Report: Tokyo DisneySea Opening Ceremony,

Report: Tokyo DisneySea Opening Ceremony
Page 3 of 4

EisnerSpeech.JPG (33789 bytes)

Michael Eisner: Good morning distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. Roy Disney and I are thrilled to be in your beautiful country and experience the warmth of your hospitality. Today, The Walt Disney Company and Oriental Land Company mark an unforgetable moment in Disney history. I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to everyone at Oriental Land Company for their undying devotion and vision in making Tokyo DisneySea such a magnificent achievement. There is a plaque overlooking this beautiful harbour to which I offer a greeting for all who visit here. Since you are about to be our first official guests, I would now like to personally read it to you:

Welcome one and all to a world where Imagination and Adventure set sail. Tokyo DisneySea is dedicated to the spirit of exploration that lives in each of us. Here we charter a course for Adventure, Romance, Discovery and Fun and journey to exotic and fanciful Ports of Call. May Tokyo DisneySea inspire the hearts and mind of all of us who share the water planet, Earth. September 4, 2001.

And now the sun! (Ed note: It had been drizzling through President Tagami’s speech and the first glimpses of sun were poking through during Michael’s dedication). Thank you very much.

Announcer: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great pleasure that we welcome a special member of the Disney family today. Vice Chairman of The Walt Disney Company and Chairman of Walt Disney Feature Animation, Roy Disney.

DisneySpeech.JPG (31856 bytes)

Roy Disney: Good morning ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. I repeat “the sun is out”! In 1983, Tokyo Disneyland became our first Disney theme park outside the United States. It went on to become our most successful of all. Of course, it was very closely modelled after our first park, Disneyland. Today we return to Tokyo to dedicate a very different park, a completely new and completely different one but it shares with all our parks that it takes us to worlds of imagination that might otherwise only be encountered in dreams. This ability to make dreams real is the legacy of our founders, my uncle Walt and father Roy Disney, so I am very excited to see this legacy live on at Tokyo DisneySea.

All of us at Disney are very mindful of and very grateful that this achievement has only come to pass because of the Oriental Land Company whose determination and vision have been achieved by bringing this dream to reality. I can think of two people in particular who would have been thrilled with this new park that has risen up next to a park they would have found very familiar. Of course, I refer to Walt and Roy Disney. They would both have loved to be here today, but in a real, very real way, I believe they are. Thank you.

Announcer: Thank you, Roy Disney and now President Kagami will make the Tokyo DisneySea Opening Proclamation.