Tales From The College Program: Hilary Duff

Before I start this story, let me remind you that I was in the Walt Disney World College Program in 2003.  At the time Hilary Duff was one of the biggest stars on the planet.  Having said that, let's begin.

I remember one night when Dan and I were working The Link alone, I went home sick.  I had a real sinus attack and the last thing people want to see around their food is a dude who can't stop sneezing.  I went home and Dan closed down the restaurant by himself.  The next morning I was awoken by a phone call from Dan.  His roommate who worked at Blizzard Beach had called to tell him that Hilary Duff was at the park.  Dan loved Hilary Duff, so we decided "Why not, take a crazy chance" and see if we can meet her.

I'll pause here to give you some advice if you ever plan on trying to meet a celebrity.  The first rule should be "Dress in a way that is appropriate to your surroundings.  So, you want to meet Hilary Duff at a water park, wear a swimsuit.  Neither of us really thought about this ahead of time.  Dan was dressed in his usual cargo shorts and sandals which i'd say isn't perfect but is the second best thing to a swimsuit..  At the time I only owned probably 2 pairs of shorts, I wore jeans and chucks everywhere.  This was probably not the best choice, but I also decided to wear an Alkaline Trio shirt with this graphic.

It didn't occur to us how badly we were going to stand out until we reached Blizzard Beach, and by then it was too late.

We arrived at Blizzard Beach with little to no plan.  We just walked around in hopes that we would run into Hilary Duff.  What would we say to her if we saw her?  Most likely nothing.  We assumed she'd probably have some sort of Disney entourage who wouldn't let a couple of street clothes wearing idiots like us anywhere near her. Hilary and I are both from Houston, so she would totally be cool with meeting a fellow Houstonian, right?  Turns out tracking someone down in a water park that you've never actually been to is a lot harder than it sounds. 

We walked around the park for a little while and stopped at a large area with chairs and bungalows for people to sun bathe.  As we stood there discussing if we should continue walking around the park sticking out like sore thumbs or just call it a day, we noticed something.  In one of the covered bungalows on the opposite side of the sun bathing area we were being stared at.  Given what we (or I) was wearing this was not a big surprise. The surprise was that the person staring at us was Lalaine, who played Hilary Duff's friend Miranda on Lizzy Maguire.  

This created a somewhat awkward situation as the three of us just kind of stared at each other.  The conversation between Dan and I at that point went something like this.  "Why is she staring at us?  Does she think we are here looking for her?  Why is she still staring at us?  Should we go over there and say "Hey, don't worry we are just walking around looking for Hilary?"  No, that will surely get us kicked out and probably fired, let's get out of here....Seriously, she is still staring at us" 

We decided it was time to leave, with no sign of Hilary and Disney security possibly on their way looking for the only two people in the park not wearing swimsuits.  We don't even know if she even went to Blizzard Beach that day, but it was definitely an interesting adventure.

The is pretty much my Al Capone's Vault of College Program stories.

Back to the Twilight Zone: Part 2

After the clock tower, the most important set in Hill Valley is probably the cafe. 

In the Twilight Zone, the area we know as being the cafe is a police station.

In 1985 Hill Valley, it's Lou's Aerobic Fitness Center.

The building has not changed that much since the Twilight Zone, all they really did was relocate the door and build that facade.  Funny how Lou went from owning a restaurant to a fitness center 30 years later.

Mike Ferris also takes in a movie at The Savoy.

The Marquee (and movie selection) was changed when this area became Hill Valley

A close up shows, that those busts have been there for quite a while.

One scene that really threw me off, was when Mike walked past a drug store.

It looks like the clock tower is behind him, and the reflection in the window looks like the post office building, but something about the geometry just didn't make sense to me.  I looked for more pictures of the set from this era and found out that an episode of Leave it to Beaver was also filmed here.  This photo is from that episode.

Looks like the side of the Police station is also a drug store.

So there you have it, the story of two guys, who wondered down a lonely road

and ended up in the same place.

obviously, by that I mean...a phone booth

Back to the Twilight Zone: Part 1

When you think about it, Back to the Future is a very Twilight Zone-esque movie.  In the season one episode "Walking Distance" a man actually ends up back in his childhood town and runs into his younger self and his parents.  Like Marty McFly, tampering with his past changes things when he eventually returns to the present.

"Where is Everybody?" is the pilot episode of The Twilight Zone.  It's about an Air Force pilot who finds himself in an empty town with no recollection of how he got there or who he is.  He spends the episode wandering around searching for signs of life, but only finds, mannequins, lit cigarettes, ringing phones, and an empty movie theater.  This was the only Twilight Zone episode filmed on the Universal Studios backlot.  Why is important, because the town of Oakwood that Mike Ferris stumbles into in The Twilight Zone is also Hill Valley in the Back to the Future trilogy.

I decided to take screen shots from Where is Everybody and compare them to Back to the Future, which was filmed about 25 years later.  We'll start with the most recognizable landmark, the clock tower itself.

There it is behind our Twilight Zone character, Mike Ferris.  

In Back to the Future, obviously they added the clock. 

One of the first signs of life Mike encounters turns out to be a mannequin sitting in a car.

In Back to the Future, this area becomes the Texaco Station.

Mike looks inside the building but finds more mannequins

It looks like this doorway is still there.

Here's a shot of the same area, as Mike runs to the ringing phone.  The record store entrance is still there with possibly a facade built over the pillars.

When Mike enters the phone booth, he looks around the town, which gives us a great view of the entire set.

This area is behind Marty and Jennifer when she tells him how great his demo tape is.

It looks like one of the oval window was converted/inspired the entry way when they remodeled the building.

In The Twilight Zone, the building at the end of the street is a post office

In Back to the Future, it's a Bank of America

Aside from the third story, this building was brought back to it's Twilight Zone store front for 1955 Hill Valley.

Here is a view of the whole street

The building at the end of the street appears to be a church, interestingly even though they tore it down by the time Back to the Future was made, the building they put in its place is also a church.

Mike's phone booth is actually in the same place as the Hill Valley sign.

Stayed tuned for part 2 of Back to the Twilight Zone next week!

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Book Review: The Dark Side of Disney

I've had Leonard Kinsey's Dark Side of Disney book on my kindle for a while but did not get around to reading it until yesterday.  I read almost the entire thing in one sitting.

I have found that a good portion of Disney fans have no sense of humor, let's use the Disney section of reddit as an example.  The people who post there love things like blurry photos of Stitch, pin trading, and vinylmation.  God help you if you try to make a joke about any of those things because they will freak out.  The first thing I learned about Leonard Kinsey while reading this book was that he also does not understand the popularity of pin trading, and he can take a joke.

The Dark Side of Disney is part travel tips, part memoir, and part how to pull of adult activities in the happiest place on earth.  I don't really drink and have never used drugs but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy reading about Kinsey's escapades or know people who would benefit from his tips.

My favorite part of the book were Leonard Kinsey's personal stories about sneaking into the utilidor.  When I was a CP the first thing I did was go down into the Magic Kingdom's tunnels and his stories brought back a lot of fond memories.  Seeing the map they brought along to help them navigate cracked me up.

The book also contains interviews with two other Disney renegades; Shane Perez (the guy swam to Discovery Island) and Hoot Gibson (who you should already know).

Like I said before, a large number of Disney fans are easily offended, if you are one of them then this book is probably not for you.  Even if you are easily offended though you should probably just read this book anyway.  Next time you're watching the fireworks from the California Grill balcony you can nervously wonder about what could possibly going on right under your feet....

You can buy the book and read Leonard Kinsey's blog here.

Tales From The College Program: Road Dog

Believe it or not back in 2003 there were Orlando locals who would spend every weekend hanging out at Pleasure Island.  The most infamous of these "Islanders" (a term I just created) was a dude named Joe.

Joe was probably in his mid forties, and dressed like a dude from the mid eighties.  Actually that isn't entirely true, most of the time he wore black jeans and a cut off black t-shirt.  I can't blame him for the cut offs though, he had to show off the Superman symbol tattoo on his upper shoulder that read "Bon Jovi Forever" (that is 100% true).  Joe had a good number of tattoos, off the top of my head I remember him having Freddie and Jason on his forearm.  He also had Cartman from South Park, and of course, every member of KISS.   Before I forget to mention it, and you probably would have assumed anyway, Joe had a glorious mullet.

Dan and I gave Joe the nickname Road Dog because (legend had it) he was the roadie for a bunch of 80's metal bands.  We never called him Road Dog to his face though, because Joe was a total jerk.  I think he still felt he was back in the 80's making demands for the lead singer of RATT.

RATT

When Joe would come into The Missing Link, he wouldn't walk down towards the register like all the other guests, he would stop right inside the door behind the grill.  He would bark his order "2 chili cheese hot dogs, chili cheese fries."  Joe never went to the register because he had no intention of paying for his food.  I guess sometime in the past he had been given a free meal and had expected one ever since.  This was the only conversation you could really get out of him.  While his food was being prepared Dan and I would try to talk to him but he usually gave us quick one word answers. We eventually started putting on a real fan fare when he came in which he seemed to enjoy, but didn't get us any closer to the Road Dog.  Our relationship felt like we were trying to befriend the school bully who was stealing our lunch money by laughing about it with him.

If there was on thing that you could say about Joe, it was that he loved KISS.  I already mentioned the tattoo, but he also had a black corvette with the members of KISS airbrushed on the hood.  He would park it front and center in the Pleasure Island parking lot, not even in a space.  One night KISS played a show in Tampa, Joe had told Dan and I that he was going in full make up and that after the show he was driving back to Pleasure Island to show it off.  We had the night off but Dan and I made a special trip to PI to see Joe all painted up.  He made the 2 hour drive back from Tampa in his KISS make up and showed up just in time to be the person selected to do the nightly Pleasure Island New Years countdown.  The DJ played a KISS song and he rocked out on stage feeding off the energy of the crowd like one of the bands he had roadied for so many years before.

After the fireworks Joe just walked around PI in his KISS costume, Dan and I went up to him and asked for a photo.  This was the happiest I had ever seen him, I'm pretty sure we even called him Road Dog when we saw him.  

It has been almost 10 years since I have seen the Road Dog, but I still have fond memories of his rudeness.  Who knows where he has been hanging out since Pleasure Island is no more.  Maybe he's a "City Walker" now. 

If you are ever in Orlando and see a KISS corvette illegally parked, just know that the Road Dog is near (and some poor employee is getting the brunt of his wrath).  Hell hath no fury like a Road Dog scorned.

Spaceship Earth: Sky Fall

I finally watched Sky Fall this weekend.  Every time Judy Dench spoke I was hoping for a line from Spaceship Earth, like telling James Bond he should "Thank the Venetians."  At one point in the film she gives a speech and I thought "This would sound incredible if I put it in Spaceship Earth"...so I did.

Here's the link Spaceship Earth: Sky Fall 

Cast Member Knowledge

Imagineering Disney had a great post yesterday about cast member's knowledge of Magic Kingdom/Disney.  You can read it here. 

Mitch approached random cast members and asked them about 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the Skyway, Carousel of Progress, and Splash Mountain (to name a few).  Their answers were a bit surprising.  Why do Disney cast members know so little about Disney history?   Now, as he states in the original post, some of these cast members could have been new hires from the College Program which gives them a little bit of an excuse.  Here's my theory on the rest of them.

When I was in the Disney College Program, on the days when I would venture outside of Disney property, I found that almost every person I met had at some time worked for Disney.  The deli guy at Publix, the guy who changes your oil, and almost everyone who works at Universal claims to have been fired by Disney.  In Orlando working for Disney is not the glamorous job that Disney fans think of it as, it's just a huge place that is always hiring.  Do you know the history of the company you work for, probably not?  Then again, this is Disney World, why can't a cast member tell you the name of Splash Mountain?

I took the Disney Traditions class, the College Program course is shorter than the one regular cast members take, which I find odd since a majority of cast members are in the college program.  So, how much Disney history is discussed in Traditions?  In my experience, not much.  There was a short video about the company, but most of the class was done from a work book.

There was one page in the book that had around 10 pictures from Walt's birth to the opening of Animal Kingdom that you had to put in order, but that was about it for company history.

Before you start work you spend a day walking around your new work location.  You have probably noticed a group of well dressed people walking around the parks in the mornings, these are most likely new cast members.  I worked at Downtown Disney, so I don't know exactly what is discussed with Magic Kingdom CM's but i'd bet they go over park history and the names of attractions.

So, who's fault is it when a 16 year old kid who pushes strollers around or asks "how many in your party" doesn't know there used to be a 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea attraction?  I'd say a little bit Disney's and a little bit their own.

We can't force them to learn Disney history, but we can pray that they apply at Universal.....