01x02 - Haunted Mansion

[bunniefuu]

ANNOUNCER 1: Remain seated, please.

(in Spanish)

Please remain seated.

(lively music)

(elephants trumpeting)

MAN: The love of liberty.

(moans)

(screaming)

MAN 2: KU-6908.

-PAUL: Well, then, let's do this.

-MAN 3: Yeah.

PAUL: You want me to do it

very breathy like that?

-MAN 3: Oh, yeah.

-PAUL: All right.

PAUL: Whenever candle lights flicker,

where the air is deathly still,

that is the time when ghosts are present,

practicing their terror

with ghoulish delight.

(thunder rumbles)

Welcome, foolish mortal

to The Haunted Mansion.

(screams)

NARRATOR: The Haunted Mansion.

One of the world's most beloved

theme park attractions.

Now can I go see The Haunted Mansion?

Packed to the rafters

with world-class illusions,

this house of horrors

has become a timeless classic.

I remember it as a child.

I don't want it to change.

The Haunted Mansion

has changed over the years.

Don't change it.

NARRATOR: Reincarnated at Disney Parks

all around the world.

-In Tokyo

-Paris.

-Hong Kong.

-NARRATOR: Known as

-Mystic Manor.

-Or

Phantom Manor.

NARRATOR: This iconic attraction

has been scaring

the daylights out of guests

(shrieks)

for over 50 years!

-They're all just hilarious.

-NARRATOR: Hilarious?

That's not

what the mansion's supposed to be.

-The mansion's supposed to be

-(screams)

-Scary.

-It could be scary. It could just be

-Foreboding

-But also

Fantastical, but

-It's really quite

-Comical.

-NARRATOR: Even

-Dare we say it Funny.

-Funny?

-Really not all that funny.

(laughs)

NARRATOR: But the real story

of the darkest of Disney's dark rides,

well, the truth

about that might scare you!

(laughs)

And if not the truth?

Then Walt's earlier work probably will.

(laughs)

Walt did mention one day,

he said, "People like to be scared."

NARRATOR: In fact,

much of Walt's work had a dark side.

Even back to "The Skeleton Dance" in 1929.

Well, it was all very crude and primitive.

NARRATOR: Look at 1940's Fantasia.

So when the idea of a theme park came

to Walt, it only made sense that

He always wanted a haunted mansion.

It was in his ideas

from the very beginning.

NARRATOR: But these early ideas,

conceptually at least,

are a pretty long walk

from where The Haunted Mansion ended up.

This was gonna be a walking attraction

in which people would be walking through

the rooms and experiencing it.

NARRATOR: Whatever it was

They couldn't quite get a grip

on what to do with The Haunted Mansion.

So Walt has the animators just do sketches

of what what a haunted mansion

should have in it.

NARRATOR: And it was soon revealed

They were really basically

little cartoons.

That's not what

the mansion's supposed to be.

The mansion's supposed to be scary.

NARRATOR: Well, yeah, didn't Walt say

"People like to be scared."

NARRATOR: But on the other hand,

Walt did admit to one of his

most trusted Imagineers, John Hench

You could have a friendly feeling

about ghosts

if we made such that they were

like retired actors from the stage.

They loved an audience.

NARRATOR: Well, this slight indecision

wouldn't stop them,

because when Disneyland opened

on July 17th, 1955

Welcome.

it wasn't funny or scary,

because there was no Haunted Mansion.

And so, Walt dispatched lead

scary character designer Ken Anderson.

Ken Anderson actually designed some

of the the early concepts

for the attraction.

NARRATOR: Starting with the outside.

Using these Southern

architectural designs as inspiration,

all Ken had to do was just

add a few cobwebs, some broken windows,

a few spiders,

and, just generally, haunted things.

We wanted this haunted house

to be kind of ruined.

JOHN: Shutters would be crooked.

It would be some

kind of house disintegrating.

NARRATOR: But

Walt said, "No."

NARRATOR: Because for as much

as Walt wanted a haunted house

He really wanted The Haunted Mansion

to be as clean

and well-kept as the rest of his park.

NARRATOR: So, instead of the grimy

ghost trains of 1960s carnivals

Walt's vision was that he wanted

the exterior of the mansion

to be pristine,

and the interior

is what would be dilapidated.

And he said, you know,

"We'll take care of the outside

and we'll let the ghosts

take care of the inside."

NARRATOR:

That's all well and good. However

Nothing had been designed

to be inside of it.

So, dusting off the cobwebs,

Walt turned to another Imagineer

for his take.

DANIEL: Yale Gracey worked

at Walt Disney Animation.

And eventually, he was a member

of the Magic Castle in Hollywood,

so he did stage performance magic,

but had never done theme park magic.

-NARRATOR: Who had?

-Nobody had ever done theme park magic.

NARRATOR: Well, there's no hiding

Daniel Joseph's admiration

for this master magician.

Yale Gracey, for me,

was my Michael Jordan.

I mean, I had pictures of Yale Gracey

on the wall,

growing up in my little

bedroom in Delaware.

NARRATOR: But this pinup heartthrob

was already taken.

He was partnered up with Rolly Crump.

NARRATOR: Who has a few fans of his own.

I love Rolly Crump. He's such a great guy.

VANESSA: He designed

the Tower of the Four Winds

at the 1964-'65 New York World's Fair.

-How tall is the real tower, Rolly?

-It's 120 feet.

NARRATOR: But this was a job Rolly knew

he was destined for

ever since he wasn't very tall at all.

I always wanted to work for Disney

from the time I was three,

'cause the first film I saw

was the Three Little Pigs.

ROLLY: I told my mom at the time,

"I wanna work for Disney."

She said, "Well, someday maybe you will."

NARRATOR:

Like most mothers, she wasn't wrong.

My first film was Peter Pan

and then the Lady and the tr*mp.

ROLLY: So, that's what I did.

I just worked in animation.

NARRATOR: Rolly did rack up

an impressive credits list,

along with a bit of a reputation

that followed him his whole career.

Rolly, ended up becoming my boss.

He was wild. I mean, he was a wild guy.

NARRATOR: And so, for the wild Rolly

and magical Yale,

Walt's instructions were simple.

Walt just wanted a lot of good ideas.

NARRATOR: And so, the two got to work,

conjuring up things

for Walt's Haunted Mansion.

Yale and I had this big room

filled with weird, scary stuff.

Well, we got a call

from Personnel one day,

and they said, um

ROLLY: "The janitors would like to have

you leave the lights on in that room."

Maybe 'cause when

we turned the lights out,

it was pretty spooky,

'cause a lot of stuff was lit

-with black light.

-(woman shrieks)

Which meant it glowed in the dark.

And so, Yale and I said,

"Oh, okay, uh, if that's the case,

uh, we'll do a little something here."

We rigged the whole room.

And we had the whole thing

on a little timer.

We triggered everything

to take off during the night.

-(bell dings)

-(disembodied voices)

We came back the next day.

Personnel called us the next day and said,

"They're never coming back.

You're gonna have to clean up

your room yourself."

NARRATOR: Flying in the face

of Walt's one clear instruction

The Haunted Mansion should be as clean

and well-kept as the rest of his park.

NARRATOR: Rolly and Yale continued

to develop ideas amidst

the squalor of youthful creativity.

And we were having a great time.

(applause)

NARRATOR: And so was the entire

Disney staff from the looks of it,

because construction work

finally began on Walt's long-sought-after

house of ghosts.

And then the World's Fair came along.

NARRATOR: Ah, yes, the World's Fair.

An immensely important phase

in Disneyland's development,

but also one that would absorb years

of Walt and the Imagineers' time.

As a result, work on The Haunted Mansion

project expired.

For many years, The

The Haunted Mansion, lay dormant here.

(laughs)

The gates were closed.

Guests were wondering,

"Why can't we go in?"

And so, a sign was placed out front.

NARRATOR: A sign of what was to come

for the story of this apparitious abode.

Walt talked about wanting

to build a retirement home

for all these 999 happy ghosts and haunts.

GARY: And so, of course, Disney legend

Marty Sklar had taken his cue from Walt

and written a plaque that spoke to it

being a retirement home

and that guests could apply

to Ghost Relations in order to stay there.

NARRATOR:

There weren't too many takers for that.

But what Disney failed to gain

in ghostly reservations in Anaheim

was more than made up for

for the experience gleaned in New York.

We learned so much at the World's Fair

in terms of new means

of entertaining our guests

through Audio-Animatronics

and the ride systems that came out

of the research and development

of the World's Fair.

NARRATOR: And with this new knowledge,

work began in earnest on a brand-new area

of Disneyland called

WALT: New Orleans Square.

New Orleans Square is not a square.

NARRATOR: Right. But still!

The flagship attraction

for this New Orleans

It it's sort of a trapezoid.

would finally be

the Pirates of the Caribbean?

(laughs)

We moved ahead with the pirates.

Everyone was really

all hepped-up on doing that.

NARRATOR: As well as being

a treasure chest of World's Fair wizardry

unlike Haunted Mansion,

Pirates had a clear artistic direction.

We've always been partial

to pirate stories.

NARRATOR: They still didn't even know

if The Haunted Mansion

was meant to be funny or scary.

The show never was to a point

where I think he was comfortable

with with going ahead with it.

NARRATOR: So for Walt,

Pirates of the Caribbean

became the priority.

And for the empty Haunted Mansion,

that ship had sailed.

Or, you know, ran on a shallow track.

But not for long,

because that empty house over there

was getting a little awkward.

I grew up in the '60s,

so I was one of those kids drooling

at the gate like, "When are when are

they gonna open this thing up?"

And then all the rumors.

"A lady fell in a pit."

"There was a snake pit." Blah, blah, blah.

NARRATOR: Blah, blah, nah.

I always wondered about that.

NARRATOR: But there was

really nothing mysterious afoot.

Rather, Walt wanted to make sure Pirates

was well on its way

before focusing efforts on The Mansion.

And once it became clear

that the Pirates project

was coming to a head

Walt was ready to plunge headlong

into The Mansion.

By plundering legendary

Imagineer Marc Davis

away from working

on Pirates of the Caribbean,

which he lovingly referred to as

The, uh, pirate ride,

which came along there somewhere.

NARRATOR: Well, that was

a pretty clear signal from Walt

that he was leaning more toward taking

The Mansion in a humorous direction,

because while Marc had made

a name for himself

as a master animator

on many of Disney's classic films,

he particularly excelled

at one specific aspect of his craft.

He was known

as the great gag man within animation.

NARRATOR: And they could use the help,

because

We didn't know whether you were

gonna ride through this thing,

walk through it, or what.

with the confidence and proven

track record of Marc Davis

And we did some paintings,

and they were quite fantastic.

now things should be easy,

except for the fact that there were now

Two art directors on Haunted Mansion.

(laughs)

NARRATOR: Yeah, one small detail.

It would appear Walt hired Marc's

fellow Imagineer Claude Coats

to share the art director post

on Haunted Mansion, because

Walt knew he mainly got his best results

when he put opposites together.

Claude Coats was more of a theatrical

set designer, if you will.

Claude Coats was a straight arrow.

Straight arrow.

NARRATOR: So, kind of like

the opposite of Marc, then.

But from an equally

prestigious background and reputation.

Claude was a beautiful background artist.

If you look at Pinocchio

and the beautiful street scenes

He was amazing.

Good architect, good designer.

Walt would use him In my eyes

when he saw one of his attractions

starting to fall behind.

NARRATOR: While The Mansion

wasn't quite running behind just yet

"When are they gonna open this thing up?"

it hadn't exactly

hit its stride, either.

So, we have on one side Marc Davis saying,

"I want this funny,

gag-driven haunted house.

These are happy haunts that live here."

DANIEL: And then on the other side,

you have Claude Coats who's saying,

"You should go in and feel

the hot and cold running chills

-(thunder rumbles)

-as you go through this mansion."

So with that, as in any

creative organization, there's tension.

NARRATOR:

Thankfully, there was nothing but harmony.

And mischief shared

between Yale Gracey and Rolly Crump.

And so, I had started

doing sketches of all my scary stuff.

NARRATOR: Because after all,

Walt had said

"People like to be scared."

NARRATOR: But he had also said

He wanted it to go funny.

NARRATOR: So what did Walt want?

It was time to find out.

"Okay, we're gonna have

a meeting with Walt.

Everybody bring their sketches down

and their models."

Then everybody didn't like the idea

that I was doing things that were scary.

In fact, they didn't like that what

anything I was doing.

NARRATOR: So much so that Rolly's stuff

was strategically placed

behind Walt for the meeting.

And they did it on purpose

so he wouldn't see it.

And all of a sudden, he says,

"What is that stuff?"

And they said,

"Well, that's some stuff Rolly did."

And he says,

"Well, what is it that Rolly did?"

And I said, "Well, I just feel

that we need some scary stuff in there."

NARRATOR: The janitors probably disagree.

And so the next morning,

I came to work at seven o'clock.

Walt's sitting in my chair.

And the first thing he said to me was,

-"You son of a"

-(woman shrieks)

And I thought, "Oh, my God."

He says, "I didn't get an ounce

of sleep last night

because what you showed me yesterday

kept me up all night long."

And I said, "Oh, God, I'm sorry."

He says, "No, no.

I know what you're gonna do

with your art. "

I says, "You do?" He says, "Yeah."

He said, "We're gonna do

a Museum of the Weird.

And you can do

all the weirdest stuff you wanna do

and put it in the museum."

Oh, I said, "Oh, God, that was easy."

NARRATOR: But things were about

to get a little bit harder.

Walt Disney never lived

to see The Hunted Mansion completed.

NARRATOR: The impact of losing

their leader was vast,

and the reality of a Walt-less Disneyland

was upon them.

They had lost their leader,

they were a bit directionless,

but they still had to buck up

and get these things done.

NARRATOR: That, they could agree on.

But that was about it.

It didn't really have its final direction

when he passed away.

So that's where it kind of

accelerate this

kind of pitched battle, if you will,

between the forces

of fun and lighthearted

-NARRATOR: or

-dark and sinister.

NARRATOR: So with two teams tasked

with making one attraction

These guys are fighting amongst themselves

and trying to figure out, you know,

what direction it should go in.

NARRATOR:Well, with the opening day

fast approaching,

the gates of Walt Disney's Haunted Mansion

would finally swing open,

revealing more than ten years of work

by dozens of Imagineers,

promising 999 ghosts,

with just a few outstanding questions.

Did Claude make it scary?

Or did Marc make it funny?

Did Rolly contribute enough weirdness?

What's inside that mansion?

NARRATOR: Let's find out, shall we?

1969, The Haunted Mansion

finally opened its gates.

TOM: It was one of Disneyland's

highest attendance days ever.

Obviously, with all those years

of waiting

Now can I go see The Haunted Mansion?

NARRATOR: By all means, Donny!

KURT: Come on, the line's moving.

NARRATOR:

And whether you were visiting alongside

The Osmonds and Kurt Russell

in this 1970 TV special,

or visiting today,

as you enter the mansion,

your mood will change

as you stand inside a holding room

and hear the immortal words

PAUL: Welcome, foolish mortals,

to The Haunted Mansion.

NARRATOR: Words uttered

by legendary voice actor, Paul Frees,

also known as the voice

of Ludwig Von Drake.

You don't know.

(screams)

-NARRATOR: But now

-PAUL: I am your host. Your ghost-host.

-Oh, it's wild!

-(ghost laughs)

It's like, okay, everybody's in.

PAUL: There's no turning back now.

NARRATOR: Which is about when you realize

that you're not in a holding room at all.

Suddenly, the room starts stretching.

Oh, the picture's moving!

NARRATOR: Stretching, but also sinking

because you're actually standing

in one of two lifts

designed to take guests six feet under.

Or, you know, maybe it's further.

And to distract you from the fact

that you're just going down an elevator,

this optical illusion sprang

from the brilliance of Rolly and Yale,

then adapted by Marc Davis.

You know, the funny one.

Tell her about this thing here,

will you, Marc?

Oh, this is our, uh, elongating,

stretching room,

and also some stretching portraits.

NARRATOR: So, thanks to those portraits

and the ghost-host,

it's probably one point for funny, right?

(laughs)

We finally displayed the ghost-host

hanging by his neck.

NARRATOR: Ugh! Well, maybe not.

Lights go out with thunder,

and everybody screams.

That whole introductory experience

totally puts you in the mood for,

"What is the show is gonna be about?"

NARRATOR: Well, perhaps

what's at the bottom of that elevator

might offer further clues

as you walk down quite the moody hallway.

(thunder rumbles)

Hey, look at the picture of the man

on the horse.

NARRATOR:

Now, speaking of pictures on the wall,

the next mind-blowing moment

that'll have you asking

What is going on here?

Came from Daniel Joseph's favorite,

Yale Gracey.

A special effects designer

like Yale Gracey

would have all these heads,

these busts sitting around the lab.

DANIEL: And one day,

one of them was sitting in reverse,

and he walks past it

and notices, "That face is following me."

EJ: How do they do that?

And that's a perfect happenstance effect.

(ghost wails)

NARRATOR: Finally escaping the gaze

of Yale Gracey's accidental creations,

you realize that the ride part

of the attraction hasn't even begun.

Turns out you've just been in the line.

Haunted Mansion's experience in the queue

gives you that sense

of foreboding and anxiety

and anticipation for what

you're gonna experience on the ride.

NARRATOR: Speaking of which

Realizing the number of people

that would want to see

The Haunted Mansion

they decided to go

with a spectral carriage, so to speak.

NARRATOR: But guests won't be taking

the reins of this carriage.

PAUL: Do not pull down

on the safety bar, please.

I will lower it for you.

You're used to being the one in control.

Now the doom buggy's in control.

NARRATOR:

That's right, doom buggy, with an "M".

Affectionately known as "doom buggies".

NARRATOR: Well, affections aside,

these doom buggies

are engineering marvels.

You have multiple rails, designing the

different rotation of all the vehicles,

a lot of vehicles

that are all strung together

You have to drive all the vehicles

through a very large layout,

up and down hills.

NARRATOR: Up and down hills?

What sort of house had they built?

So it was extremely complicated.

NARRATOR: Well, in the same way

that New Orleans Square

isn't actually a square,

it turns out that The Haunted Mansion

isn't actually a mansion, either.

In fact, it's really

more of a haunted facade.

Because, aside from the stretching room

where the tour begins,

the attraction

isn't even inside this building.

You're actually travelling

through a tunnel

dug under the house,

under the railroad tracks,

outside of the park border,

and finally,

up into a massively, monstrous

mega-mansion!

And this is where

You head off into the mansion itself.

NARRATOR: Riding your doom buggy

deeper into the mansion,

it's worth noting that

for all the promises of ghosts,

at this point,

we haven't actually seen one.

So to conjure up

what we came for, we enter

The Séance Room.

LEOTA:

Awaken the spirits with your tambourine.

And in this crystal ball,

a lady's head appears.

Send us a message from somewhere beyond.

NARRATOR:

Not just any lady. This is Madame Leota.

Madame Leota is our resident medium

here at The Haunted Mansion.

NARRATOR: But also

a resident Imagineer named

Leota Toombs, a very important

designer here at The Mansion.

Goblins and ghoulies

from last Halloween

We had problems with filming it

because the head had

to be held very still.

XAVIER: And we finally fixed up

a brace for her.

In fact, we nailed her down

so she couldn't do anything

but do her incantations.

NARRATOR: But Leota Toombs

wasn't just an Imagineer

or a floating head.

She was also a mother

who raised another Imagineer.

When I go through there,

when my kids were little

and I'd say,

"There's Grandma. Wave to Grandma."

(Kim chuckles)

I'd hear people behind me go,

"What a weirdo, telling her kids

that Grandma's in The Haunted Mansion."

NARRATOR:

But Grandma was working overtime.

She's summoning the spirits.

NARRATOR: And you can't help but think

Oh, this makes me feel creepy all over!

that Walt's original vision

People like to be scared.

had won out, especially because

This is where we see

the ghosts for the first time.

NARRATOR: But not just one or two.

This is the grand ballroom,

home to a dozen ghosts!

Seeing real ghosts dancing

in the ballroom scene blew my mind.

NARRATOR: This incredible scene utilized

every state-of-the-art trick Disney

had at their disposal,

as well as a really old one.

Well, that was an old magician's technique

called "Pepper's Ghost."

-What do you see?

-An organ.

-WALT: Yes.

-JULIE: A ghost.

A ghost is playing, sure.

It was invented by a guy named Pepper

back in the 1800s.

NARRATOR:

And what John Henry Pepper invented

was a clever technique

to conjure spooks and specters

to the stage for live audiences.

If you've ever looked out of a window

and think you've seen something

outside the window

but it's actually a reflection

from the window

of something in the house,

that's how Pepper's Ghost can work.

So in The Haunted Mansion,

when you see those ghosts,

you're actually seeing a reflection

of real Animatronic dancers.

NARRATOR: A deceptively simple,

yet effective illusion.

But they wouldn't all be so easy.

As Yale Gracey would soon discover

while building the mansion

attic spotlight spook known as

-(laughs)

-the Hatbox Ghost,

who was brought to life

by an equally simple optical illusion.

At least, in theory.

When the light was turned off the face,

it would disappear.

And at the same time,

a light would shine on the inside

of this translucent hatbox.

VICTORIA: And it was, "Ooh, spooky ghost.

His face is on his head,

and then his face is in this box."

-NARRATOR: But

-It never quite worked.

NARRATOR:

Well, to be fair, it did at first.

The lighting conditions were different

between where they had tested it

and where it was installed.

And that difference in lighting condition

ruined the effect.

VICTORIA: You could see

both faces simultaneously.

NARRATOR:

And Imagineers were forced to face facts.

The perfectionist Yale Gracey was,

he really lobbied to have that taken out

because it didn't live up to his vision.

NARRATOR: And so, the Hatbox Ghost

was boxed up after less than a week.

And that adds to the mystery immensely.

NARRATOR: But had this beheaded boogeyman

truly been cast out for good?

(laughs)

NARRATOR: Only time will tell.

But before you can be cast out

of the attic space,

you'll come face to face

with the chilling bride.

Who is a black widow bride,

and we're trying to piece together

all these different husbands

who seem to be somehow losing their heads

in the portraits.

NARRATOR: And you might lose your head

when you learn that this betrothed banshee

is a remnant of a discarded mansion story

from the attraction's early days

of development.

And the story had to do with a bride

who, on her wedding day, was abandoned.

And became a ghost as a result of

NARRATOR:

Something too heinous to speak of!

(female ghost laughs)

NARRATOR: But lest this attic space

become too macabre,

it's at this point that

You leave the mansion and head outside.

NARRATOR: And that's when you get

the biggest shock of all

(screams)

as you're confronted

by a vast cemetery full of fun!

You'll see them all singing and dancing,

playing musical instruments,

engaging in games, riding on bikes.

NARRATOR: As the song

that's been spookily guiding us

through the attraction

cleverly morphs into one

of the catchiest tunes at Disneyland!

The musical score is a sweeping

version of "Grim Grinning Ghost"

that's orchestrated

in many different ways.

NARRATOR: An old-school Imagineer,

Xavier Atencio

Was the best Mickey Mouse artist

that ever worked for Disney Studios.

was relatively new to writing lyrics.

NARRATOR:

But after his successful sea shanty work

on Pirates of the Caribbean,

it was a songwriter's life for him!

Walt assigned him, late in the game,

to pen the words and lyrics

to accompany the music

of famed Disney composer Buddy Baker

for The Haunted Mansion theme.

Writing songs for rides like this,

you can't have a beginning and end.

Each stanza has to have its own meaning.

NARRATOR: And the meaning

of this part of the attraction,

well, that's pretty clear.

It is a full-fledged jamboree.

When the crypt doors creak

And the tombstones quake ♪

And there's these marble busts,

but they're singing to me.

NARRATOR: Another one

of Yale Gracey's special tricks

And they're certainly fan favorites.

the singing busts utilize

clever projection.

As the moon climbs high

o'er the dead oak tree ♪

NARRATOR: And as you stare

into the morbid face of a marble bust,

happily singing about death

Grim grinning ghosts

come out to socialize ♪

it becomes clear that your ride

is about to come to an end.

But before you can get off

your doom buggy,

you look and you see a ghost hitchhike

a ride with you along the way.

I think that made a very nice finish

for that attraction.

There was a ghost sitting on my lap.

I'm like, that is the funniest thing ever.

NARRATOR: It's about then you realize

The Haunted Mansion

has, like, two different vibes.

NARRATOR: Yeah, they just did both.

TOM: Claude had the first half.

NARRATOR:

Yeah, the scary half, and, yeah

TOM: Marc had the second half.

-NARRATOR: The funny half!

-(ghost laughs)

But they made

a beautiful attraction together.

That has helped make The Haunted Mansion

the classic attraction that it is today.

I wanna go again.

NARRATOR:

Word quickly spread about the pristine,

white-columned house in Anaheim.

And it meant that Disney was now firmly

in The Haunted Mansion building business.

And this ghoulish construction venture

quickly expanded eastward,

as Walt Disney World in Florida

planned to open its gates,

along with its own Haunted Mansion,

just two years after Anaheim.

Even though it opened

in 1969 here at Disneyland,

it was about to open in 1971

at the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World.

So Imagineers actually

built two of everything.

Grim grinning ghosts

come out to socialize ♪

NARRATOR: In an almost Pepper's Ghost

reflection of itself

They built duplicates

of all the showpieces

as they were going through the shops

and stored in a warehouse.

this clever planning ensured

that the Florida ghosts could take up

residence inside their mansion

as soon as it was ready.

NARRATOR: But when it came to the outside?

Well, that's where the Imagineers

stopped seeing double.

'Cause we didn't have

a New Orleans Square.

We had Liberty Square.

NARRATOR:

So, to better reflect the location

We were solidly placed

on the Eastern Seaboard.

and time period, they went with

Hudson River Dutch Gothic mansion

sitting up on the hill,

playing into all the ghost stories

that that thing provided for us.

NARRATOR: And they had plans to take

this Haunted Mansion to the next level,

from a practical point of view at least.

Because of the water table here

in Florida,

everything is sitting up higher.

NARRATOR:

Oh, well, no Stretch Room required.

The Stretch Room was so popular out there,

they wanted to replicate that here, so

hence, we still have a Stretch Room,

but it stretches up,

instead of pulling us down.

NARRATOR: Along with several other

relatively subtle differences,

The Haunted Mansion in Walt Disney World

was also a screaming success.

And throughout the '70s,

the attraction was becoming

It was one of those sacred shows,

you just don't change it that much.

NARRATOR: Well, the same can't be said

for the decades.

In the early '80s,

plans for Tokyo Disneyland emerged.

And with it, new opportunities

to update Haunted Mansion or not.

The Haunted Mansion in Tokyo

is a lift of Walt Disney World's

Haunted Mansion.

The only difference is that

it's in a different land.

-NARRATOR: Which is understandable.

-(screams)

With Tokyo Disneyland not having

a New Orleans Square like Anaheim

or a Liberty Square like Florida,

it made perfect sense

to put their Haunted Mansion in

Fantasyland.

Right next to Small World.

(laughs)

DANIEL JUE:

And right in the front of Dumbo.

So it fit well in that location

is the only reason

why I think it would go there.

DAVE: Each one is different.

You have to think about where it's going

and how it needs to be tweaked.

NARRATOR: Well, when Disneyland Paris

opened as Eurodisney Resort in 1992,

even more tweaking was necessary.

But this time

The French and the Europeans, you know,

they're used to walking around Paris

and seeing all those rich, rich, rich

detail and history.

NARRATOR: And let's be honest,

it's hard to compete with the catacombs.

That's a wall made out of human bones,

in case you're wondering.

Which Disneyland Paris cast member

Pascale Kaced

doesn't find shocking in the least,

because

(in French)

NARRATOR: Ah! Rolly was right!

People like to be scared.

NARRATOR: Especially the French, it seems!

(woman shrieks)

NARRATOR: And clearly,

The Mansion's funny-slash-scary combo

wasn't going to cut it this time.

But, in a surprising twist

-Hey

-GREG: We certainly thought that

the French audience

would really appreciate

experiencing the Wild West environment

that they really don't get exposed to.

So they put it in Frontierland.

NARRATOR:

Frontierland? Well, that might work.

All of Frontierland is a gold rush town.

GARY: And so, the mansion

is the estate of the gold baron

that has fallen into disrepair.

NARRATOR: Disrepair?

Our Haunted Mansion is the

only one that looks abandoned.

NARRATOR: But what would Walt say?

MAN: It should be neat and clean.

Well, because we're in Frontierland,

it could be abandoned

because that went really well

with the story.

NARRATOR: All right. Fair enough.

It's really a terrific twist.

There was this great earthquake

that happened.

GREG: And in the earthquake,

both the proprietor

and his wife passed away.

NARRATOR:

And did a fresh take on an old favorite

from both Anaheim and Florida.

The daughter who was going to

become married soon was left

to roam the halls of the manor,

bemoaning the loss of her parents.

She, too, eventually passes away

and continues to haunt the home

to this day.

NARRATOR:

Sounds potentially terrifying! Is it?

(in French)

NARRATOR:

And that is how the West was won!

Western Europe anyway.

LANNY: A lot of our work as Imagineers

is to keep the legends,

don't destroy the lore, but make it

better in many ways, clearer, brighter.

NARRATOR: And, obviously,

relevant for the specific park.

And that that's a challenge.

NARRATOR:

A challenge they faced yet again in 2010

when construction began

on a haunted attraction

for Hong Kong Disneyland.

The Western notion of ghosts

and how they're portrayed is different.

So a completely different storyline

was written.

NARRATOR:

About a haunted manor with no ghosts.

This is Mystic Manor.

We have the storyline of Lord Mystic,

who's created this manor house,

um, to house his collection of artifacts.

Hello, there.

NARRATOR:

But mostly, it's about a cheeky monkey.

ERIC: We have been warned

not to touch Pandora's box.

And of course, Albert the monkey

opens the box

and that's really

where the attraction, uh, takes off.

NARRATOR: But you're not taking off

in a doom buggy this time.

GREG:

That ride system is a free-range vehicle.

And you're in a scene, moving around

in ways that you don't even know

which direction you're gonna go next.

ALEX: With the trackless system,

it gives the design team

lots of flexibility.

NARRATOR:

Now, as for that design team, well,

they faced many challenges

for this new attraction.

The trickiest among them

-The music dust.

-NARRATOR: Yeah, music dust

Comes out of the box and it starts

affecting everything that it touches

as you travel through the museum.

NARRATOR: Gee, that sounds complicated.

That is a tough ask.

And we worked for about a year

to figure out a way

to do magical floating dust

that flies around a room.

I think what we came up with,

and what the team came up with,

is is pretty amazing.

NARRATOR: So that's the "dust" part

of "musical dust" figured out.

As for the "music" part?

They went to someone

whose talents are renowned

-far and wide.

-far and wide.

NARRATOR: Danny Elfman

who, among many other things,

wrote the music and lyrics

for Tim Burton's

The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Going to Disneyland, The Haunted Mansion

was my favorite ride.

So being asked to participate

in something like this that could become,

uh, iconic for several generations,

I couldn't imagine not wanting to do it.

Hearing that Danny Elfman

was going to do the soundtrack,

uh, I was very excited about that.

NARRATOR:

Well, if you're excited about that

you should see how both Anaheim

and Tokyo Haunted Mansions

celebrate the magic of the holiday season.

"The Nightmare Before Christmas" overlay,

it's really one of the most

popular attractions that we do.

GREG: We had to put FastPass machines

in Japan for Haunted Mansion

because they were having waits

of up to four hours long

because of this enhancement

that we would do

during the Halloween

and Christmas seasons.

NARRATOR: The Haunted Mansion

is an iconic Disneyland attraction,

and "The Nightmare Before Christmas"

overlay is incredibly popular.

But there’s an understanding, and that is,

come January, the Christmas decorations

go back in the cupboard

and random storage boxes.

MAN 4: Out! Let me out of here!

NARRATOR: And the house is returned

to normal for another year because

If they're classic and still effective,

there's no reason at all to update it.

NARRATOR: An idea that, in many ways,

goes against the very promise Walt made

when Disneyland first opened.

There will always be something

new and unusual.

NARRATOR:

And it left today's Imagineers wondering,

what would the greats have done?

How would Yale Gracey update

his illusions for today?

Or, as Walt would say, "Plussed it up."

NARRATOR: Would he improve things?

Create new things?

Wouldn't it be wonderful

if a disembodied Madame Leota

could fly around the Séance Room

in ways that just baffle guests?

You come into the scene,

you go all the way around her.

DANIEL: There's no chance for you to say,

"Well, obviously, they did it this way,

'cause this was hidden."

No, we show you every single thing

that's up our sleeve.

NARRATOR: Or perhaps, finally fix things

that never really quite worked

in the first place.

I kind of had the eureka moment.

NARRATOR:

Daniel Joseph's golden idea was

Bringing back the Hatbox Ghost

to The Haunted Mansion in Anaheim.

NARRATOR: Good idea!

The Hatbox Ghost was something

that I loved since I was, like, ten.

NARRATOR: It was a project Daniel Joseph

seemed destined to complete,

and the funny thing was, he already had

in his spare time!

I built a mock-up prototype

of this thing in my garage.

NARRATOR: Just for fun.

I do it after work.

Sometimes I do it at lunch.

NARRATOR: With the utmost respect

for his idol, Yale Gracey,

Daniel Joseph tinkered.

I took his original design

and concept of how to do it

and pitched it to people

in the office up in Imagineering.

NARRATOR: And so, with

Utmost secrecy

We got moved to this very dark room.

NARRATOR: And under the expert eye

of Daniel Joseph

"Now, watch this."

VICTORIA: Even though I knew

how the mechanism was supposed to work

(laughs)

it completely blew me away.

NARRATOR: Thanks to the admiration

and dedication of Daniel Joseph

Daniel Joseph is a wizard.

the Hatbox Ghost's status

as the great, unfinished work

of the master Imagineer Yale Gracey

was now complete.

Daniel understands

the simplicity of things

and how simple effects are created,

and I know his mentor/idol, Yale Gracey

was of the same meld.

NARRATOR: In a passing of the torch,

or perhaps moving of the head

Daniel Joseph now continues the work

of the great, enigmatic man.

DANIEL: Yale Gracey, I feel like,

is as much of a myth

within the Walt Disney Company,

almost, as the Hatbox Ghost

because he was a man of few words,

uh, extremely humble and passed away

at a very young age.

NARRATOR: We'll never know

what Yale himself would've thought, but

I think Yale, I'd like to say,

he would dig it.

NARRATOR: Well, Daniel Joseph,

hats off to you.

And to all the Imagineers

who played their part in coming together

to create one of the greatest

theme park attractions of all time.

The Haunted Mansion is amazing

for the attraction that it is,

given the number of hands

that were competing

for creative leadership on it.

NARRATOR: Yale Gracey

If you take all the illusions

out of The Haunted Mansion

that Yale designed,

it'd be dead as a post.

NARRATOR: Xavier Atencio

All the credit for the success

of the Haunted Mansion,

story-wise, should go to X.

NARRATOR: Marc Davis

So many of his amazing gags

are seen throughout The Mansion.

and his creative opposite,

Claude Coats.

ORLANDO: Claude was a great artist.

He was very opinionated.

He knew what he had to do,

but he would always listen.

He was amazing.

NARRATOR: And of course,

the prankster himself, Rolly Crump.

Rolly Crump is definitely a fan favorite.

Roland.

He gave us that twisted vibe

for The Haunted Mansion.

When you see a Rolly Crump drawing,

you know that it's a Rolly Crump drawing.

We're gonna have man-eating plants

and we're gonna have a coffin clock here

that we're working on right now.

Museum of the Weird.

NARRATOR: And although Rolly's Museum

of the Weird never actually happened

His style was able

to contribute to that

that weird vibe of The Haunted Mansion.

YOUNG ROLLY: These are just things

I collected from all over the world.

Just the weirdest things we could find.

He was Tim Burton before Tim Burton,

if you will.

NARRATOR: Rolly's unique perspective

led to a long career

as one of the premiere theme park

attraction artists in the world.

DORIS: He was such a great boss,

because if I would be off track,

he wouldn't say, "Well, that was dumb."

He would just say, "Oh, okay,

I didn't think of it that way."

Because I think Walt did that for him,

so he kind of passed that on.

We were a family. And after Walt

had passed away, his brother, Roy,

who I had never met,

came up to me, he said,

"Are you Rolly Crump?"

And I said, "Yes, I am."

He said, "I want you to know

my brother used to talk about you."

That's a part you know. It's hard.

(whimpers)

That's what kind of a guy he was.

He was a sweetheart.

We're also collecting real ghosts

to bring in here.

You believe in ghosts, don't you, Julie?

NARRATOR: As one of the first

major attractions completed

after Walt's death,

the success that these Imagineers

had proved that Disneyland could endure

with Walt's vision at its heart,

-whether it was

-Funny.

-or

-Scary.

I'm not scared. I'm not scared.

(screams)

(laughs)

NARRATOR: Whatever word best describes

Haunted Mansion for you

Dark and sinister.

The funniest thing ever.

NARRATOR: Yep, all those things!

There is no doubt that,

either through sheer luck

or a team of individuals

at the top of their game

It's pretty hard to look at an old movie

from 50 years ago and say,

"I don't know how they did that."

DANIEL: That's what The Mansion

is still doing today.

NARRATOR:

And this Imagineering masterpiece

has been not just a fan favorite,

but an inspiration to all those

who know what's behind the curtain.

And when I'm down at any of our parks,

if I have a break,

I wanna go to Haunted Mansion

and ride Haunted Mansion.

I still love it.

It's still just as magical

as the first time I rode it. I love it.

NARRATOR: Be it the original

or any of the mansions around the world,

The Haunted Mansion is,

without question

It's magic.

GHOST: Beware of hitchhiking ghosts.

(laughs)

NARRATOR: And maybe magic is exactly

how Walt wanted it in the first place.

(laughs)

(spooky music)