An Interview with Disneyland Resort President Cynthia Harriss - Part One
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LP: Do you have a time table as to when you’ll be able to announce specifics?
CH: It will probably be the day before - no (laughs). We’ll try to keep it a secret as long as we can but I don’t know if we can from you. We’re still formulating and what we don’t want to do is talk about "maybe ideas" because as you can imagine, with our Imagineers who are so creative, all the entertainment people and everybody in our company, there’re more ideas than you can ever do. In fact, I’ll tell you, at the last creative session we had there were so many ideas that we actually have a couple of huge ideas that we’ve now put in for ‘06, ‘07 and ‘08. What we’re going to do is over the coming months is really get this nailed as to what we will actually have so that we can cut down on some level of the speculation. But all I can tell you is it will be spectacular.
LP: When might you be ready to announce what’s going on in Critter Country?
CH: Come see us in October. I know you’re going to come for the opening for Flik’s Fun Fair and a bug's land. We’ll be talking a little more specifically then. (Ed Note: The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh was announced on October 7th)
LP: Tom Sawyer’s Island has been the subject of a lot of rumors about closures. Can you tell us anything about that?
CH: Tom Sawyer’s Island is an important part of the Disneyland Resort. It’s been a tradition and it’s also one of the things that the kids love. It needs some attention and so we’re giving it its appropriate attention. So essentially what you’re seeing this year is we’ll go in and make it even safer and get it all spiffed up. Then the following year we hope to be able to add a few things to it. But Tom Sawyer’s Island is with us. We love it. And all those rumors about we’re going to do something more dramatic aren’t really valid. It will be Tom Sawyer’s Island.
The spot where the Carousel used to be in a
picture taken a couple of months ago
LP: What happened to the Carousel. Why is that taking so long?
CH: Because it is so spectacular. Honestly, this is one of those things that - when I say it’s so spectacular, you know the history of the carousel so I don’t need to take out the time on this. The Carousel is one of those special, special attractions. You know that Walt searched the world to find that carousel and to bring it here and the fact that it is an original and the fact that it has been in this park for so many years. And we needed to rehab it as we do typically on all our attractions. And it’s such a centerpiece for Fantasyland. It’s kind of one of those - Doobie - that while it is down we are doing everything possible that we can think of to make sure that we don’t have to take it down again hopefully for decades. On top of that is taking an opportunity to spiff it up. All the horses will be even more beautiful than ever before and all the details that go into that. So it’s really just so that we can avoid having to ever take it down again for a long, long time. Just doing everything possible that you can think of and it just takes a while to get it done.
LP: Do you know when you expect it to be done?
CH: We’re planning to open it for the holidays. The exact date I can’t tell you right off the top of my head. But we’ll have it open for the holidays.