Fabulousland!
Say whatever you want about flat surfaces and Walt running out of money at the last minute...early Fantasyland was SPECTACULAR!

Captain Eo Window Display

This figure, created for a display in the Disneyland Showcase preview center on Main Street in 1985, was the public's first view of Michael Jackson in his role as Captain Eo.  The sculptures of Eo and his "ragtag band", displayed in a miniature setting from the film, were all made and painted by an enthusiastic  young  artist, Jason Bahret, of the Disneyland Entertainment Art Department.

Hooter

In the early 1980s, Jason was the undisputed whiz-kid of the Art Department, creating character art, building scale models for parades and shows, and constructing full-sized set pieces. When I was hired into the department in 1988, Jason had already transferred to the Disney Stores design group, designing all those big fiberglass Disney characters that populated the first new store interiors.  I didn't really get to know Jason until 1991, when we both sculpted characters for the "Beauty and the Beast" Emporium windows, but his name was legendary to me.

 Clay over aluminum wire armature.

For the Captain Eo figures, Jason recalls that there was not much reference available to him. No one had seen the fim, which was still in post-production, and the Studio was reluctant to release any  photos so early, so he referred to a handful of color slides that had been shot on the set.  "The biggest challenge for me was figuring out all the layers, buckles and straps on Michael Jackson's costume," Jason recalls.  "I must have just made up about 40 to 50 percent of it since I couldn't see it in the slides."

Major Domo

Thanks to Jason for generously sharing these images from his personal portfolio.  After 27 years at Disney, he left in 2006  to explore more interests (he's also an actor!) but you can enjoy more of Jason Bahret's creative work here.

With Jason at our gallery show in Laguna last year.  

He's still a whiz-kid!

The Birthday Cake Room
Happy Birthday to you, dear blog readers! Welcome to the Birthday Cake Room, that odd circular gallery at the rear of the Disneyana Shop!  Why don't you come on back and check out some of the beautiful paintings hanging around in here (and I'll be darned, there's one by me!)  

What's that you say?  You didn't know this was the Birthday Cake Room?

For many years, I'd hear older Disneylanders refer to this little space as the Birthday Cake Room, and I often wondered why.  Perhaps, as some said, it was simply because the room was shaped round like a cake. Or maybe, as others believed, it was built to house a giant pastry for one of the early birthdays of the Park.  

Well, that answer's nearly right.  Here's the real story behind the Birthday Cake Room...

Sam McKim's 1955 rendering of Swift's Birthday Cake Room

In 1955, April to be exact - only 4 short months before Disneyland was set to open - Artist Sam McKim was asked to sketch a small alcove that could be built at the back end of the Market House.  The store, equipped with marble counters, large glass jars, cracker and pickle barrels, and a pot-bellied stove, was sponsored by Swift & Co. Meats, a company signed on to be a major sponsor in the Anaheim park. Besides keeping those pickle barrels stocked in the Market House, Swift would be providing beef, bacon, poultry, cheese, butter and ice cream to two new restaurants (namely, the Red Wagon Inn and Swift's Chicken Plantation in Frontierland) -- AND they were going to co-sponsor the nationwide opening day telecast.  

So, when it was announced that 1955 also happened to be the company's 100th year in business, a special room in the Market House was set aside to house a huge fake birthday cake... a cake "with 100 candles and topped with the Swift Centennial emblem."  Windows cut into the cake's sides showed scenes depicting "a century of progress in food preparation", as the press release described it.  There were pictures of wood-burning stoves, antique iceboxes and modern refrigerators, great-grandpa butchering a steer and great-grandma cooking a pot roast. It was a veritable carousel of progress in the form of an eight-foot tall layer cake.  Man, what a party!

The new unbirthday cake room, circa 1967 

After the celebrating was over the big dessert was rolled out of there, and the open space became a charming getaway from the crowds in the Market House.  A collection of antique nickel-operated music machines tinkled out old-timey tunes for happy folks who wandered back to enjoy a cookie and a cup of apple cider. 

Hank, honey, get up and 

put another nickel in, 

in the nickelodeon... 

Special details, such as these ceiling ornaments, seen in Sam McKim's original concept drawing remain in the Birthday Cake Room to this day.

Through the open doors above we see the 1967 Burry's Cookie Shop - formerly the Swift Butcher Shop, and our current day Disneyana Shop!   The wall separating the two rooms has since been opened for easy entry into the galleries.  No roadblock to get in your way as you head for that wall of big figs!

Disneyland Autopia, 1963

The Tropics go Technicolor at the American Cinematheque's Tiki Luau Weekend at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. See a classic island musical romance PAGAN LOVE SONG (starring Esther Williams and Howard Keel), a hot-blooded Hawaiian soap opera DIAMOND HEAD (with Charlton Heston), and the volcanic adventure THE DEVIL AT 4 O'CLOCK (featuring Spencer Tracy and Frank Sinatra.

The Egyptian's courtyard will host a "Southern California-style" Luau Dinner with live musical entertainment by King Kukulele and the Polynesian Paradise Dancers on July 25.  

Visit the American Cinematheque's Site.

Pointy Silver Thing
Can you guess the purpose of the shiny object in these photographs from July 14, 1955?

It's the tip - and final detail - being added to the Disneyland Moonliner Rocket,  three breathless days before the Park's opening.

    I can tell you this much- I would not want this guy's job.  Suspended from a crane 76 feet above the  terra firma of Tomorrowland, he's left his shoes on the ground, preferring sock feet. One soft footstep for man on that polished Kaiser aluminum surface...

Cartoon Bruins

Look out!  Cute on the loose!  Tuffy and Tubby wreak havoc on vacationing humans in Walt Disney's fluffy live-action comedy Yellowstone Cubs (1963). 

This is the original publicity artwork - (click on it to make it huge) - hand-painted by, I think, artist Paul Wenzel.  Anybody know for certain?

The painting was auctioned in 2006, and I kept a scan of it for my files. I like it a lot.  It's not perfect, but it's got that funky, sixties sweetness that was so well conveyed with paintbrush and gouache. 

You don't have to agree with me, though. In fact, Cartoon Brew's Jerry Beck wondered just last week if this very illustration could be the "Worst. Disney Poster. Ever."

As for the movie itself, I recently got the new DVD release and found that it still offers much to enjoy, such as Rex Allen Jr.'s folksy narration and these simplistic, punchy title cards:

On the other hand, here's the current packaging that Disney is using to sell the DVD...
I bet you can guess which art I prefer.