Costumed characters have come a long way since 1955. In the 60 years since Disneyland opened, the parks have gone from rented costumes at special events to characters having specially built meet and greet rooms, FastPasses, and hour long lines. Not only have the characters’ looks and costumes changed throughout the years, but the interest of meeting and taking pictures with the characters has drastically changed as well. So let’s explore the evolution of character meet and greets through the years, from Disneyland’s opening day to today, and take a look at what we can expect in the future.
Pre-Disneyland
Image: Disney
One of the first official public appearances of costumed Disney characters happened on December 21, 1937 at the star-studded Hollywood premiere of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.” Among celebrities like Shirley Temple and Cary Grant were the first costumed versions of Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, and, of course, the Dwarfs. You can see them in the film reel below:
These costumes were crude and fairly basic. The Mickey, Minnie, and Donald costumes included a full body suit with a pointed sack head with painted eyes and mouths. Donald also a large beak for a mouth. The Dwarfs were more life-like than Mickey, Minnie, and Donald and were three dimensional, especially around their eyes, mouths, and cheeks and included real, full beards. While these characters interacted with celebrities and audience members, their appearance was far from traditional meet and greets as we know them today.
Image: Disney
A few years later, the Ice Capades was founded and became a hit. The touring show involved former Olympic and US National Champion skaters and the routines featured popular music and characters. In 1950 the show included a segment called “Walt Disney’s Toy Shop” that included skaters in Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto, Dumbo, and Pinocchio costumes. These costumes, like the Snow White premiere costumes, were also basic, although to their credit they had to be designed in a way that allowed the ice skater to have enough free movement to skate properly. The heads were made of mesh so they could be light and so it could give the performers the best visibility (especially since ice skaters need to be very aware of their surroundings). Oddly enough, the Dumbo and Pluto costumes appeared have four legs, meaning that there were two skaters in each costume. The Ice Capades continued to present show segments with Disney characters, including shows in 1951 and 1952 which included characters from new Disney films such as Alice and Wonderland and Cinderella, respectfully.
Disneyland’s opening and early years
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Disneyland opened for previews on July 17, 1955. The opening day was televised on ABC and included thousands of guests, a ton of celebrities, and a parade. However, there were no characters. Well, at first anyway. For whatever reason, it didn’t appear that Walt wanted characters in his park. But with a large live and televised audience, he decided that he needed to add some to the parade. Not only would it better represent the Disney brand, but he knew some of the guests would want to meet the characters and shake their hands. Since the Ice Capades had the only character costumes at the time, they were rented just for the opening day. Besides Mickey and Minnie, other costumed characters like Chip, Dale, Peter Pan, Wendy, Alice, Cinderella, Aurora, and Snow White attended. Although they did at least somewhat resemble the famous animated characters, Walt was not happy. Their heads were oddly shaped, their heights were off, and their bodied looked more like a person in tights rather than a mouse or a duck. For the next few years, he had various Imagineers and animators tinker with new designs and costumes that more closely resembled his characters.
Throughout the 50’s the character costumes evolved. Not only were they getting closer to resembling the actual characters, but they were made to better accommodate the performers inside of them. One of the Imagineers tasked with designing the new costumes Disney legend Bill Justice. Justice joined The Walt Disney Studios in 1937 as an animator where he worked on classics like Fantasia, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan. After directing some animated shorts and stop motion segments for live-action films, he was invited by Walt Disney himself to be an Imagineer. Once in Disneyland, he was responsible for programming Audio-Animatronic figures, specifically for guest favorites like Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted Mansion, and Country Bear Jamboree.
Both Disney and Justice’s first priority was the safety of the Cast Members in the costumes. The original costumes could be heavy, which was especially challenging in the hot California sun. The second priority was to get the costumed characters look as close as possible to their animated counterparts. Justice’s first thirty-five characters premiered in the park in 1961. The arrival of the characters was announced in park advertisements, promising guests the chance to finally meet their favorite characters in person.
Image: Disney
These new costumes had one very striking feature – their large heads. They were so large it appeared that the character’s head covered the performers up to their waists. In fact, many of the characters wore tall hats, giving the performer even more room. You can see the mesh piece where the performers would see out of below. Because of this, most of the character’s arms hung limply by their sides, unable to shake guest’s hands or sign autographs. Minnie’s hands were made of wire so she could always hold a parasol. And while the costumes were not proportional, they at least better resembled the characters. In fact, the costumes had an almost comic strip-type style. But to Walt, they still weren’t perfect.
Image: Disney
The 1964 “Fantasy on Parade” introduced guests to a new version of the characters, and this time the Imagineers hit the mark. Mickey had a normal proportioned head and the performer had the use of his or her arms back. Not only did Mickey look like himself, but he could now freely walk around the park, waving and shaking hands.
Image: Disney
This brought up another topic – now that Disney had good looking characters and costumes that allowed performers to move, what would they do with them? Of course, they were in the parades, but now they could also meet the guests. This was the start of what is considered the “roaming characters” era. While the performers would come into work with a schedule, the character’s schedule was never announced to the guests. To them, the characters would pop up at seemingly random times in random places to meet the guests. And while the character’s appearance drew a small crowd, it appears that guests wouldn’t linger for long. They would go up and shake the character’s hand, perhaps pause for a quick photo, and move along. It appears guests of this era enjoyed simply watching the character rather than interacting much with them.
Walt Disney World’s early years
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Walt Disney World opened on October 1, 1971 with one park, Magic Kingdom, and two resorts, the Contemporary Resort Hotel and the Polynesian Village Resort. Its opening day ceremony, like Disneyland’s, included celebrities, parades, and, of course, characters that included the “Fab Five” (aka, Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto, and Goofy) as well as characters from Alice in Wonderland, Song of the South, Bambi, The Three Little Pigs, The Jungle Book, and more.
Disney World kept its character interactions close to what Disneyland previously established. There were daily parades that included the characters as well as live musicians. The characters were also available to meet in the parks, although they, like Disneyland, would pop up randomly without an announced schedule. And for many years, in both parks, the model remained unchanged.
When EPCOT Center opened on October 1, 1982, it threw designers and Imagineers through a loop, character-wise at least. It was thought that since EPCOT would be about showcasing the world and introducing guests to the future, they wouldn’t be interested in meeting characters.After all, why would someone want to meet Mickey when they were learning about the history of automobiles or sipping on European wines? They also thought that just seeing the characters would destroy the theming. Thus, it is incredibly hard to find any evidence of Disney characters at EPCOT’s opening ceremony or during its first few years of operation. The closest we get was a series of “it’s a small world” inspired doll characters, who are dressed in costumes and outfits from around the world.
For a few years, the only established character that could be found in the park was fan-favorite Dreamfinder from the Journey Into Imagination dark ride. Along with his purple dragon friend, Figment, Dreamfinder would often meet guests and sign their autograph books around Future World. Dreamfinder could be found around Epcot up until the mid or late 1990’s.
Slowly, Epcot realized that when people visited Disney World, they wanted to meet their favorite Disney characters. Starting in the 1980’s, various classic Disney characters would roam around the park. In Future World, you may have been able to find them in their “future” space-age clothes, while around World Showcase they wore outfits representing various cultures. In fact, you can find old photos of Chip and Dale wearing straw Chinese hats, Pluto wearing a Mexican sombrero and poncho, Goofy in a Scottish kilt, Minnie in a Japanese kimono, and Mickey in an American Revolution-era suit and hat.
It’s wasn’t long before other characters started roaming around Epcot. While the original plan for Epcot was to have the park based in reality without fantasy characters and creatures, didn’t it make sense to see Alice wander through the gardens in the UK as well as Belle and the Beast explore the streets of France? Not only did these appearances give guests the character interactions they craved, but it added a sense of life to the pavilions, along with the traditional dancers and musicians previously seen in World Showcase.
Like the early years of Disney, the 1980’s and 1990’s continued the tradition of random character appearances, although they were now occasionally mentioned in park guides. The characters rarely had set lines, and although guests might organize themselves into a line for a quick picture, the characters, for the most part, we free to walk around. However, as the years changed, so did technology, and character interactions were about to change forever.
The invention of the digital camera
Image: brett jordan, Flickr (license)
Older Disney guests may remember the 2000’s had a shift in character interactions. Maps now featured keys and icons pointing out where guests can find a character. A entertainment guide from Disney California Adventure in 2001 lists specific characters meeting in specific locations and times. Slowly, every character was soon assigned a meeting location and a set schedule. But why?
The answer – the rise of the digital camera. The first digital camera was built 1975 by Kodak, but it was eight pound prototype that took only black and white images. Since then, digital cameras evolved. The first consumer camera (or at least, the first one sold under $1,000) was the 1994 Apple QuickTake 100 and was followed by other clunky and expensive cameras. However, the first popular digital camera was the 1997 Sony Digital Mavica MVC-FD5/FD7. This camera let photographers take the memory card out of their camera to put directly into their computers. Another great invention? The 1999 Kyocera VP-210, the first camera inside of a phone! Throughout the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, digital cameras became less expensive and less bulky, but with more memory and battery life.
More pictures = more character demand
Image: Disney
But how can a camera affect when and where Mickey Mouse takes a picture? Well, back in the “old times” one role of film would hold 20-40 exposures, or photos. While guests visiting Disney would most likely bring more than one roll of film, or would be willing to buy more in the parks, the fact is that there was limit on the amount of photos people would take on their vacation. So if they were strolling along Main Street, USA and saw Mary Poppins roaming around, they may stop, say hello, take a group photo, and move along. After all, they may only have 35 exposures left in their camera for the day, and families who traveled on budgets had to be conscious of the amount of money they were willing to spend on film.
While the earliest digital cameras stored about as many photos as an average film camera, soon they could hold hundreds, then thousands of photos. And if someone took a photo they didn’t like, it was easy to delete it and get more memory space. People were no longer limited by the amount of photos they could take, and this opened up vacationers to many more photographic options – now people could take as many photos as they like without “wasting” anything.
So now when a family wants to take pictures with Mickey Mouse, they’re not going to take just one photo and move on. No, now they have the option of taking a group picture, a bunch of individual pictures, and a picture with just the kids or just the adults. They can afford to take a dozen photos in less than a minute. And now with nearly everyone over the age of thirteen connected to the internet via social media, they certainly need to take a selfie or two for their Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter pages. So now instead of someone casually passing by a character, perhaps stopping to say hello and asking for a quick picture, people tend to demand multiple photos. In today’s world of social media and sharing, vacation pictures are no longer developed weeks later and stored in a picture album. Now people like to instantly share vacation pictures as they are taken, showing their friends and family what they are doing in real time. And with today’s “pic or it didn’t happen” mentality, people need photos to show their friends exactly what they are doing the moment it happens.
Roaming characters fade into the past
With people’s demand for photos, the “roaming” character method started to become a bit chaotic. The characters looked as if they are being surrounded by paparazzi, with people crowding them on all sides looking for a photo. In fact, once they met the character, there is a surprised lack of actual interaction. While people do, and always will, want a hug or handshake from a character, a large portion of people just want the photo, and after a quick hello they look towards the camera, take a picture, and walk away, barely making eye contact with the character.
As of now, a majority of characters have designated meeting areas. And while some may miss the spontaneity of running into their favorite character on the street, Disney has worked hard to ensure that the new queued system of meeting characters is just as exciting.
Today even waiting in line to meet the characters have become an experience. Take Tinkerbell’s new meeting location at Magic Kingdom in the Town Square Theater. Instead of waiting in a boring line, guests now get to “shrink” down to Tinkerbell’s size, complete with glittering, sparkling walls. Like her previous meet and greet location in Adventureland, the meeting space consists of larger than life objects like teacups and crayons, making the guest feel like they are as small as a fairy. Both meeting spaces were carefully designed by Imagineers to emulate the theme of the films’ setting, much different than the plain walls in previous character meeting locations.
Image: Disney
Speaking of special meet and greet locations, Disney has specifically created locations to meet characters with the same time, effort, and money as they would for new attractions. In 2012, Disney World closed Snow White’s Scary Adventures in Magic Kingdom, replacing the location in 2013 with Princess Fairy Tale Hall, a meet and greet location that hosts four princesses at once. Also in 2013, Adventures Outpost, a Mickey and Minnie Mouse meeting area, opened in Disney’s Animal Kingdom, replacing a gift shop called Beastly Bazaar. Although this was probably done because their previous meeting locations, located in Camp Minnie Mickey, was soon to be closed to make way for the new Avatar expansion, it is unusual considering a money making gift shop was closed for a character meeting location. And, of course, a section of the Norway pavilion in Epcot is currently being modified to create a meet and greet area for Anna and Elsa.
While not technically a costumed character, one of Disney’s first attempts at creating a new character experience was Turtle Talk with Crush in Epcot. Built in 2004, the attraction allows guests to talk to Crush the sea turtle from Finding Nemo. Not only does Crush talk, he greets guests by name and answers their questions. The attraction was instantly a hit and was built in Disney California Adventure, Hong Kong Disneyland, and Tokyo DisneySea. Another similar attraction is the Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor in Magic Kingdom. While guests don’t interact with the characters as much as they do in Turtle Talk, they do get to be involved in an interactive comedy show, where various audience members get a part in making the show unique. Both attractions use innovative technology to make the guests feel as if they are directly communicating with the animated characters, something that was never done before.
Image: Disney
And when discussing new technology, we of course have to mention Magic Words with Mickey, also known as “Talking Mickey,” located in the Town Square Theater in Magic Kingdom. The meet and greet started tests in 2011 in both Disneyland and Disney World but it wasn’t until 2013 when his Town Square Theater location became home to talking Mickey full-time. Now Mickey can chat with guests, ask them for a photo, tell jokes, and sing. Although Mickey’s vocabulary is limited (for example, he doesn’t say names) it is the first time a traditionally “furry” character has been given a voice.
Another addition to the character meeting experience is FastPass. As of November 2015 seven Walt Disney World and one Disneyland character meet and greets have FastPass lines, with Disneyland’s Anna and Elsa’s Royal Welcome meet and greet requiring a FastPass for entry. Long lines for Anna and Elsa have been the norm since Frozen opened in late 2013, with advanced FastPass+ reservations “selling” out weeks in advance.
Image: HarshLight, Flickr (license)
While guests are used to hour long lines for rides like Soarin’ and Toy Story Mania, now guests have to choose if they rather spend that time waiting for a meet and greet. These long lines seem to be most common during special events like Star Wars Weekends or Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party where rare characters make appearances. In fact, Jack Skellington and Sally’s first Florida meet and greet in Downtown Disney back in 2012 had a three hour line while Hollywood Studio’s Unleash the Villains: Friday the 13th Fun event in 2013 caused similar lines (and more chaos) when ultra-rare villains like Oogie Boogie (The Nightmare Before Christmas) and Bowler Hat Guy (Meet the Robinsons) also met guests.
The future
Image: Disney
Today we have less roaming characters, more lines, cool technology, and FastPasses. What’s next? With the popularity of Magic Words with Mickey, it wouldn’t be surprising if the technology moved to other Disney parks with more characters. But with new technology comes new problems, and lines might be longer as character interactions go “101” and break down. A good example is the Baymax meet and greet, which suffered from technology issues during the two years it was at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and was ultimately retired in 2015.
It’s clear that guests are willing to spend as much of their time waiting for character interactions as they do for rides, so perhaps Imagineers will continue dedicating just as much time to character locations as they do to attractions. In fact, the newest attraction announcement out of Disney’s Hollywood Studios is Club Villain, a upcharge event where guests can dine, drink, and dance with their favorite villains. Spending extra money to spend extra time with characters is nothing new (look at all the various character dining and special event offerings) so we can probably look forward to even more premium events.
With today’s changing technology and Disney’s seemingly endless budget, there is a good chance that the characters themselves will change. Perhaps in the future Tinkerbell will really fly or Cinderella will greet each guest by name before they even tell her. With the continuing rise of Pixar fans, maybe we could have more interactions like Turtle Talk with Crush or the Monsters, Inc Laugh Floor, with more animated characters coming to life behind a screen. And with Disney buying more popular franchise brands, perhaps we can see more characters like Darth Vader appear on a daily basis rather than just during special events. In fact, imagine what it would be like to meet the Na’vi people from Avatar once Pandora – The World of Avatar opens in Disney’s Animal Kingdom. While seeing a nine foot tall, bioluminescent talking alien may seem impossible, Imagineers have made more improbable tasks happen.
With cameras, phones, and tablets rapidly evolving, it looks like there will be little change to the current queue line meet and greet model. And while roaming characters have done some recent tests in Magic Kingdom, as of now no permanent meet and greets have been confirmed. But with even the face of vacation planning changing, with people deciding their daily schedules based on advanced FastPass and dining reservations weeks, if not months, in advance, it looks like, as of now, character meet and greets will become more organized and more technologically advanced as time goes on. And while people can always get a hug from their favorite character, the future of character interactions is almost unlimited.
