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I guess I fall into the category of “Disney Adult,” a derogatory term for adults who visit Disney theme parks without their children.
Disney has 12 theme parks and two water parks around the world, and I've been to them all. I was at Walt Disney World in Florida when the theme parks reopened in July 2020 after a four-month closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and at Disneyland in California in 2022, when Mickey Mouse was allowed to give hugs again after a two-year pandemic hiatus. I also spent an entire afternoon hanging out at the turkey leg stand in Disneyland's Frontierland.
And so, this month, when Disney World began test runs of its newest attraction, Tiana's Bayou Adventure, I went for a ride.
But I didn't do this as a Disney fanatic — I went to Disney theme parks because it was part of my job as an entertainment journalist.
Early in my career, in the late 1990s, I covered “hard news” in Philadelphia, covering police and courts. That job was a breeze compared to what I do now. Disney, to put it mildly, is slow to respond when a story pokes holes in the company's myth-making of “The Happiest Place on Earth.” I once tried to get information from a Toy Story Mania ride operator, wanting to know how Disneyland employees felt about new safety procedures. Out of nowhere, a corporate spokesperson appeared and abruptly ended the conversation.
As of 2021, The Walt Disney Company has a global media relations team of 500 people. I'm just one person, but I still aim to cover all the big news.
Tiana's Bayou Adventure caught my eye as a film likely to be talked about in 2020. That summer, as anti-racism protests swept across the US, Disney announced it was closing Splash Mountain, the popular but controversial log slide attraction based on the 1946 Disney film Song of the South, and replacing it with an attraction based on Disney's first black princess, Tiana. Tiana, an aspiring chef living in 1920s New Orleans, first appeared in the 2009 animated film The Princess and the Frog.
The new attraction will use the same track as Splash Mountain, but will have a completely redesigned ride. Instead of featuring the characters and music from the racist Oscar-winning film “Song of the South,” the log slide will follow Tiana's journey across the bayou in search of musicians to play at a Mardi Gras party.
While some people welcomed the decision to remove Splash Mountain, others were outraged.
It would be easy to dismiss these actions, the good, the bad and the ugly, as simply “stupid.” This is a no-no. Get a grip.
But Disney is so heavily involved in creating memories for so many people that even the smallest changes at a Disney park can provoke intense reactions. Other examples include the ill-fated update of the Enchanted Tiki Room attraction at Disney World in the late 1990s, and concerns over reviews updating the “Country Bear Jamboree” attraction in 2012.
Park enthusiasts hope to recreate their memories as accurately as possible when they visit again: The logs are no longer moldy. It must smell moldy!
At the same time, the addition of a major attraction featuring a black heroine — the first flagship attraction at a Disney theme park featuring a black character — will have a positive impact on younger visitors, especially people of color. Tiana's Bayou Adventure opens to the public on June 28 at Disney World's Magic Kingdom. A similar version of the attraction is scheduled to come to Disneyland by the end of the year. The two parks combined draw about 40 million visitors a year. That's the power of culture.
The ride overhaul also offered insight into Disney as a company. Yes, the company was trying to right a wrong by removing Splash Mountain. But the changes were also about looking at the country's changing demographics and identifying potential growth opportunities—to, as one Disney ride designer told me, “widen the net” by creating more inclusive spaces in its parks.
For these and other reasons, I try not to be too cynical when I write. In the main article, I wanted to make a joke that Disney was missing the point by naming the new ride “Tiana's Bayou Adventure.” Shouldn't they have called it “The Princess and the Log?” I thought that was too flippant.
To report this story, I flew from my Los Angeles base to Florida and stayed overnight at one of Disney's budget hotels, the Port Orleans. (Per The Times's ethics code, I never accept anything for free from Disney; the Times paid for it.) The next morning, I met with Jackie Wahler, a Disney World public relations executive who respects the journalistic process. She took me to a conference room behind Main Street in the Magic Kingdom, where I interviewed the attraction's designer.
After an hour or so, we walked over to the ride, which was in its testing phase, and after some more interviews, I hopped on a log with the ride's designer and rode it around the bayou multiple times, asking questions along the way.
I didn't like getting wet (luckily, my notebook didn't get wet), but taking the time to go there helped me write a better article and understand what Disney was trying to do with the ride, something I couldn't quite understand over the phone.
As is common with Disney rides, the attention to detail was apparent — the ride is embroidered with thousands of tiny white and pink artificial flowers, for example. But what struck me most were the smiles of the passengers, especially the black passengers. “I finally feel like I belong here,” one woman exclaimed.