that acting continuity is maintained. “We find,” Reeves explains, “that there is so much knowledge and planning in the understanding of a scene that an animator must go through while working on his lead character that it really should apply to the other characters as well. Handing the scene off to someone else for each character causes that second, third or even fourth person to have to re-think all of the things going on in the scene. We find it’s better to leave the scene with one animator and have that person flesh out the entire scene. “Still, some animators do a better job on some characters than others, so certainly there is some assigning done on the basis of handing a scene to an animator who seems to understand the lead character of that scene best. So while there is still some animator casting in that way, by and large, scenes do not get passed animator to animator to do the individual characters.” Nor does the detail work go to the other teams. “When you get a scene,” affirms directing animator Glenn McQueen (who died in 2002), “the animator is responsible for all the main characters, and that includes everything down to their antennae and toes; those detail tasks are not passed off to others to complete. By this film’s end, I would say that almost all of the animators—and we had over 50—will have worked with almost all of the characters at one time or another.” So, at what point does the animator put aside the pencil and reach for the mouse? “When an animator is assigned a scene,” Reeves explains, “he gets a set of files that define what layout did with the shot. It will have camera angles and moves. Some animators will first pick up a pencil or work up some quick thumbnails or experiments before turning to his workstation. Not everybody does that by any means, but quite a few of them do doodles first. “Then they bring up the scene on their machine and a main window shows how the shot looks from the layout. There is what we call the Main Cam View, which is essentially the view that the final image will take. In addition, the animator can view the scene or action from many different angles while they’re working on it: maybe a top view or several side angles. For complicated dialogue, they can set up an extra view as a close-up on a character’s face, and no matter how or where the character moves in the Main Cam View, the extra window will always show the character’s face. It’s very handy for maintaining the flow of movement in today’s complicated layouts.” Besides these views, CG animators also have the computer equivalent of an animator’s exposure sheet or time line—usually most conveniently placed across the bottom of the screen from left to right. Various frames can be selected for quick playback the way an animator would flip through a stack of drawings, except, of course, the animator can rock and roll backwards and forwards. “Each character has a certain set of controls,” Reeves explains. “We call them AVARS, which stands for Articulated VARiableS. They work much like a puppet or marionette. By this point, the animator is never sketching the character’s shape, but is rather controlling the shapes that have been programmed into the character. It’s like having a built-in model sheet. “Of course, it is not direct as working with a pencil—there you just draw the line where you want it. Here the computer saves the animator from all the drawing and allows him to focus on movement and bringing the character to life. But you have to know what AVAR or set of AVARS to adjust. “The characters in A BUG’S LIFE have thousands of controls, but many of these are not used by the animators; they are functions for the light and shading crews. However, it isn’t unusual to have 500 controls on a particular character. The complexity of facial expressions demands most of these controls. Certainly, no one uses all of the controls in every scene, but there’s the potential for a lot of flexibility in the models. “So you go to a menu for that character, select the various controls that you want to use and bring them into your worksheet area,” Reeves continues. “You decide on a particular frame and decide that you want more of this and less of that, and then 10 frames later you want these other changes. The whole system uses key frame animation, which traditional cel animators use as well. The difference is that the computer fills in all the in-betweens. If you want the eye to fully open at frame 10, you might set the AVAR at one, which means open. Then at frame 20 you want it to be closed, so you set the AVAR at zero for frame 20. The computer automatically draws the steps in between ramping down the eyelid on the intervening frames. Now, you can also decide that maybe at frame 15, you don’t want it to be .5 but .66; you can do that. You can fill in every frame, if you want, as a key frame, but typically the animators opt not to do that. They let the computer take the load of the drudgework. “There are curves that define how the AVARS change value, and you can change the shape of those curves with an on-screen control. So, instead of providing individual frame values, you can select your values at sparse frames. You can see the curves and control their shapes. It gives you a graphical sense of animation timing. “At any one time, you can ask for a preview of your scene or any sub-set of your scene to see how it works in real time. Of course, there are lots of undos so you can go back and change things, and you can save multiple versions. It’s ideal for the animator, since you don’t have to invest a lot of time drawing. You can spend your time refining the movement. “Most of the artists at Pixar work by layering in their animation; that is, they start with broad strokes to get the basic blocking and timing, and then refine from there. So, at any one time, you have a preview of how the complete shot works. As the animator develops the detail in a scene, his idea of what’s important in the scene may slowly evolve so that eventually the animator may discover that what’s important is getting the dialogue to match exactly or perhaps getting the movement with another character,” Reeves says. When an animator is beginning a scene, most of the basic acting decisions have been determined by the vocal talent working with the film’s director and directing animators. There are often four or five recording sessions, sometimes spread out over two years. The vocal cast for A BUG’S LIFE is an eclectic mix of performers—also including Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Phyllis Diller, Hayden Panettiere (later of HEROES), Roddy McDowall, Edie McClurg and Pixar lucky charm John Ratzenberger. Director Lasseter emphasizes that when casting a film, he looks for vocal quality and acting talent. “Sometimes we’ll extract some audio clips from someone we’re interested in and just put the voice up against the storyboard drawing to see if it fits or not. We never ask our actors to ‘do’ a voice. Some people assume that since they’re doing animation, they have to put on a cartoony voice. We’re looking for a high degree of believability—it has to sound as real as you and I talking,” Lasseter says. Frequently, the recording sessions are character discovery experiences for the directors and writers. Parts may be expanded because of what a specific actor brings to a role. “A good example,” Ranft explains, “is the character of Molt, voiced by Richard Kind, the idiot brother of the villain, Hopper. Now, Kevin Spacey as the villain is pretty darn serious—he’s a very scary guy. And then we have this really dumb grasshopper as his sidekick. We had to ask ourselves, why would Hopper keep him around? So, we decided that Molt is Hopper’s brother and Hopper promised his Mom that he would always take care of him, so he’s stuck with this dork. And Richard is so funny in this role that John decided that we had to have this guy stay at the end. So, when all the grasshoppers are driven off, Molt stays behind to work as the strong man in P.T. Flea’s Circus.” During the storyboard stage, the crew gets to voice the character scratch track before actors are hired and the actual recording sessions begin. Ranft was voicing five or six characters on the scratch track, but Heimlich, the fat German caterpillar, really came to life through Ranft’s exuberantly silly German accent, so Lasseter and Stanton asked him to lend his vocal talents to the final film. Ranft claims that he mixed a little of his own German ancestry with bits from Sergeant Schultz of HOGAN’S HEROES, a little Augustus Gloop of WILLY WONKA & THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY and Dr. Strangelove. “It was a natural fit,” Ranft admits, “since many of us at Pixar come from the class clown category when we were growing up.” “Traditional animation makes use of live-action reference material, and it isn’t any different for CG at Pixar,” says McQueen. “We videotaped the actors as they read their lines. It’s something we did on TOY STORY, and it proved invaluable. For example, the animator will not only have Spacey’s line reading as Hopper, but he’s able to see Spacey’s performance, too. “Generally speaking, the director will make seven or eight takes of a line reading, and of those takes, John and Andrew will select one for the film. The animator will be able to see their process of going through all the other takes that weren’t selected. So, that can give an animator a wide range of facial expressions and gestures to study. For example, an animator may decide that he really likes what the actor was doing with his eyes in take four and a gesture in take five, when in fact vocal take number seven was the one that John and Andrew selected. The Blu-ray edition also features “A BUG’S LIFE: The First Draft,” selected storyboards illustrating the original story treatment and how that changed. “Also, the animator can video himself or another animator acting out the shot,” McQueen continues. “We have a room here with mirrors on all four walls. So, if you set up the camera just right, you can shoot your action and actually see if from several different points-of-view at once. And that really helps the animator figure out how the weight shifts from one foot to another on a step or how the balance shifts. It helps the animator discover subtle secondary movement that you might not think of if you were just sitting down animating in front of your machine. A lot of serendipity happens when you explore in this way. “For example, watch a couple of people talking to each other across the room; just watch their feet. It always amazes me how much people walk around—take tiny little compensation steps. There is an amazing amount of footwork involved in just standing and talking to someone else. There are the obvious main gestures that everyone is aware of, but it really takes a good sense of observation to pick up on all the subtle gestures that aren’t immediately obvious.” In addition to videotaping the actors, some pre-production time was spent watching insects in close-up. The Pixar animators really got to know their bugs. “We had someone come in whose specialty was insect locomotion, and he had incredible footage of crawling insects on treadmills in front of a grid,” says McQueen. “He showed us all the different insect gaits and how they changed from one to the other. And we used that a fair bit at the beginning of production to establish some character walks, most notably Dim, the big dung beetle. In terms of acting, there wasn’t much to learn there. Since so many of the characters are anthropomorphized, few of them walked around on six or eight legs; Rosie, the black widow spider, was an exception. Most of the characters were animated as bipeds. It was useful to see how bugs move and to find out what people think of when they think of bug movement. It also helped us draw the line between appealing motion and ‘buggy’ motion. “The less appealing characteristics of insects were emphasized for the villains, such as antenna twitches and other buggy jerks. The ants stayed with two arms and two legs, though there are shots where four arms and two legs are visible. We found that with the grasshopper characters, the extra set of arms really accentuated their otherworldliness. “David Hyde Pierce’s character Slim, a walking stick, was really tough to work with compositionally because he has such long arms. And while it’s easy for an animator to go into the mirror room and act out what the upper arms are doing, it’s always kind of a difficult decision about what the lower arms should be doing. Should they be mirroring the upper arms but delayed a little bit? Should they be in an entirely different pose? What we did mostly was go with mirroring or kept the lower arms in a pose that amplified Slim’s feeling. It helped sell the character without cluttering up the frame too much.” A BUG’S LIFE features 22 major characters. The unusually large cast proved particularly formidable, especially in working in the wide 2.35 aspect ratio of CinemaScope. “We always have to be aware of where in the frame the audience’s attention is being drawn,” says McQueen. “It all starts in layout with lens and camera placement and then goes to animation, with, ‘What are the characters doing and when are they doing it?’ The final polish comes in lighting and shading; maybe the background characters are softened slightly or maybe a nice key light picks out the principal character.” CG artists tweak and refine right up until the scenes are printed to film. Lasseter half-jokingly remarks, “Our films are never finished, they are just released. “I love this medium,” he emphasizes, “because we’re always experimenting. I go to work every day and I see something that I have never seen before in my life, and that’s inspiring. We’ve based the whole workings of the studio around that.” Pixar’s award-winning short films have always stood out from the rest of the industry, partly because of the unique working relationship at Pixar between computer scientists and animators. “When I began at Pixar in the early ’80s,” John Lasseter explains, “I didn’t sit down with Bill and Eben and try to learn everything they knew so I could do it myself—which you have to understand is the common way that computer animation was handled back in 1983. Instead, we created a team: their knowledge of computer science and my knowledge of animation. Out of that grew the whole philosophy of Pixar, which is: Art challenges technology and technology inspires art.” |
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Top Disney
Executive Urges Partnership Travel Agent Central - The Travel Promotion Act, introduced this week, won a strong endorsement from Jay Rasulo, chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, who testified before the Senate Subcommittee on Competitiveness, Innovation, and Export Promotion of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, & Transportation. Rasulo said the Act would create a public-private entity that could speak with the authority of the U.S. government to tell the world, “We want you to visit.” “It would work to reverse widespread negative perceptions that the U.S. is unwelcoming to overseas travelers," Rasulo told the Committee. "And it would complement and augment our nation’s public diplomacy efforts: We know from research that those who have visited the U.S. are 74% more likely to have an extremely favorable opinion of America than those who haven’t traveled here. “This new entity would combine the expertise of the private sector with the oversight and coordination of the federal government," he continued. "It would serve as the primary voice for all travel-related policies. It would coordinate our national strategies to maximize the benefits of travel to America. And it would ensure that international travel benefits all 50 states and the District of Columbia, including areas not traditionally visited by foreigners. “We are only asking the United States to establish what
nearly every other major foreign market already has: a
nationally coordinated and well-funded travel promotion
campaign. To give you an idea of just how competitive the
overseas travel market has become: Greece and Mexico each spend
$150 million a year on promotion campaigns to attract travelers;
China spends $60 million; France, Germany, Italy and the UK
spend a combined $250 million,” Rasulo told the Senate
Committee. After noting that overseas visitors spend an estimated $4,500
per person when they come to the U.S., Rasulo told the committee
that “if arrivals had kept pace with global trends since 2001,
that would have totaled $182 billion in spending. That’s enough
to support 245,000 jobs. Moreover, the added revenue generated
by those visits would have yielded $27 billion in tax receipts.” Rasulo also urged three key points on the Committee, including a secure, but user-friendly, visa process. “We applaud Congress for expanding the Visa Waiver Program, but for those travelers requiring a visa, the system needs to be more efficient and easier to navigate—while continuing to put America’s security first." He also said the U.S. needed to continue making the entry process a more positive experience—something that is already starting to happen thanks to the Model Ports program to improve our nation’s busiest airports. Rasulo concluded his testimony saying the most work remains in promoting the U.S. abroad. “We need to tell the world about the improvements we have made to the entry process. We need to invite international travelers to visit the United States," he said. "We need to tell them that they are welcome here.” |
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Keep Nemo
Company in Disney's Epcot Aquarium Jaunted - Although Walt Disney World seems like a never-ending sea of tourists, there is at least one awesome way to escape from all the strollers and crowds. Go where it's quiet and cool by strapping on that air tank and those fins for DiveQuest, an experience within The Seas with Nemo and Friends at Epcot. As long as you are open water scuba certified, promise not to touch the fishies and stay on your best behavior, you’ll be free to dive around inside of their 5.7-million-gallon saltwater tank.
In order to do the dive experience, you'll only need you
bathing suit as the Disney crew will provide wetsuits,
masks, fins, tanks, and all the usual gear. If you wear
glasses or just love your mask, you are however welcome to
bring your own. Just pay close attention while reef sharks,
sea turtles, eagle rays, and dolphins check you out while
you're peeping back at them. And don't forget to put on a
show in front of your friends and family, who'll be watching
from the aquarium side.
The whole deal lasts about three hours, but you’ll only be diving for near 40 minutes. Rates start at $150 per person, but you aren’t required to have admission to the park for that day. They also offer a snorkeling program for those that like to stick to the surface. If you’re trying to avoid Mickey by going under the water, you’re out of luck; as you can see, he’s got his own wetsuit and is known to go for a dive once in a while; say hello to Mickey, Nemo and Dory for us. |
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Road Rules for Disney with Kids
My Fox 8 - In much of the United States, most kids wouldn't their childhood slip by without trying to persuade their parents to take them to Walt Disney World in Orlando. This year, we set aside our concern about costs and decided to make the trip. Then came the task of figuring out the logistics for ourselves, our daughters, 10 and 4, our son, 7, and our au pair. We ultimately settled on four days at Disney World using the four-day Park Hopper pass and staying at a hotel close to -- but not inside -- one of the theme parks. We avoided over planning how we'd spend those four days to make sure we were doing what the kids wanted to do rather than dragging them to what we wanted to do. We visited all four parks. Here are some tips based on our experience: 1. The Park Hopper pass is great for people wishing to visit Disney World parks for several days. A Disney Club member got us the tickets at a 10 percent discount: $196 for adults and $157 for children. The passes give you unlimited movement among the four primary parks: Magic Kingdom, Disney-MGM Studios, Disney's Animal Kingdom and Epcot. If you visit the parks just two or three days you can keep your pass for a future visit. 2. If you plan to visit Disney World for four days, build in at least one day off. Four consecutive days at theme parks was too much for us -- the adults and the kids alike. We spent only about four hours at Disney World on the final day because we were just too tired. 3. Our hotel offered bus transportation to and from the Magic Kingdom every half-hour. From there we could take Disney World buses to the other theme parks. We found it was easier to drive ourselves and pay the $6 daily parking fee. The daily parking pass allows you to park at other parks during the same day. 4. Beware that children who normally nap in the afternoon will have a tough time getting through the entire day without a break -- and this gets even worse as the days go on. Our youngest, almost 5, became tired and cranky at some point every day. 5. Consider renting a stroller for your young child. We didn't do this until the final day, and I wish we had done it sooner. It helped us get through the cranky periods. 6. Carry bottled water that you freeze ahead of time to give you a lasting supply of very cold water. We also carried a change of clothes for the little ones in case of accidents, rain ponchos that we bought at Magic Kingdom during a cloud burst on our first day, maps and a guide book. Be sure to carry hats and/or sunglasses. 7. I was surprised that my kids enjoyed the live shows at Disney World as much as the rides. My husband and I enjoyed them more than the rides, and they provided a nice break from the heat and from being on our feet. 8. Use "Fast Passes" to avoid standing in line for a ride. In essence, a fast pass is a reservation to go on a ride at a particular time -- usually about an hour later. Each person can get just one fast pass at a time. These cut our waiting time from about 40 minutes to about 10 minutes or less. |
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Disney
Urges Kids to Make Green Choices
Disney News - Beginning tomorrow the Walt Disney Company will launch “Disney’s Friends fro Change: Planet Green” a new multiplatform environmental initiative across the Disney Channel, Disney XD, Radio Disney and Disney.com featuring a star-studded lineup of Disney’s young talent pledging environmental stewardship and encouraging other kids to do the same. Along the way kids’ votes will determine how Disney will divide $1 million in donations to green causes. Disney stars Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, the Jonas Brothers, and Demi Lovato are among the 29 young stars participating in outreach messages as part of the Disney’s Friends for Change: Project Green initiative. Young people will join together to help the environment across four key areas: climate, water, waste and habitats. Kids will learn practical ways to preserve the planet, track their collective impact and have the opportunity to vote on how $1 million in donations from Disney will be divided and invested in various environmental causes over the course of a year. If 500,000 kids participate in Disney Friends for Change: Project Green events, together they can:
“With Disney’s Friends for Change, we’re empowering kids to tap into the potential that lies within each and every one of them to make a difference,” said Bob Iger, president, The Walt Disney Company. “Building on our recently announced environmental goals, this program highlights what is possible as we leverage Disney’s reach to educate and inspire environmental stewardship in others.” |
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Disney catches comedy pass
Variety - Disney has snapped up an untitled sports comedy pitch by producers Andrew Gunn and Charles Segars. Story centers on four friends attending a high school reunion who wind up being suckered into playing in an alumni football game. Project's envisioned as a broad comedy. Gunn and Segars, who both have term deals with Disney, will produce through their respective Gunn Entertainment and Sparkler Entertainment shingles. Gunn produced "Race to Witch Mountain" and "Bedtime Stories" for Disney. Segars, who received story credit on "National Treasure" and exec produced that pic and its sequel, is attached to produce "Fort Knox" at Warner Bros. and "Stealing Time" at Sony. |
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Coalition for the Homeless Receives Disney’s Top Grants Award Disney
News - Shining a spotlight on services for homeless children in
our region, the Walt Disney World Resort recognized the
Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida with its top
Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants honor – the Bob Allen
Outstanding Community Service Award – for the second year in a
row. Mickey Mouse, along with Walt Disney World Resort president Meg Crofton, Allen family members and other Disney dignitaries arrived at the Coalition’s facilities on Monday with a prize patrol to award $60,000 to the non-profit’s children services program which aims to instill values such as trust, honesty, integrity, responsibility, personal power and self-esteem.
“It’s humbling and a great honor to be recognized for our work with families,” said Brent Trotter, President/CEO of the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida. “Families with children are the fastest growing segment of the homeless population in Central Florida today. We’ve created a wide variety of services to meet the unique needs of the growing number of children who the Coalition serves and are happy to have the support of Disney in our mission.”
Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants celebrates those who commit their time and talent to making a difference in the lives of Central Florida’s children. One of its top awards - the Bob Allen Outstanding Community Service Award - honors the late Bob Allen, who started his career at Disneyland in 1955 and ended his tenure with a decade-long period as vice president of Walt Disney World Resort. After his death in 1987, Allen’s family formed an endowment fund that assists local social service, environmental and humanitarian organizations.
During the next two weeks, Disney will send prize patrols across Central Florida to surprise, reward and recognize a total of 34 Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants recipients chosen by a panel of judges made up of Central Florida community leaders and Walt Disney World Cast Members. Prize patrol reports and pictures will be posted on www.shineontoday.com so you can follow along on the journey across Central Florida and track the total giving.
To learn more about the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida, visit: http://www.centralfloridahomeless.org/. |
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Disney Surprises Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Florida
With $50,000 Grant Disney
News - Walt Disney World Resort honored Big Brothers Big Sisters
of Central Florida with one of its top Disney’s Helping Kids
Shine grants – the Dianna Morgan Children’s Champion Award – in
recognition of the magic the organization creates through youth
outreach and mentoring. Mickey Mouse, along with Dianna Morgan, and other Disney Cast Members arrived at the Big Brothers Big Sisters office this morning with a prize patrol to award $50,000 to the non-profit agency. “We couldn’t be more surprised or thrilled,” said Jennifer Rider, Chief Executive Officer of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Florida. “Thanks to Disney’s funding, we’ll be able to maintain our support staff that make and sustain our mentoring matches. They play a critical role in helping set our youth up for future success.” Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Florida serves nearly 1,000 of the region’s most vulnerable children – those from single parent homes, families living in poverty and households where a parent is incarcerated. Big Brothers Big Sisters’ professionals recruit and carefully match volunteers and kids and provide ongoing support (especially in the first year) to the volunteers, kids and their families. Independent research shows kids with Big Brothers Big Sisters mentors are more likely than their peers to finish/succeed in school, avoid violence and resist other negative, harmful behaviors and activities. Disney’s Helping Kids Shine grants celebrates those who commit their time and talent to making a difference in the lives of Central Florida’s children. One of its top awards – the Dianna Morgan Children’s Champion Award – is in honor of Dianna Morgan, a children’s advocate who forged relationships among Disney, community members and leaders throughout Florida during her 30-year career with the company. During the next two weeks, Disney will send prize patrols across Central Florida to surprise, reward and recognize a total of 34 Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants recipients chosen by a panel of judges made up of Central Florida community leaders and Walt Disney World Cast Members. Prize patrol reports and pictures will be posted on www.shineontoday.com so you can follow along on the journey across Central Florida and track the total giving. To learn more about Big Brothers Big Sisters, visit http://www.bbbs.org |
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Wednesday May 13, 2009 |
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Curtain `Up': Cannes opens with animated adventure Woman arrested for Disney scam The Zeppelin Takes on Disney•Pixar's "UP" Walt Disney (DIS) PriceWatch Alert Shows Bullish Technical's Disney Parks Merchandise Comes to the Disney Store Online Finally, A Walt Disney Museum With Academic Chops Disney guests get wine Adventure Radio Disney and Oddwater Will Kick Off Oregon Coast Aquarium's Summer Season Win passes to an advance screening of Disney/Pixar's 'Up'! New Channel Announced For ESPN RISE And Disney's Wide World of Sports Man accused of flashing girl at MOA Disney Store Vanessa Hudgens Open to Nude Film Roles |
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Curtain `Up': Cannes opens with animated adventure AP - After nine hits and four Academy Awards for films including "WALL-E" and "Ratatouille," the Pixar Animation gang finally feels it has made it to the grown-ups' table with "Up," the first animated movie to open the Cannes Film Festival. The Oscars compartmentalize animated films into their own category. Audiences often do the same, lumping animation in as a genre meant mainly for kids. But Pixar's creative minds feel the choice of "Up" as the Cannes curtain raiser signals that animation can stand alongside the best that live-action films might offer. "It is one of the greatest kinds of rewards, it's one of the greatest things that's happened to us in our career," said Pixar's John Lasseter, who pioneered feature-length computer animation with the two "Toy Story" movies. "To see animation respected at the world's premier film festival. To be given opening night ... you pinch yourself. You just can't believe it," said Lasseter, who also oversees animation at Walt Disney, Pixar's parent company. The English-language version of "Up" features Edward Asner providing the voice of Carl Fredricksen, a brokenhearted widower who renews his spirit of adventure after floating his house off to South America under thousands of helium balloons. The film is released in U.S. theaters on May 29. "Up" has moments of deep pathos, including a couple of sequences that brought tears to viewers' eyes in preview screenings as Carl's life with his beloved wife is chronicled in montages and old photos. "There's a perception that animated films are for kids. A lot of people have that, which I think is very unfortunate. The films are made by adults who have very adult concerns," said Ed Catmull, president of Disney and Pixar's animation studios. "What happens now at Cannes is they're recognizing it as a film. Not as a category, but as a really great film." While the movies can soar off on whatever flights of fancy the animators imagine, Pixar aims to ground the stories in human emotion, whether they're about talking fish ("Finding Nemo"), working-class superheroes ("The Incredibles") or chatty autos ("Cars"). "Up" director Pete Docter said animation was a tool, not the star. "It's not a genre, it's a medium. Animation can do anything. If we decided to, we could do horror films or drama, suspense, anything," said Docter, who also made Pixar's "Monsters, Inc." "We think about characters much in the same way live-action filmmakers think about the characters. Motivation and underlying goals, and needs and wants," he said. "Up" producer Jonas Rivera said Pixar thinks of its productions not as animated films, but as films that "happen to be animated." "Sometimes, you feel like animation sits at the little kids' table," Rivera said. "We just want to make films that people enjoy, so to be honored with opening night at the festival, it feels a little bit like, OK, maybe somebody else sees that, too. ... This is the big kids' table." |
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Woman
arrested for Disney scam WOFL - A 21-year-old Miami woman was arrested Tuesday for posting fake advertisements for Disney vacation packages and Disney World discount tickets, scamming customers out of more than $7,500. Investigators said Nancy Alvarez, who goes by several false names, posted the ads on Craigslist using the business name "A Fairy Tale Event." Customers who responded to the ads and provided Alvarez with personal checks and money orders were scammed out of $7,640, collectively. The Florida Agriculture and Consumer Services Commission said Alvarez failed to provide the promised vacation packages or Disney tickets to her customers, despite having received their money. |
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The Zeppelin Takes on Disney•Pixar's "UP" MarketWire - The familiar sight of the white Zeppelin, "Eureka," flying over the San Francisco Bay, is a little less familiar after the airship emerged from her hangar at Moffett Field last week sporting a new look! The 246-foot-long Zeppelin now features Disney•Pixar's newest animated comedy adventure "UP" on her hull, with nearly 5,000 square feet of special aviation-certified decal material, including a 78-foot "UP" logo. Opening nationwide May 29, 2009, Disney•Pixar's "UP" features the high-flying adventures of 78-year-old balloon salesman Carl Fredricksen.
"Eureka" currently flies over the San Francisco Bay Area and Monterey, but later this month is headed to Los Angeles. "You can buy a ticket for a 'flightseeing' experience on our Zeppelin, which is just one of the differences between it and all the blimps that are often seen over stadiums," says Joanne Fedeyko, Airship Ventures' director of sales. Earlier this year the Zeppelin "Eureka" was put through her paces for sound recordings to form the foundation for the airship soundtrack in the movie. Said Hall, "We were very pleased to be able to help Disney•Pixar with this request, and while it wasn't a starring role, we think Hollywood will develop a soft spot for our 'leading lady' when we visit later this month!" About the Movie From Disney•Pixar comes "UP," a comedy adventure about 78-year-old balloon salesman Carl Fredricksen, who finally fulfills his lifelong dream of a great adventure when he ties thousands of balloons to his house and flies away to the wilds of South America. But he discovers all too late that his biggest nightmare has stowed away on the trip: an overly optimistic 8-year-old Wilderness Explorer named Russell. From the Academy Award®-nominated director Pete Docter ("Monsters, Inc."), Disney•Pixar's "UP" invites you on a hilarious journey into a lost world, with the least likely duo on Earth. "UP" will be presented in Disney Digital 3-D™ in select theaters. About Airship Ventures, Inc. Founded in 2007 in California, Airship Ventures, Inc. operates the only passenger airship operation in the United States, featuring "Eureka," the world's largest airship. The Zeppelin's spacious cabin comfortably accommodates one pilot, one flight attendant, and 12 passengers with luxury features including oversized panoramic windows, an onboard restroom with window, and a 180-degree rear observation window and "love seat" that wraps the entire aft of the cabin. Using the inert gas helium for lift, and vectored thrust engines for flight, Zeppelin NTs have been flying in Germany and Japan since 1997 with an unparalleled safety record. The trademarked graphics for the Disney•Pixar "UP" are used by permission. Their use does not imply any endorsement of Airship Ventures, Inc. or its passenger experience by The Walt Disney Company and its affiliated companies. |
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Walt Disney (DIS) PriceWatch Alert Shows Bullish Technicals Market Intelligence Center - Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS) closed yesterday at $24.32. So far the stock has hit a 52-week low of $15.14 and 52-week high of $35.02. Walt Disney stock has been showing support around 23.37 and resistance in the 25.37 range. Technical indicators for the stock are Bullish and S&P gives DIS a positive 4 STAR (out of 5) buy rating. DIS appears on the Investors Observer Analysts Favorites list. For a hedged play on this stock, look at a Jan '10 25 covered call (DIS AE) for a net debit in the $21.47 area. That is also the break even stock price for this trade. This covered call has a 248 day duration, provides 11.72% downside protection and a 16.44% assigned return rate for a 24.20% annualized return rate (comparison purposes only). A lower cost hedged play for this stock would use a longer term call option in place of the covered call stock purchase. To use this strategy look at going long the DIS Jan '10 22.50 Call (DIS AX) and selling the Jan '10 25 call (DIS AE) for a $1.50 debit. The trade has a 248 day life and would provide 1.32% downside protection and a 66.67% assigned return rate for a 98.00% annualized return rate (for comparison purposes only). Walt Disney has a current annual dividend yield of 1.37%. |
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 Disney
Parks Merchandise Comes to the Disney Store OnlineDisney News - As of today, Disneystore.com (formerly Disneyshopping.com) is now offering a large assortment of merchandise from the U.S. Disney Parks. Among the Walt Disney World and Disneyland merchandise available are Mickey Mouse ear hats, character autograph books, photo albums, toys (including the monorail playset and some of its accessories), apparel, snowglobes, big figures, small statues, home decor, and much more. You can start shopping right now at this LINK. |
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Finally, A Walt Disney Museum With Academic Chops Jaunted - In the unforgiving world of public opinion, there are pushbacks, there are pushbacks, and then there's what the Disney empire will do to protect its brand. Remember that scene from South Park? Yeah. The personal image of Walt Disney has taken more than a few hits over the last decade. In response his heirs are opening a $112 million museum in San Francisco, the purpose being to dispel some of the wilder myths about Walt Disney the man. The Walt Disney Family Museum, set to open in Fall 2009, will be run by the former deputy director of the Harvard University Art Museums, Richard Benefield. The museum, made up of three buildings located in San Fran's Presidio, will be dedicated entirely to Walt's life. It will have 215 video monitors and feature all manner of unique Disney memorabilia. The exhibits will cover everything from the conditions of Walt's childhood to the production of Snow White to the political controversies that swirled around him.
Keep in mind that this is an initiative by Walt's family,
which is distinct from the corporation. Getting a curator
with academic credibility was important to them, just as
keeping the project rigorous was important to the Benefield.
The museum isn't supposed to be a whitewash or a vanity
project.
In between descriptions of Walt's childhood, then, there will be exhibits about his troubles with unions and his testimony in front of the House Un-American Activities Committee. So while the museum will of course be a destination for Disney aficionados, it should also appeal to mainstream museum buffs. Ticket prices are still being worked out. The small museum will only allow 60 people at a time, and so people will be shuffled through every 15 minutes. |
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Disney guests get
wine Adventure
The Desert Sun - But Disney's California Adventure is in the midst of its fourth annual California Food and Wine Festival, offering daily events through June 7 in Anaheim. It was conceived as a way to give adults something do (and eat) while the kids enjoyed the rides and attractions, said Gary Magetti, director of food and beverage for the Disneyland Resort theme parks. This year's festival “will take guests on a delicious journey around the globe,” Magetti added. “What we realized is that food is really part of everyone's entertainment budget,” said Michael Jordan, master sommelier for the Disney resort. “This is a way to expand the (theme park) experience and offer something for everyone's taste.” Daily events include culinary demonstrations with Disney resort and celebrity chefs, such as Food Network stars Guy Fieri, host of “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives,” on May 31, and Keegan Gerhard, host of “Food Network Challenge,” on June 4. Kids aren't left out of this culinary celebration, either. The Junior Chef demonstrations are hands-on culinary experiences designed for chefs ages 11 and older at Bountiful Farms Friday through Sunday. There are also winemaker dinners at the Disneyland Hotel, with vintners from some of California's best boutique wineries, including one with Robert Cabral, executive winemaker for Williams Selyem Winery. As the resort's master sommelier, Jordan is a big part of the festival, giving classes in Introduction to Wine Tasting on Saturday afternoons ($50) and working with the winemakers' dinners. “One of the things I tell my students is not to take themselves to seriously” when it comes to wine, he said. “We're here to have fun. My best advice is always drink what you love.” While the emphasis is on wine, there is also a nightly beer walk ($10) at the Pacific Wharf area of the park. The festival ends with the Taste Food Wine Life event from 8 to 11 p.m. June 5-6 on the California Adventure backlot. “Our intent is to weave the story of of wine and honor the culinary culture in California,” Magetti said. “And we're already starting to make plans for next year.” |
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Radio Disney and Oddwater Will Kick Off Oregon Coast
Aquarium's Summer Season
Zoo and Aquarium Visitor News - Memorial Day Weekend promises fun for the whole family at the Oregon Coast Aquarium May 22 – 25, featuring the popular exhibit, Oddwater, a visit from Radio Disney, a change to summer hours and a new café ready to offer coastal cuisine to Aquarium visitors. Radio Disney performance troupe will perform at the Oregon Coast Aquarium Saturday, May 23, from 1 to 3 pm. The troupe consists of talented young choreographers dancing, singing and leading interactive games. Children are delighted as they participate and win prizes. Free face painting will be offered Saturday and Sunday from 11 am – 2:30 pm. The Aquarium will be showing off its new café Memorial Day weekend as well. Local Ocean Seafoods will offer Aquarium visitors fresh food and seafood. Local Ocean’s other location on Newport’s bay front has become one of the area’s most popular restaurants and fish markets where locals, fishermen, marine scientists, and visitors sit side by side, enjoying a fresh, healthy meal or shopping for dinner. Local Ocean Seafoods co-owner, Laura Anderson, is a third generation commercial fisherman. Her experience working summers on her father’s fishing boat salmon trolling and Dungeness crabbing has given her an authentic understanding of product quality and sourcing. “It is our mission to give people the best seafood experience of their lives,” said Anderson. With a Master’s Degree in Marine Resource Management from Oregon State University, Anderson has been at the forefront of the sustainability movement in Oregon. She has been an independent Marine Resource Management Consultant to organizations such as Oregon SeaGrant, Environmental Defense, Ecotrust, MidCoast Watersheds Council, and the Oregon Salmon Commission. “We are so pleased to be partnering with Laura and Local Ocean,” said Carrie Lewis, Aquarium Director of Marketing and Interim President. “The Aquarium’s messages of sustainability make Local Ocean a perfect fit for us and we look forward to a delicious summer!” The Oregon Coast Aquarium’s newest exhibit, Oddwater, continues to be a big draw for Aquarium visitors, featuring a sting ray touch pool and “Bioluminescent Theater.” Oddwater examines some of the most bizarre and mysterious life forms that live in the ocean. Colorful hand blown art glass creations alongside the animals are accentuated with subtle lighting to simulate the environment of each species’ habitat, combining art and marine biology to create an experience that educates, entertains and enlightens visitors about life forms most people never see. Memorial Day Weekend marks the transition to the Aquarium’s summer hours; beginning Saturday, May 23, the Aquarium will be open from 9 am to 6 pm. Summer hours will last through Labor Day Weekend; September 7, 2009. The Oregon Coast Aquarium is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit educational attraction dedicated to the highest quality aquatic and marine science programs for recreation and education so the public better understands, cherishes, and conserves the world’s natural marine and coastal resources. For more information, visit the Aquarium’s Web site at www.aquarium.org or call (541) 867-FISH. Photo Caption: The Radio Disney Performance Troupe consists of talented young choreographers dancing, singing, leading interactive games and giving out prizes. They will perform Saturday, May 23 from 1 to 3 pm. Photo by Cindy Hanson, Oregon Coast Aquarium. To view Oregon Coast Aquarium's web page on Zoo and Aquarium Visitor, go to: http://www.zandavisitor.com/forumtopicdetail-9-Oregon_Coast_Aquarium |
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Win passes to an advance screening of Disney/Pixar's 'Up'! MLive - I'm not a betting man, but I'd wager "Up" will be a commercial and artistic success. Why? It's a Pixar product, which, from "Toy Story" to "WALL-E," has churned out one quality animated family film after another -- and a handful of hands-down classics, to boot. So I jumped at the chance to share the "Up" experience with Press readers. I have 12 four-packs of passes to see an advance screening of "Up" at 7 p.m. May 26 at AMC Star Grand Rapids, 3000 Alpine Ave. NW. Interested? Here's what you have to do to get your hands on a four-pack: 1. Send an e-mail to contest@grpress.com with "Up" in the subject line. 2. Your e-mail must contain: Your name, mailing address, age and daytime phone (and cell phone, if available). If you don't include all of this information, you will not be eligible. Please, only one entry per e-mail address. 3. The deadline for entries is noon Thursday, May 21. 4. I will randomly select 12 people to receive passes good for four tickets. Winners will be notified via e-mail May 21. You will be able to pick up your passes at the theater, just prior to the movie. The movie is rated PG, and opens in theaters May 29. Good luck -- and for more on "Up," go to Disney.com/UP or text "UP" to DISNEY (347639) to view exclusive UPisodes, play games and more. |
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New Channel Announced For ESPN RISE And Disney's Wide World of
Sports The Tournament Guide Magazine - ESPN RISE and Disney’s Wide World of Sports have developed a new weeklong, multi-sport event called the “ESPN RISE Games”. The ESPN RISE Games, which will feature elite and competitive channel sports events, will be presented by Target. The ESPN RISE Games Presented by Target will take place July 19-25, 2009 at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex, the nation’s leading multi-sport venue for amateur and professional sports, in suburban Orlando, Fla. The ESPN RISE Games Presented by Target will be anchored by three elite high school sports events: the AAU 17-under Boys Basketball Super Showcase presented by Champion®, the Under Armour High School Softball All-American game and ESPN RISE’s newly developed, elite high school football event Champion® Gridiron Kings. Additional sponsors for the event will include POWERADE, the events exclusive beverage provider. The weeklong event will also feature competitive channel youth sports – baseball (10U, 11U and 12U), basketball (12U and 14U), field hockey (U14, U16 and U19) and track & field (12-14 and 15-18). The ESPN RISE Games Presented by Target is expected to host 4,000 student athletes. “Creating events like the ESPN RISE Games provides us with a great opportunity to work with our various partners to offer student athletes, looking to hone their skills, the resources and inspiration that can be utilized to aide in their continued development,” said James Brown, senior vice president, ESPN RISE. “We hope that the events we are planning will motivate them to elevate their collective games, taking them all one more step closer to achieving their individual goals.” The ESPN RISE Games Presented by Target is in line with the strategy for the ESPN re-branding of the Disney sports complex, which will create a one-of-a-kind, immersive experience for athletes and fans. “The ESPN RISE Games builds on the wide range of nationally-recognized youth and amateur sports events we host at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex,” said Mike Millay, Disney’s Director of Sports Events. “Through the increased collaboration between Disney and ESPN, we look forward to creating more marquee events and transformational sports experiences at our sports complex that athletes, coaches and spectators can’t get anywhere else.” ESPN RISE GAMES ELITE EVENT DETAILS: AAU 17-under Boys Basketball Super Showcase presented by Champion® is part of the AAU National Championships held at the Disney sports complex and features marquee 17-under club teams from across the country. The event includes two days of pool play and a single-elimination tournament. The tournament is a breeding ground for future NBA stars including Amare Stoudemire, Chris Paul, Dwyane Wade, as well as collegiate phenoms such as Tyler Hansbrough and JJ Redick. July 20-25
Under Armour High School Softball All-American game will feature 30 of the top high school All-Star players in the nation divided into two squads. Players are selected by a committee of high school softball experts from ESPN RISE. July 19-21 Champion® Gridiron Kings is an elite high school football event that features the best players in the game’s seven skill positions – quarterback, running back, tight end, wide receiver, linebacker, cornerback and safety. The event includes performance training, position specific training, skills challenges and a 7-on-7 competition. July 23-25. Team enrollment for the open division baseball, basketball, field hockey and track & field programs are available. Additional information on the ESPN RISE Games Presented by Target is available at ESPNRISEGames.com. About ESPN RISE ESPN RISE is the culmination of ESPN’s 20-year history of covering high school sports, including boys’ and girls’ basketball, football and lacrosse competitions, in addition to its acquisitions of SchoolSports, Hoopgurlz.com, Student Sports and its StudentSports.com and DyeStat.com. ESPN RISE represents ESPN’s commitment to engage and elevate high school athletes by providing them with recognition, resources, information and inspiration that can motivate them to improve their skills and achieve their goals to be the best athletes they can. ESPN RISE assets include ESPN RISE, GIRL, Hardwood and Gridiron magazines; ESPNRISE.com, Hoopgurlz.com and DyeStat.com, and more than 160 high school events including Elite 11, Elite 24, ESPN RISE National High School Invitational, Faster to First, Area Code Baseball and Nike Combines/Nike SPARQ Mini Camps. ESPN RISE is uniquely positioned to provide high school athletes and the company’s core fans with compelling high school sports content across all ESPN platforms. About Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex Opened in 1997 at Walt Disney World Resort, Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex is the leading multi-sport venue for amateur and professional sports in the United States. The sprawling 220-acre state-of-the-art complex features the Milk House, a 165,000-square-foot field house which seats 5,500 for basketball; the 9,500-seat Champion® Stadium ballpark; the Hess Sports Fields, which include multiple baseball, softball and soccer fields; and the Jostens Center, an 80,000 square foot multi-sport field house. In addition, the complex has 11 tennis courts, including a stadium court, and a track and field complex. The complex is home to more than 180 amateur and professional sports and entertainment events each year, including the Major League Baseball Atlanta Braves spring training, the Pop Warner Super Bowl, the Old Spice Classic college basketball tournament, Chelsea Football Club events, Disney’s Soccer Showcase, the Special Olympics Florida Summer Games and the World Cheerleading Championships. Please visit disneysports.com for more information. About Target- US Minneapolis-based Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) serves guests at 1,699 stores in 49 states nationwide and at Target.com. Target is committed to providing a fun and convenient shopping experience with access to unique and highly differentiated products at affordable prices. Since 1946, the corporation has given 5 percent of its income through community grants and programs like Take Charge of Education. Today, that giving equals more than $3 million a week. About Champion Since 1919 Champion has offered a full line of innovative athletic apparel for men and women including sport bras, activewear, team uniforms, sweats and accessories. Champion can be purchased at most sporting goods and department stores. For more information about Champion for men and women visit www.championusa.com . Champion is a brand of Hanesbrands Inc. About Under Armour, Inc. Under Armour® (NYSE: UA) is a leading developer, marketer, and distributor of branded performance apparel, footwear, and accessories. The brand’s moisture-wicking synthetic fabrications are engineered in many different designs and styles for wear in nearly every climate. The Company’s products are sold worldwide and worn by athletes at all levels, from youth to professional, on playing fields around the globe. The Under Armour global headquarters is in Baltimore, Maryland, with European headquarters in Amsterdam’s Olympic Stadium, and additional offices in Denver, Hong Kong, Toronto, and Guangzhou, China. For further information, please visit the Company’s website at www.underarmour.com .
About POWERADE |
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Man
accused of flashing girl at MOA Disney Store Minneapolis City Pages - You know that "creepy man" story you read in the news and repeat to all your buddies at the bar? Scratch that and use this one instead. This is probably the best penis sighting story so far this year (or ever). A Minnesota man is accused of getting a little too adventurous with his penis at the Mall of America this month. He is charged with criminal sexual conduct for two different incidents and could face a one-year prison sentence. Let's just say this story involves the Disney Store, a 6-year-old, and a mannequin dressed in underwear.
Police say Marcus Nelson, 39, of St. Paul, approached a
6-year-old girl May 3 at the MOA Disney Store with his penis
hanging out, according to WCCO. He asked the girl, "Did you
see it?"
She definitely did and promptly told her mother about it. She was able to describe the man to police. Just six days later, Nelson was allegedly caught in another store masturbating while peeking down the underwear of a mannequin. Who wouldn't get a little turned on removing the underwear from an unwilling mannequin, right? When police arrested him, what did they find in his bag? A ticket for indecent exposure. What a Sick F. |
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Vanessa
Hudgens Open to Nude Film Roles
San Francisco Chronicle - Disney star Vanessa Hudgens won't be writing in a no-nudity clause in her acting contracts, because she would consider stripping off onscreen as long as the film "calls" for it. The "High School Musical" actress, 20, reveals she has no qualms about shaking off her squeaky-clean reputation for good and getting naked for a movie role, but it will be a few years yet before her fans can expect any titillation She tells Eonline.com, "I will show nudity in a film when the time is right. "Right now, I wouldn't feel comfortable doing it, but if it's an amazing movie that I'm really passionate about and that's what it calls for, then we'll see." Hudgens gave the world a sneak peek of what to expect when she hit the headlines in 2007 after nude photos of the actress leaked online. The full-frontal snaps were reportedly intended for boyfriend Zac Efron. |
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Tuesday May 12, 2009 |
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Disney
Finance Chief's $1.9 Million Sale Kodak and Disney Cruise Line Bring Exclusive Fan Experience to the High Seas Disney Shares Fully Valued; Time to Sell 'Toy Story Mania!' (Wii) - Screens Boxee, ESPN Discuss Cable-Cord Cutting and Online TV Guests arrive at Disney World's newest vacation club resort -- Kidani Village Exclusive: 'The Princess and the Frog' Poster Premiere! Disney World actor fondly recalls Rochester Disney Animation Collection Volume 4: The Tortoise And The Hare on DVD Disney Animation Collection Volume 5: Wind In The Willows on DVD Disney Animation Collection Volume 6: The Reluctant Dragon on DVD Dadnapped and Hatching Pete Buy a Select Disney Blu-ray Disc on Amazon - Get $10 Back Disney to 'Race to Witch Mountain' this August Shine On! Exclusive room rates for nurses at Walt Disney World John Lasseter to get Venice honor |
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Disney Finance
Chief's $1.9 Million Sale Barron's - Thomas Staggs, Disney's (DIS) chief financial officer, did not mince words during the entertainment company's fiscal-second-quarter conference call last week. Vacationers are demanding steep discounts to visit the company's theme parks; movie-goers are bypassing the company's films; and advertisers aren't buying time on Disney-owned TV stations. But Staggs may have made his most important statement about the company without saying a word, observers say. On Friday, he sold 75,000 Disney shares for $1.9 million, or about $25.38 per share on average. The insider sales were the first at the company since September, when Staggs sold. |
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Kodak and Disney Cruise Line Bring Exclusive Fan Experience to
the High Seas Disney
News - In a Disney exclusive, numerous Disney Channel stars will
set sail this summer, joining thousands of Disney Cruise Line
guests aboard the Disney Wonder for eight special sailings
during the first-ever "Disney Channel Summer at Sea," presented
by Kodak.“We’re thrilled to partner with Disney Channel and offer guests on our ship a unique opportunity to sail with Disney Channel stars,” said Disney Cruise Line President Karl Holz. “A cruise vacation with Disney Cruise Line is always a family-favorite and ‘Disney Channel Summer at Sea’ provides families another reason to set sail and experience the Disney difference.” Popular stars from Disney Channel shows like "Hannah Montana," "Sonny With A Chance," "Wizards of Waverly Place," "The Suite Life on Deck," “JONAS,” "Camp Rock," "High School Musical" and "Hatching Pete" will sail with guests on three- and four-night Bahamian cruises taking place July 9 through August 2. During these themed sailings, Disney Channel stars will help pump up the volume during onboard deck parties and will join guests for Q & A and autograph sessions along with preview screenings of Disney Channel programming. The onboard fun culminates with a “Party with the Stars” event, an evening where guests can join the stars for a special live musical performance. As an added treat, Radio Disney will broadcast live from the ship during two of the cruises. Aligning with Kodak's "It's Time to Smile" campaign, all Disney fans will be able to share in the ship-to-shore fun online. Select video-blog reporters onboard the ship will capture their magical vacation memories on a ‘KODAK Zi6 Pocket Video Camera’ and post video from their voyages at disney.com/summeratsea. “At Kodak, we’re all about relationships. We bring people together through images and are thrilled to work with the Disney Channel to help Disney fans share their magical vacation memories,” said Kodak Chief Marketing Officer and Vice President Jeffrey Hayzlett. Each cruise during "Disney Channel Summer at Sea” will include multiple Disney Channel stars. Among those scheduled to sail include Tiffany Thornton from “Sonny With A Chance” (July 9 & 12), Nicole Anderson “JONAS” (July 9 & 12), Jason Earles from “Hannah Montana” (July 16 & 19), Mitchel Musso from “Hannah Montana” (July 19), Jason Dolley from “Hatching Pete” (July 23 & 26), Debby Ryan from “The Suite Life on Deck” (July 30) and Alyson Stoner from “Camp Rock” (Aug. 2). More stars will be announced shortly, guests can visit disneycruise.com/summeratsea frequently for up-to-date information on the line-up of stars sailing. (Talent is subject to change without notice.) "Disney Channel Summer at Sea" adds to the family-friendly fun found onboard a Disney ship. Disney Cruise Line provides a vacation experience that every member of the family feels was created just for them. Families enjoy award-winning Broadway-style entertainment at the Walt Disney Theatre, play together at high-energy deck parties featuring the only fireworks display at sea and dine in three uniquely themed restaurants. Kids delight in their own dedicated spaces and become immersed in Disney stories with their favorite characters and hosted by specially trained youth counselors. While the kids are at play, parents can slip away and relax at the spa, soak up rays at the adult-only pool, dance the night away in the clubs, or enjoy an exquisite Northern Italian meal at Palo. A leader in the family cruise segment, Disney Cruise Line offers three-, four- and seven-night itineraries to the Bahamas and the Caribbean with special voyages to the Mediterranean and Northern Europe on tap for 2010. Disney Channel Summer at Sea voyages are exclusive to three- and four-night itineraries on the Disney Wonder between July 9 and Aug. 2 with rates starting at $679 per person -- based on double occupancy for a category 12 inside stateroom, not including government taxes and fees. Land/sea vacation packages that include a stay at Walt Disney World Resort are also available. To learn more about Disney Cruise Line or to book a vacation, guests can contact their travel agent, visit disneycruise.com or call Disney Cruise Line at 888/DCL-2500. Travel agents can call Disney Cruise Line at 888/325-2500 or visit disneytravelagents.com. About the Disney Channel Summer at Sea Sweepstakes Beginning Monday, May 11 guests can visit Disney.com/SummeratSea, to enter a sweepstakes for a chance to win one of eight (8) Grand Prize Disney Cruise Vacation packages during the "Disney Channel Summer at Sea" program. Sweepstakes winners also receive an additional special meeting aboard ship with Disney Channel stars, and Kodak prize packages including a Kodak Zi6 video camera. Ten (10) second place winners will receive the ‘KODAK Zi6 Pocket Video Camera’ and Easy Share W1020 Digital Frame kit. About Kodak As the world's foremost imaging innovator, Kodak helps consumers, businesses, and creative professionals unleash the power of pictures and printing to enrich their lives. To learn more, visit the newly redesigned kodak.com and follow our blogs and more at kodak.com/go/followus. More than 70 million people worldwide manage, share and create photo gifts online at KODAK Gallery --join for free today at kodakgallery.com. About Disney Channel Disney Channel is a 24-hour kid-driven, family inclusive television network that taps into the world of kids and families through original series and movies. Currently available on basic cable in over 97 million U.S. homes and to millions of other viewers on Disney Channels around the world, Disney Channel is part of the Disney-ABC Television Group. |
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Disney Shares
Fully Valued; Time to Sell Seeking Alpha - The Cub Scout motto "Be prepared" has been translated into many languages with slightly different interpretations. In English, the motto is taken to mean that you are always in a state of readiness in mind and body to do your duty. Although my scouting days were short-lived and are now a distant memory, I follow this advice in my investing approach. As a value investor, I believe every asset is attractive at a certain price. My job is to dig through financial statements, model risk, and determine the price at which the potential rewards outweigh the possible risks. Buying shares below that price allows me to increase the likelihood that my portfolio will increase over time. Since markets do an excellent job of separating winning stocks from losers, my value approach eliminates most investment ideas. Of the 150 companies I actively follow, normally there are only eight to ten that I find attractive at a given time. However, markets constantly change and we must be prepared to act when they do. For me, being prepared entails understanding what an asset is worth and what variables led to the determination of that value. This level of preparation allows me to watch a price change and decide whether the change was driven by fundamental shifts that affect my valuation or by investor emotion. When emotions lead prices lower, buying opportunities are born. During this bear market, we have seen many emotion-driven plunges erased by wild optimism. While I believe the economy is nearing a bottom, I do not believe a sharp V-shaped rebound is in the future. Instead, I foresee years of subpar growth while we adapt to slower overall growth and a declining quality of life. In this environment, emotion-driven plunges offer buying opportunities while strong rallies lead to sales. Fundamental trades-buying what is cheap and selling at full value-have accounted for 65% of our portfolio's profits. Following this pattern, one of my first fundamental trades was Walt Disney (DIS). I believe that fair value for DIS is $25, and the market allowed me to purchase the shares at a discount. With the current rally, that discount is now gone. At the moment, I find the shares fully valued and will take advantage of the opportunity to exit. By clearly modeling risk and reward, we prepare ourselves for whatever the market delivers. When investing, we must remember that a sale approach is equally as important as a buy approach. Markets will provide us multiple chances to buy stocks at a discount. By realizing profits when stocks hit our target, we prepare for new opportunities. |
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'Toy Story Mania!' (Wii)
- Screens WorthPlaying.com - In Toy Story Mania!, players experience the fast-paced, zany fun of the Toy Story Mania! theme park attraction, which is an interactive experience requiring 3D glasses and involving rapid or quick-firing shooting galleries. 
Toy Story Mania! showcases an array of
entertaining games based on the new Disneyland Resort and Walt
Disney World Resort attractions, while featuring the iconic
characters and humor from the popular Disney/Pixar “Toy Story”
franchise. In Toy Story Mania!, players experience the fast-paced, zany fun of the Toy Story Mania! theme park attraction, which is an interactive experience requiring 3D glasses and involving rapid or quick-firing shooting galleries. In addition to galleries adapted from the attraction, the game includes new and original galleries and a series of mini games, all hosted by beloved characters from the movies. The thematically-connected levels are designed for up to four players of all ages with competitive and co-operative multiplayer options. Toy Story Mania! also includes bonus 3D features, transforming the game experience with eye-popping visuals.
Developed by Papaya Studio, Toy Story Mania! will be available this fall exclusively for Wii. |
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Wall Street Journal - Online video has become much more available to consumers in recent years, but its providers disagree over how much it will complement or cannibalize traditional television.
At the Streaming Media East conference
in New York, Damon Phillips, a vice
president at ESPN360.com, said he knows
what it’s like to lose the battle for
the TV remote and often watches games on
his PC while his daughter sits in front
of “Hannah Montana” on the tube. “It
fuels more consumption across all of our
platforms,” he said.
But Avner Ronen, CEO of Boxee, which makes software for watching Web video on TV sets, said the increase in streamed TV will naturally lead more consumers to rethink whether they want to also pay $60 to $80 a month for cable. “If online provides to you a better experience, I think some people will choose to cut the cord,” he said. He estimated that tens of thousands of Boxee’s 500,000 users fall into that category. “I think cutting the cord is a hard decision to make,” he said, but it’s easier for younger consumers, such as recent college graduates who may have never seen a cable bill. Mr. Phillips said that sports fans will still gravitate to the big-screen TV when it’s an option. Mr. Rosen said the question is whether that person is willing to pay $60 a month for ESPN if that’s the only cable channel he watches. “Maybe cable should offer me a smaller package that’s centered on those” high-demand stations, though he stopped short of using a term that has become charged in media circles. “The word ‘ala carte’ is a very dangerous word,” he said, to laughs from the audience. “Now when I say it, I know that it’s upsetting to people.” Doug Ferguson, vice president of product at Sling Media, agreed with Mr. Phillips that Internet TV is complementary — though he did his best zombie impression to say it, to more laughs. Parent company EchoStar plans to sell Sling’s products, which let customers watch recorded TV shows on their computers, to cable operators, he said. The panel also addressed the question of weak revenue online compared with traditional television advertising. That will change as more premium content comes online, Mr. Phillips said. Michael Rosen, chief revenue officer of Babelgum, a niche-video site, said brands seeking specific audiences will also seek out the proliferating field of video producers. Mr. Ferguson said early video players were “a little sloppy with how they treated advertising,” subjecting viewers to two minutes of pre-roll ads in exchange for a two-minute clip. Mr. Ronen said it’s a dangerous game for Web providers to play, especially when they’re primarily airing prerecorded content that’s also available ad-free on BitTorrent. “I don’t think there’s going to be parity” in ad rates as a result, he said. Mr. Ronen also gave an update on what he called “our Hulu situation,” after the TV aggregator pulled its content from Boxee (more than once). Today Boxee users can access Hulu’s RSS feed through a Web browser that is part of the program, which will let them watch any show Hulu makes available there. ”I don’t think they’re happy about it,” he said, adding that its availability could change “any day, any minute. We hope that it will settle down.” The moderator asked the audience how many have cut their cable in favor of online TV and only a handful of people raised their hands. But many more raised their hands when asked if they were considering it. Are you? What would it take to make you do it? |
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Guests arrive at Disney World's newest vacation club resort --
Kidani Village Orlando
Sentinel - Disney Vacation Club has opened its newest property
at Walt Disney World.The first phase of Kidani Village, a time-share extension of Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge, formally opened May 1. The name comes from the Swahili word for "necklace" and is meant to represent the resort's layout. Sixty percent of the development's 340 units are now accepting guests, with the remainder due to open by September. The amenities include Sanaa, a 150-seat restaurant serving African cooking infused with Indian flavors; Uwanja Camp, a themed water-play area; and Samawati Springs Pool, a themed pool area with a 128-foot-long water slide and two whirlpool spas. The project, combined with the 109 units in the lodge itself that have already been converted to time shares, makes up Disney's Animal Kingdom Villas, one of eight current Vacation Club properties. |
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Exclusive: 'The Princess and the Frog' Poster Premiere! Cinematical
- Cinematical has just received this beautiful
exclusive teaser poster for Disney's The Princess and the Frog,
which marks the studio's triumphant return to 2D hand-drawn
animation. Featuring the voices of Anika Noni Rose (as Princess
Tiana), Oprah Winfrey, Keith David, Jim Cummings, John Goodman,
Jenifer Lewis, Bruno Campos, Michael-Leon Wooley, Peter Bartlett
and Terrence Howard, The Princess and the Frog is based on E.D.
Baker's classic novel The Frog Princess, except this film --
written and directed by the filmmaking duo of John Musker and
Ron Clements (The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules) -- is set
in New Orleans, stars a singing crocodile and features Disney's
first African-American princess. Famed songwriter/composer Randy
Newman (Toy Story, Monsters, Inc.) lent his familiar voice to
the soundtrack, which I'm sure will carve out its special place
alongside Disney's long list of memorable tracks. The first trailer for The Princess and the Frog was also just released on Apple (watch it there or after the jump), and folks will have a chance to see the film when it hits theaters in New York and LA on November 25th before expanding wide on December 11th. Click the image below to view entire poster -- does this look like vintage Disney, or what? |
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Disney
World actor fondly recalls Rochester
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle - If you visit Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla., look for a character named Vladimir Pooey in the Hollywood Studios section working the crowd as part of an improv troupe of actors. You can't miss him. He'll be all dressed out like a 1940s movie director, right down to the "lion tamer" pants that flare out at the side, and the shiny black boots. Tell him you're from Rochester. You might be surprised at the response. Movie director Vladimir Pooey, you see, is just one of many incarnations that Tim Trombitas, aka Tim Kincaid, has brought to life over the years. There was Simon Wannabe, Miss Muffin and Pierre the Painter of the Gina D's Club preschool TV program, for example. Or Walter Klondike, Fairport Fanny, Henrietta Brisbane, Granny — and a host of other characters — that he brought to life on morning radio in Rochester. But the character that many Rochesterians will remember best is Ranger Bob. A 'Buckaroo' favorite "Howdee, Buckaroos." From 1980-1986, Ranger Bob entertained children — and a lot of other people — every weekday at 4p.m. as host of the Buckaroo Club on WUHF-TV, Channel 31. He wore a huge, outlandish cowboy hat that "looks like a bell with his head as the clapper," one reporter noted, and gray stage makeup to make him look a lot older than his real age. At that time Trombitas was still in his early 30s — "a guy who occasionally likes Chablis with a meal, drives a pickup truck to work and lives in a refurbished house off East Avenue," the same reporter explained. He did all kinds of crazy stuff to entertain the kids in between the cartoons. In the summer of 1984, for example, the station began bringing young children into the studio as a sort of peanut gallery. A Times-Union reporter described the "bleacher full of Mexican jumping bean children who get to wiggle and giggle, titter and wave on the only TV show that gets local kids in front of the camera." She then described Ranger Bob's entrance to a trumpet fanfare. " 'Wanna get your picture taken?' he asks. "'Sure,' the peanut gallery yells. "He pulls out a tiny camera-shaped squirt gun and zaps the first few rows. "The kids start to scream. "'What's the matter? Doncha like watercolor pictures?'" The kids loved it. So did the parents who accompanied them. "I think Kincaid is a scream," one of them told the reporter. "Some of the humor is directed at adults. It goes right over the kids' heads." Indeed, a lot of Ranger Bob fan mail came from local college campuses. Mind you, this was all done live, not taped ahead of time. "What excited me the most was the opportunity to play off the mistakes and make it look like it was supposed to be happening," Trombitas said recently in a phone interview. Such as the time the station brought in a new staff member to operate one of the studio cameras. They were still the big cameras mounted on pedestals. The new guy had his headset on and was having a hard time hearing when another cameraman tried to tell him how to zoom in. The new guy kept leaning over farther and farther to hear. Unfortunately, the pedestal wasn't locked, and all of a sudden the camera was panning away from Trombitas. So Ranger Bob literally fell out of his chair and kept moving across the room as the camera panned across the set, all the way over to the control room, where Trombitas finally grabbed the curtain, ripped it open — exposing the show's director and production crew — and hollered "What are you doing!" "I had a great time. We entertained ourselves. We were just having fun and trying to do different things." From football to radio Born in Dover, Ohio, Trombitas was a promising football wide receiver in high school. When he graduated in 1969 he had a sports scholarship to Youngstown where Ron Jaworski — later a star with the Philadelphia Eagles — was quarterback. "This is gonna be great," Trombitas told himself. Who wouldn't want to be one of Jaworski's receivers? But then came a draft notice — this was during the Vietnam War — and Trombitas ended up in the Navy instead. After his discharge he still managed to play football for Virginia Tech and Kent State University. But he had a different goal in life. "While Kincaid was in the Navy, a disc jockey perched in a store window in Norfolk, Va., invited him to sit at the radio console, and the experience (and weeks of listening to radio) changed his direction," according to a Times-Union article. Trombitas graduated from Kent State's radio-TV program, and began his career as a late-night disc jockey for a radio station in Raleigh-Durham, N.C. That's when the characters Trombitas had begun to develop in college took on solid shape. After all, at 3 a.m., few people are listening. Trombitas would "invent" his own imaginary callers, changing his voice to carry on conversations with them right on the air. That got him a morning show. However, in an industry where "job security rides like a gambling bet on uncertain ratings and temperamental management," the article noted, Trombitas "paid his dues" in a half dozen cities before landing in Rochester in 1980. Rochester radio host Trombitas also did stints here as morning host with WNYR (that's where he was given the name Kincaid to fit in with the station's western format at the time) and later with WBBF radio before leaving in 1992. By then he had married Barbara Powers of Rochester, and had two children. In Orlando, he did Ranger Bob for a local TV station for three years, then signed on with Nickelodeon there, doing audience warmups and eventually becoming a writer and producer. Then it was on to the American Health Network, where he became a senior producer. His roots in Orlando were now well established. His wife had a job and his children were in school, so when the health network relocated to Los Angeles, Trombitas stayed in Orlando, putting his family first. For four years he was writer, producer and actor on the Gina D's Kids Club show. "I did everything at first because it was operating on a low budget," Trombitas recalled. He started his own production company, New Spirit Entertainment LLC. He's also excited about a project still "in the works" to resurrect Ranger Bob — not as a cowboy but as a grandpa, on a show aimed not at preschoolers but families. Two years ago he successfully auditioned for the improv troupe at Walt Disney World. It's not just fun and games. A lot of people come to the park to find temporary escape from some very harsh realities in their lives: People who have just lost a spouse through death or divorce, for example, or young children sponsored by the Make-a-Wish foundation who might have only a month or two to live. "I think sometimes it's like a ministry here," says Trombitas. He can relate to them, in part because he is an ordained deacon in the Anglican Church. "God just kind of changed my life and showed me what's important in life, and how blessed I've been all these years." He and his family still get back to Rochester once every year or two to visit his wife's mother, Pat, and his wife's brothers, Jack and Mike. "I love Rochester," he said. "The one thing that used to crack me up all the time was at the Distillery on Mt. Hope Avenue. They used to have a big mural encased in glass, showing all the great things about Rochester, and it had me driving a bus right in the front." That meant a lot, knowing that Ranger Bob had been that popular here. So if you meet Vladimir Pooey, aka Tim Kincaid, aka Tim Trombitas, be sure to mention you're from Rochester. That, too, will mean a lot to Ranger Bob. |
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 Disney
Animation Collection Volume 4: The Tortoise And The Hare on DVDWalt Disney Studios Home Entertainment - Walt Disney's Academy Award-winning adaptation of The Tortoise And The Hare (1934; Short Subject – Cartoons) is now part of the Disney Animation Collection series on DVD! Join the excitement as unlikely competitors Max Hare and Toby Tortoise challenge each other to a foot race. Max is so confident he will win, he takes time out to flirt with some cute bunnies, show off his skills in other sports and break for a nap. But when he hears the crowd roar for Toby, who has slowly and steadily kept to the course, Max must make a last-minute dash for victory. Will the ever-persistent Toby beat him across the finish line? |
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 Disney
Animation Collection Volume 5: Wind In The Willows on DVDWalt Disney Studios Home Entertainment - Experience the magic of Wind In The Willows in this extraordinary adaptation – now part of the Disney Animation Collection series of beloved classic short films. Join the adventures along the riverbanks as one of the most enchanting storybooks of all time comes to life with classic Disney animation. Mr. J. Thaddeus Toad has got himself into a bit of trouble – from buying fancy new cars and dealing with some weaselly weasels! Now his beloved home, Toad Manor, is at risk of being lost. It will take the help of his dear friends Ratty, Moley and Angus McBadger, and a promise to change his ways, for Mr. Toad to set things right. |
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 Disney
Animation Collection Volume 6: The Reluctant Dragon on DVDWalt Disney Studios Home Entertainment - The Reluctant Dragon, a clever and entertaining short film, is now part of the Disney Animation Collection! This lighthearted story follows the adventures of a brave young boy who, emboldened by tales of brave knights, decides to pursue the horrible dragon that is terrifying the villagers. But what he discovers is a surprisingly friendly dragon that is more interested in reciting poetry and making music than devouring fair damsels. Will the boy be able to stop the local hero before he challenges the dragon to a fiery battle? |
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Dadnapped
and Hatching Pete Walt
Disney Studios Home Entertainment - Fans get double the laughter
and two times the fun when Disney Channel Original Movies
Dadnapped and Hatching Pete arrive on DVD on May 12, 2009 from
Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment. For the first time ever,
two full-length movies featuring some of the network's favorite
young stars come together in a single disc for one low price!
Dadnapped and Hatching Pete will provide viewers with hours of
wholesome, hilarious entertainment, as well as a bevy of
exclusive bonus features not available anywhere else.
Top-flight Disney Channel talent shines in a pair of the network's signature productions as Emily Osment, star of the hit Disney Channel series, Hannah Montana, and David Henrie of Wizards of Waverly Place headline Dadnapped, an action-packed, thrill-a-minute comedy. Then a pair of tween faves rules the roost when Jason Dolley, of Cory in the House and Minutemen, and Mitchell Musso, of Hannah Montana, star in the screwball comedy Hatching Pete, a tale of fame, friendship and "fowl" play. In Dadnapped, fourteen year-old Melissa (Emily Osment) is struggling with a unique kind of sibling rivalry. To get her father Neil's (George Newburn) attention, she has to compete with teenage spy Tripp Zoome, the main character in her father's best selling novels. Her dad spends so much time on his imaginary son's exciting missions that even Melissa's special daughter-dad vacation gets interrupted by a promotional event for Neil's newest book. But when Neil is abducted by overzealous fanboys and falls into the clutches of a pair of sinister brothers, the fictional Tripp can't save him and Melissa will have to try to channel her "inner Zoome" to rescue her dad. A bashful high school student finds fames as a high-flying poultry impersonator in Hatching Pete. Pete's (Jason Dolley) best friend Poole (Mitchel Musso) wants to keep up his family's longstanding tradition of playing their high school mascot, the Chicken, but Poole is allergic to the costume. Pete agrees to stand in for his pal, but only on the condition that his identity remains a secret. The anonymity of the Chicken suit gives Pete the freedom he's always dreamed of and a whole new personality emerges. His unexpectedly outrageous antics make the Chicken an instant celebrity— except no one knows it's Pete. As Poole reaps the benefits of his pal's talent, Pete must decide if it's time to reveal that he's the man behind the beak. |
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Buy a Select Disney Blu-ray Disc on Amazon - Get $10 Back Bigpicturebigsound - Looking for a deal on some family-friendly entertainment in high definition? Amazon.com is running a sweet little promotion with select Disney Blu-ray Discs. Between now and May 30, 2009, simply buy one of eleven featured Disney titles on Blu-ray Disc, and Amazon will send you (by mail) a $10 prepaid MasterCard good toward any purchase wherever MasterCard is accepted. Prices vary per title, but Amazon's standard 30%+ discounts still apply. Some titles are already discounted 44%. For example, you can take home the Hannah Montana 3D concert movie, Enchanted or any of the films in the Pirates of the Caribbean series for under $20 (list prices are $34.99 and $35.99), and you'll get an additional $10 back in the form of this prepaid MasterCard. That's a net price of $9.49 for a $35 movie on Blu-ray. What a deal! Titles included in this promotion:
Details of the promotion:
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Disney to
'Race to Witch Mountain' this August High-Def Digest - Disney has announced an early-August date for 'Race to Witch Mountain,' which will hit high-def as a Blu-ray/DVD combo. The $50 million-grossing remake, which stars Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in a effects-laden update of the '70s family classic, will arrive on Blu-ray August 4, day-and-date with the standard DVD. Tech specs will see a two-disc Blu-ray/DVD combo set, with the Blu-ray enjoying 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 video and a DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround track. No word on bonus features, but we'll keep you posted. Suggested retail price for the Blu-ray has been set at $39.99. |
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Shine On! AP
- Walt Disney World Resort made a clear connection between
itself and the recent “shine on” sightings in Central Florida by
arriving at the Coalition for the Homeless this morning on a
“prize patrol” bus with Mickey Mouse and a check for $60,000 in
tow.“Today is a fabulous day,” says Eugene Campbell, vice president of Community Relations and Minority Business Development for Walt Disney World Resort, with a smile. “We are sharing some of our magic by shining a spotlight on some very deserving non-profits and students who help make dreams come true in our community.” For the next two weeks, Disney will disperse prize patrols across Central Florida to surprise, reward and recognize award recipients for two of its signature community outreach programs. Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants financially support non-profits that are actively involved in improving children’s lives. Disney Dreamers and Doers recognizes outstanding students who help better their communities through volunteer service. By May 22, a total of 34 Disney’s Helping Kids Shine Grants and 15 top Dreamers and Doers Shining Stars will be awarded. Prize patrol reports and pictures will be posted on www.shineontoday.com so you can follow along on the journey across Central Florida and track the total giving. |
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Exclusive room rates for nurses at Walt Disney World SmartBrief - In appreciation for all that you do, the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort would like to offer you a very special room rate for your next vacation to the most magical place in the world ... the Walt Disney World Resort! For detailed information on room rates visit http://swandolphin.com/promos/nurses/ana/. |
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John
Lasseter to get Venice honor THR - The Venice Film Festival will present its lifetime achievement award to producer, writer, and director John Lasseter with the 3D world premieres of his directorial efforts "Toy Story" and "Toy Story 2," organizers said Monday. Also planned in Lasseter's honor is an advanced look at the upcoming Disney/Pixar release "The Princess and the Frog," and an animation masterclass from Disney/Pixar. Additionally, Pixar directors Brad Bird, Pete Docter, Andrew Stanton, and Lee Unkrich are expected to be on hand for the Sept. 6 award ceremony. "All of us at Pixar are extremely grateful and honored to be recognized by the Venice Film Festival in such a special way," Lasseter said in a statement. The 66th edition of the Venice Film Festival will take place Sept. 2-12. |
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Monday May 11, 2009 |
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Disney Seen Turning Corner With Better-Performing Film Slate 'Up' is Pixar at its most ambitious ESPN Classic to air Wimbledon roof-test matches Disneyland Blocks MTV Cameras At $150K Quinceanera Disney Channel Summer at Sea A brief history of the future of Star Tours 2.0 at Disneyland |
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Disney Seen Turning Corner With Better-Performing Film Slate Barron's - Walt Disney (DIS) hasn’t exactly delivered in typical Disneyian fashion at the box office recently. Its two title released in the first months of calendar 2009 - ”Bedtime Stories” and ”Confessions of a Shopoholic” - fared relatively poorly compared with last year’s early-year film slate, which included titles such as ”Enchanted.” Credit Suisse said it expected that to change. It said the upcoming theatrical slate, which would include titles such as the third installment of the ”Toy Story” series, as well as the Pixar animated 3-D fare ”Up,” should lift the studio out of its doldrums, which DVD sales could get a lift from the release of the first two Toy Story titles. The firm said Wall Street has been too pessimistic about the box-office prospects for ”Up,” noting that pricing performance of 3-D films tends to be more elastic than is the case for conventional features. ”Up” - expected to return something like $55 million in its initial weekend of release, would perform comparably to Disney’s ”Wall-E,” giving it a better box office take than Wall Street has been anticipating. That May 29 release should give investors a fresh data point from which to assess Disney’s performance. Anticipating the box office take of feature films always has proved a tricky point for analysts, but Credit Suisse said that it expected Disney’s fare to outperform some relatively beaten expectations. Shares of Disney - trading at a multi-year valuation low in the low teens - could get a bounce if the film slate draws more customers to the cineplex. |
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'Up' is Pixar at its
most ambitious
Los Angeles Times - The 100 or so Pixar Animation Studios employees had good reason to be giddy, and you could understand why they were more than a little nervous too. For more than four years, the animators, sound designers, editors and artists from every other Pixar department had plugged away on "Up" and on an early morning in April, they were finally about to see how their animated movie had turned out. The movie itself -- Pixar's 10th animated film -- is narratively ambitious, a story about a 78-year-old widower's highly unusual road trip with a chubby young boy that, throughout its making, teetered on becoming sentimental and episodic. Although the movie is filled with comic bits, "Up" also features scenes of complex human emotion -- including the grief of a miscarriage -- that are rarely explored in family films. Parent studio Disney really needed the film to work commercially too: In earnings released last week, Disney's profit fell 46%, largely because of underperforming movies such as "Confessions of a Shopaholic" and " Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience." To add one more level of pressure to the Pixar team, just a few days before that April screening at George Lucas' bucolic Skywalker Ranch, the Cannes Film Festival had selected "Up" to launch this week's prestigious festival, a first for an animated film. If producer Jonas Rivera and writer-director Pete Docter, two of Pixar's earliest employees, were sweating bullets when they introduced "Up" to their Pixar colleagues, they didn't show it. "This is the first time that we've got everything together," Rivera said. Added Docter just before the house lights dimmed: "Thank you guys for making the movie." Despite all the end-of-the-journey gratitude, "Up," which premieres in Cannes on Wednesday and arrives in theaters May 29, wasn't quite finished. As soon as the screening ended, Docter, Rivera, composer Michael Giacchino, executive producer John Lasseter and a dozen members of Pixar's brain trust met over lunch in a Skywalker conference room to discuss what they had just seen. By the time the team finished dessert, they had decided "Up" needed a new piece of music, and the choice they made with Giacchino revealed much about the film's creative ambitions. As "Up's" poster and trailer make clear, the film's central image is a house, tethered to thousands of balloons, soaring into the sky. When septuagenarian Carl Fredricksen's ( Ed Asner) residence took flight at the Skywalker screening, Giacchino's score was big and dramatic, the kind of music that typically accompanies an action sequence. "What we had I think works," said Docter. "But I didn't feel like we were quite capturing it." Specifically, the music wasn't magical, poetic. The house's taking off needed to play more like a mystical metaphor -- Fredricksen's trying somehow to join his late wife, Ellie, in the heavens -- and less like a prison break. "There's something about the lyricism of the floating house that appealed to me from Day One," said Docter, a tall man whose 10-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, provided young Ellie's voice. With a new piece of music, the scene played closer to how he always imagined it should. "Now, it's almost like he's waltzing with Ellie as the house takes off." Getting personal "Up" represents several Pixar firsts. In addition to the studio's first trip to Cannes, "Up" also marks a new move into producing and releasing a film in 3-D. It's a format that has worked well for competitor DreamWorks Animation's "Monsters vs. Aliens," and Pixar is now remaking its first two "Toy Story" films (in addition to next year's "Toy Story 3") in the immersive technology. The film's more material departures are harder to detect. It's the first Pixar feature to have as its central character a senior citizen, and because Fredricksen is based on friends and relatives of the filmmakers, "Up" might well be considered the studio's most personal film. "I think so too," said Bob Peterson, "Up's" co-director and co-writer, who also lends his voice to one of the film's dogs. "It's an hommage to our grandparents, and that makes it personal." Before "Up" became a movie, it was just a single image: a grouchy old man with balloons. The 40-year-old Docter, who has a writing credit on last year's Oscar-winning "Wall-E" but hasn't directed a movie since 2001's "Monsters, Inc.," then added another element: What if those balloons raised the man's house into the skies? As visually striking as the image might be, it wasn't clear how it and the senior citizen inside the floating house fit into a larger story, which explains why "Up" took so long to make it to the screen. "In the very first draft . . . he just wanted to join his wife up in the sky," Docter said. "It was almost a kind of strange suicide mission or something. And obviously that's [a problem]. Once he gets airborne, then what? So we had to have some goal for him to achieve that he had not yet gotten." Added Peterson: "Originally, he was not going anywhere. He was just going into the sky, because he had always associated his wife with birds." That didn't sound like a Pixar movie -- it sounded like a film out of the surrealism movement. So Docter, Peter- son and Rivera tried to figure out what they were really trying to communicate in their movie. "We hadn't flushed it out. We didn't really know what was going to happen or who he was going to meet," Rivera said. "But what we knew was why he was doing it -- the desire to get away." As the story took shape, it became clear that Fredricksen felt not only a little angry but also unfulfilled. He had enjoyed a long romance with his wife, but they hadn't been able to have kids (touched on in an emotional, dialogue-free, four-minute montage of their lives), and their dreams of traveling to the distant land of Paradise Falls had died when she did. But those were episodes, not narrative. "Up" needed something more. So now real estate developers are encroaching on Fredricksen's last remaining patch of comfort, his home, and a pesky 8-year-old Wilderness Explorer named Russell (voiced by newcomer Jordan Nagai) was knocking on his door, trying to collect a help-a-senior-citizen merit badge. Taking flight, in other words, wouldn't be such a bad idea. But even if he (along with Russell, who happened to be on Fredricksen's porch at liftoff) was finally able to get to Paradise Falls, was that it? What would they find there? When Russell and Fredricksen land in Paradise Falls, they encounter Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer), a once-famous explorer Fredricksen and his wife had idolized. The exotic land is populated with strange birds and talking dogs, but the real surprise is Muntz, who has gone the way of Col. Kurtz in "Heart of Darkness" and becomes "Up's" villain. "A guy ties thousands of balloons to his house and floats away to South America to go to Paradise Falls," Rivera said. "That's what happens, those are the plot points," Rivera said. "But that's not what it's about. What is it about? It's about adventure, it's about life." Elderly influences To solve that question -- What are the most important things in life? -- the "Up" filmmaking team turned to their oldest acquaintances and relatives, mining their memories for stories. The influences included the legendary Disney animator Joe Grant (who died in 2005) and Disney costume designer Alice Davis. What the filmmakers decided was that the most meaningful trips didn't have to be in a balloon-propelled dwelling. They could be picnics in the park, watching clouds drift by, visits to an ice cream store. "He's always thought of adventure as travel and exotic places and animals no one has ever seen," Docter said of Fredricksen. "And in the end he comes around to realize that the real adventures in life are the small things that we do with our family and friends." "Up," for all of its novelty, was returning to some of the same simple, universal ideas that anchor all Pixar movies. Strip away the elaborate (if sometimes unconventional) narrative devices, and you begin to see relatable truths that give the movies heart. Wall-E just wants to hold hands. "Ratatouille" is about becoming the person you were born to be. The importance of family? Watch "Finding Nemo." What "Up" was trying to say, in other words, was not so different from what has happened to Pixar itself: that growing older can be a beautiful thing. |
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ESPN
Classic to air Wimbledon roof-test matches AP - ESPN Classic will air live coverage of the May 17 exhibition matches under Wimbledon's new Centre Court roof. Past Wimbledon champions -- and married couple -- Andre Agassi and Steffi Graf are scheduled to play, as are Tim Henman and Kim Clijsters. The event is being called "A Centre Court Celebration" and will be a test of the All England Club's new retractable roof and ventilation system. ESPN Classic will air 3 1/2 hours of the British Broadcasting Corp. feed, starting at 9:30 a.m. EDT. The matches also will be shown on ESPN360.com. "Why do it? It is simple: The venue is a citadel," ESPN senior VP Len DeLuca said in a telephone interview. "Wimbledon is spoken of properly in the same paragraph as Augusta, as Yankee Stadium, as the Rose Bowl. And, obviously, the roof experiment is a news item." The schedule includes a men's singles match, a women's singles match and a mixed doubles match. Wimbledon begins June 22. ESPN is a unit of The Walt Disney Co. |
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Disneyland Blocks MTV Cameras At $150K Quinceanera
CBS 2 - Disneyland is standing in the way of one princess and her Cinderella story. The theme park was chosen as the site of Chelsea Krueger's quinceanera, a traditional coming-of-age party celebrating a girl's 15th birthday. Both Chelsea and her mother, Marilin Vargas, who live in La Palma, are planning the event to be worthy of the Grammy Awards – in fact, the production company that decorates the awards show was hired to deck out the Chelsea's party. But one thing that the Grammys has over Chelsea's party will be the cameras. Disneyland, which is being paid more than $45,000 for use of its facilities, has refused to allow MTVtr3s cameras to film at the hotel where the $150,000 event will be held. Chelsea and her mother had sent in videos to be on "Quiero Mis Quince," a spin-off of MTV's "My Super Sweet Sixteen." Both shows follow teenage girls as they throw swanky coming-of-age parties. "I want to show that my mom has worked so hard to give me something. Its her dream and my dream. I just want to show off my dream," Chelsea says. Despite the disrupted dream, the rhinestone-studded invitations have been sent, the 24-carat cake topper has arrived, Chelsea's Cinderella dress is ready and the show will go on at Disneyland Hotel. Disneyland spokeswoman Suzi Brown says the theme park retains "the right to approve all filming for broadcast at Disneyland Resort, and feel this type of show is not the right fit for Disney Parks." |
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Disney
Channel Summer at Sea Just Jared Jr. - Some of your favorite Disney Channel stars will set sail this summer, joining thousands of Disney Cruise Line guests aboard the Disney Wonder during the first-ever “Disney Channel Summer at Sea.” There will be onboard deck parties, Q & A and autograph sessions and special live musical performances! Popular stars from DC shows like Hannah Montana, Sonny With A Chance, Wizards of Waverly Place, The Suite Life on Deck, JONAS, Camp Rock, High School Musical and Hatching Pete will sail with guests on three- and four-night Bahamian cruises taking place July 9 through August 2. Here’s who’s on board so far: Tiffany Thornton from Sonny With A Chance (July 9 & 12), from JONAS (July 9 & 12), Jason Earles from Hannah Montana (July 16 & 19), Mitchel Musso from Hannah Montana” (July 19), Jason Dolley from Hatching Pete (July 23 & 26), Debby Ryan from The Suite Life on Deck (July 30) and Alyson Stoner from Camp Rock (Aug. 2). |
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A brief history of the future of Star Tours 2.0 at Disneyland
Los Angeles Times - One of the longest-running Disneyland rumors got another boost this week when news resurfaced of an impending upgrade to the dated Star Tours ride, which debuted at the Anaheim theme park in 1987. A look back at the many hints - always denied by Disney officials - dropped in recent years of the imminent arrival of Star Tours 2.0: April 2005 - George Lucas announces at a "Star Wars" convention that Star Tours "will be getting an overhaul soon," according to ComingSoon.net. May 2005 – Mouse Planet columnist David Koenig gives a detailed scene-by-scene description of the pod race scenario envisioned for the Star Tours reboot. June 2007 – Anthony Daniels (C-3P0) announces at a collectors convention that he has "just finished filming the new digitalized upgrade" for Star Tours. February 2008 – Screamscape reports on the testing of 3-D capabilities in the Disneyland Star Tours attraction. May 2008 – A LucasFilm/Industrial Light & Magic computer graphics supervisor tells CNet his next project is a "redo of the Star Tours ride at Disneyland." March 2009 – Mice Age columnist Al Lutz reports that Star Tours 2.0 will feature "randomly changing plotlines" and "facial recognition technology." May 2009 – Slashfilm details a top-secret Star Tours shoot in West Hollywood that includes an action sequence featuring bounty hunter Boba Fett. May 2009 – Frank Oz (Yoda) reveals to the Los Angeles Times' Hero Complex blog that he has recorded new dialogue for Star Tours. As always, Disneyland and Walt Disney Imagineering declined to comment on the latest round of rumors. Three other Disney parks have similar outdated Star Tours attractions: Tokyo Disneyland (1989), Disney's Hollywood Studios (1989) and Disneyland Paris (1992). |
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Sunday May 10, 2009 |
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Epcot
International Food and Wine Festival 2009 Zorro on Walt Disney Treasures |
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Epcot
International Food and Wine Festival 2009 Whether sampling bites of Camarõnes com Palmito (shrimp with palms) from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, or sipping the trendiest wine from Buenos Aires, Argentina, festival guests can enjoy the flavors of more than 25 international marketplaces dotting the World Showcase promenade. The festival will spotlight tastes from cities on six continents, including Bologna, Italy; Bangkok, Thailand; Wellington, New Zealand; Santiago, Chile; Marrakesh, Morocco; Shanghai, China; and, from the United States – New Orleans. Tapas-sized portions of regional specialties run $2-to-$7 each, and recommended wines and beers make perfect pairings at each kiosk. Puglia, Italy, returns as a sponsor this year, presenting culinary demonstrations with regional chefs and showcasing “Adventures of Pasta and Olive Oils.” Live regional entertainment is scheduled throughout each day along the promenade. Daily wine and beer tastings serve up sips from around the world, and culinary demonstrations dish up featured taste treats. A series of special culinary programs features a lineup of renowned winemakers, guest chefs and speakers participating in elegant dinners, luncheons, seminars and wine schools. Live music kicks the festival up several notches
each evening during the Eat to the Beat! concert series
featuring acts from many musical genres including classic rock,
jazz, R&B, funk and soul. Concerts are performed three times
each evening at America Gardens Theatre along the World Showcase
lagoon. Scheduled to appear for the first time on the Eat to the
Beat! stage are: Richard Marx, Better than Ezra, Vanessa
Carlton, John Waite and Billy Ocean. Returning acts scheduled
are Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Starship, En Vogue, Sister Hazel, Kool
& The Gang, Spyro Gyra, Jon Secada, Sister Sledge, Taylor Dayne,
Boyz II Men, Night Ranger and Los Lobos. Guests can call 407/WDW-FEST (939-3378) for information and to make reservations for special events and programs. Festival details will be available by late July at www.disneyworld.com/foodandwine, and guests can book special events and programs beginning Aug. 11. Fine Cuisine and wines from some of the best "foodie"cities in the world will take a bow at the 13th annual Epcot International Food & Wine Festival. Embark on an epicurean adventure as the 13th Annual Epcot International Food & Wine Festival showcases the flavors of the world. Explore marketplaces featuring regional foods, wines and beers, learn from renowned chefs and winemakers at special programs and demonstrations, and sample the finest cuisine from around the globe. Plus, be sure to savor the sizzling sounds of the "Eat to the Beat" concert series that boasts a stellar line-up of popular musical acts! |
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Now,
here’s where things get really interesting: If you
watch the film’s teaser trailer closely, you get a brief peek at
1:04 of the shot they’re referring to. While Carl’s house zooms
by in the background, a young girl can be seen playing with her
ball and toy airplane – also note, a brightly-colored teddy bear
is sitting in the corner, in front of the child’s bed.
"The
decal material in this branding is equal to about 17
billboards," said Airship Ventures CEO Alexandra Hall. "Since
our Zeppelin arrived last October, we've been touting our
wonderful luxury flight-seeing experience. But when the
opportunity arose to feature Disney•Pixar's 'UP,' which even has
a fantasy Zeppelin in it, we could hardly say no!" 
