Nine Dragons at Epcot is shaking up their menu for the “Year of the Monkey”, heralding the first major menu changes for the restaurant since it reopened in September 2008.
New to the menu are Chinese “Burgers”, featuring braised pork belly, sweet and sour fish, and general Tso’s chicken on steamed buns.
The new prix-fixe lunch special features appetizer, entree, and dessert for $17.98 per person. The full menu was not available at the time of this announcement but should be available soon.
The Lights, Motors, Action! Extreme Stunt Show at Disney’s Hollywood Studios will close April 2nd, 2016.
The closure is to accommodate the construction of the Star Wars-themed land for the park. Other nearby establishments will be closing on April 2nd as well, but Disney has made no official announcement on exactly what else will shutter that day as of yet.
The Earful Tower, one of the long-standing icons of Disney’s Hollywood Studios dating back to 1989, will be removed in the coming weeks.
The area near the Earful Tower is going to become Toy Story Land, meaning the tower would be “visually intrusive” to the story of the land where guests are shrunken to the size of a toy.
Disney has not announced if they will move the Earful Tower, but they have officially stated that it will be removed soon.
If you are planning to meet Darth Vader, you had better do so soon… for your sake.
Kylo Ren will begin meeting guests at Star Wars Launch Bay at both Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disneyland Park in February 2016, replacing Lord Vader. Chewbacca will continue to be offered on the light side for meet and greet opportunities. No word was given on who will meet guests waiting in the special Disney VISA card experience come next month.
Construction is currently wrapping up on the Town Center area of Disney Springs, but one structure from the concept art that we still haven’t see rise upon the site is the water tower bearing the Disney Springs name. Now, this could all be a big coincidence, but it does seem a bit odd that as Disney is about to build a new water tower, another one that has stood for 27 years is coming down. Based on the amount of recycling we’ve seen from Walt Disney Imagineering the last few years with larger props from extinct attractions, I can imagine a scenario where the Disney Springs water tower is built from the remains of the Earful Tower.
Bruce Vaughn has decided to leave Walt Disney Imagineering, leading Disney to name Bob Weis president of Walt Disney Imagineering.
Weis at the 2015 D23 Expo
In addition, Anthony Connelly will join WDI from Disney Cruise Line and take on the role of Executive Vice President, WDI Business Operations and Project Delivery. Anthony brings 26 years of Disney experience in a variety of leadership positions.
The changes create an interesting dynamic for WDI, with Bob Weis acting as a creative leader and Connelly overseeing the financial and construction management aspects of WDI.
The Iron Man Experience will be the very first MARVEL ride built by Disney
Though previously announced, a big part of the streamlined Walt Disney Imagineering relies heavily on franchise leaders, with Scott Trowbridge leading Star Wars and Joe Rhode leading MARVEL projects.
Overall these changes should be positive for Disney fans, returning a lot of the decision making power to the creative side of Walt Disney Imagineering once projects are approved. Here’s how the new corporate structure at WDI will work:
Reporting to Bob Weis:
Franchise Leaders –
Scott Trowbridge (Star Wars)
Joe Rohde (Marvel)
Creative Leaders –
Tom Fitzgerald
Daniel Jue
Joe Lanzisero
Zsolt Hormay
Creative Entertainment Leaders –
Matt Almos
Kevin Eld
Dana Harrel
Michael Jung
Jon Snoddy who will continue to lead WDI R&D including Disney Research
Patti Burke who will lead the newly created WDI Centers of Excellence
Chris Kubsch, Show Studio Leader, will add oversight of the Entertainment Design and Delivery Studio reporting to Patti Burke
Reporting to Anthony:
Craig Russell – as referenced above
Regional Leaders –
Kathy Mangum (WDW, DCL, DLP)
Howard Brown (Asia)
TBD (DLR/Aulani)
Daniel Carney – Environmental Design & Engineering Studio Executive
Mark Mesko – Ride Engineering Studio Executive
Michael Cawlina – Construction Management Studio Executive
Zach Riddley – Strategic Menu Planning and Project Development Executive
Justin Newton, leader of Project Management and Project Controls will report to Zach Riddley
Strategic Park Menu Planning, also under Zach, will dual report to Bob Weis
Disneyland Reporter Tim Alcoser brings us back to the Disneyland Resort for the latest news, as well as our return across the Esplanade to California Adventure in this new photo report:
It’s a beautiful evening at Disneyland!
Paint the Night is a wonderful re-imagining of the old Electrical Parade, hopefully soon on the way to Walt Disney World
Tim was nice enough to take video of the Paint the Night Parade for us, be sure to watch if you haven’t checked this out yet:
Tim also checked out the stationary experience for the Disneyland Railroad at Main Street Station
Here guests can check out the E.P. Ripley and take a peek inside the Lilly Belle
While it is sad that it is closed, how often can you do this?
The engineers are also available to talk too, making this something really special for those of us who are real park fanatics
Tim also took a video of the Main Street Station stationary experience to share with us today:
The Rivers of America remain quiet, awaiting Star Wars construction at the back end of the area
The Mark Twain is docked, but should be home to a new experience soon
If you’ll be dining at the Hungry Bear over the next two years, you’ll have an interesting view of things…
What I mean is you will be staring at a tarp with trees on it
Haunted Mansion Holiday is coming down quick this year, so don’t expect to see any maintenance performed on the much-maligned normal version of the ride
Moving over to DCA…
PIXAR Play Parade is still running
The Aladdin musical closed last week, the FROZEN musical will start in the Summer
This is still a thing…
The Flying Tires replacement, Rollicking’ Roadsters should open very soon
Don’t expect much from this attraction, it’s essentially the Aquatopia ride from DisneySea on dry land
The new Moonliner Rocket statue has been released already at Disneyland
I took a quick trip to Epcot one evening last week and I took a few newsworthy photos to share, so let’s see what’s new and exciting at WDW’s second gate:
I like the colder weather, so the 60 degree nights in Orlando lately have been wonderful
It looked like they were finally doing some work inside the former VISION House at Innoventions. Habit Heroes quietly closed 3 days after this photo was taken, completely unannounced.
With Innoventions West gone and now two exhibits closed in Innoventions East, we really need to wonder if this is the end of the exhibit space.
Innoventions West is slowly being converted to more and more meet and greet space, I can’t iamgine what they will do with Innoventions East at this rate.
The holiday decorations are slowly vanishing around the parks
Managed to get a ride in on Test Track…
Here’s my car…
Scaffolding up in the China pavilion amidst a lightsaber battle
I had dinner at KAtsura Grill in Japan, really one of the better counter service restaurants at Epcot.
The off season has begun, as you can tell by this picture was taken at 7:30PM
If you are looking for the old celebration buttons, they are still around at various merchandise locations, but you might want to hurry up before they are gone
New Women’s Princess t-shirts on sale in MouseGear
As part of the show’s ongoing evolution, La Nouba by Cirque du Soleil has introduced two new acts recently: B-Boy, commonly referred to as breakdancing, and Aerial Bamboo, a technique mastered by only a handful of performers worldwide. The acts join the recent additions of uproarious clowns and a breathtaking juggling rolla bolla act.
For the first time in any Cirque du Soleil show, a B-Boy trio is featured in their own electrifying act. B-Boying is a physically demanding form of dance, in which performers execute acrobatic tricks and moves, including flips and spins, to music. The La Nouba artistic staff scoured the globe for its three inaugural B-Boys: Josh Ortiz (“Incredible Josh”), Jean Carlos Lloret (“Bebo”) and Dmytro Li (“Flying Buddha”). The three hail respectively from the Bronx, N.Y., the Boston area and Ukraine and are performing together for the first time. All three have been dancing since their youth and bring their own unique styles to the act.
Performing their act for the first time in the United States, Russian couple Alexander and Ekaterina Abramov bring the rare performance of Aerial Bamboo to the La Nouba stage. An art form originating in China, Aerial Bamboo involves a pole-shaped apparatus suspended from the ceiling, with attached loops used for a variety of tricks and stunts. Originally, the pole was made of bamboo, giving the craft its name, but is now made of stainless steel. The act requires extreme trust as for most of the performance, Ekaterina is held only by Alexander – his arms, his feet and even his teeth – as he himself hangs by his feet or arms high above the stage.
To seamlessly integrate the new acts into La Nouba, the show brought back original choreographer Debra Brown, original composer Benoit Jutras and original lighting designer Luc Lafortune to apply their individual crafts and create original Cirque du Soleil acts unlike anything audiences have ever seen before.
To preface my review, I had actually never been to La Nouba. It’s one of those things we had talked about going to see at least a hundred times, but we had just never managed to go see it. Also, I’ve never seen a Cirque show in-person before, but I am familiar with what they are.
In short, I was really blown away. The new acts were great and the show overall was very enjoyable. In fact, the new Aerial Bamboo act was my favorite part of the entire show. It’s definitely not something I personally would see every trip to Walt Disney World, but if you haven’t made time to see La Nouba, you really should. I think it’s a really nice way to cap off an evening at Disney Springs and I can’t imagine a scenario where you would be disappointed.
