The Unauthorized Story of Walt Disney's Haunted Mansion

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The Unauthorized Story of Walt Disney's Haunted Mansion Page 13

by Jeff Baham


  With WDI’s 2007 “re-haunting” of Walt Disney World’s attraction, a completely new area was added which isn’t found in any other Haunted Mansion. A strange space has been created that appears to contain staircases and doorways to other dimensions. A maze of various carpeted Escher-esque staircases lead to and fro through the air, some of which seem to turn and defy gravity, with doorways and candleabrum posed upside-down, as glowing ghostly footprints (in a nod to some early Ken Anderson concepts which included the same footstep effect) travel up and down the staircases before fading away.

  After passing the bizarre intertwined staircases, guests find themselves being stared at by a forest of glowing, blinking eyes. As the ambient light grows slightly, visitors suddenly realize that the blinking eyes belong to the demons trapped in the pattern of the corridor wallpaper, which was designed by Claude Coats utilizing Rolly Crump’s sketches.

  Turning a corner, the carriages pass a rattling suit of armor as they turn to face a seemingly endless hallway. Midway to the horizon, a candelabrum can be seen floating lazily up and down in midair, an effect created simply by hanging the prop from thin cables which control the motion, and by masking the set (which seems endless because of full-length mirrors at the end of the hall that reflect the scene back toward the viewer) with simulated haze, created by hanging a very thin scrim a few feet in front of the candelabrum across the entire hallway. The Doom Buggies are integral to the success of effects such as this throughout the Haunted Mansion, because they precisely control the patron’s viewing angle and the length of time the guest will spend viewing each set. In this sense, the Omnimover system is almost cinematic in its control over the viewer’s perception of the attraction, as it only presents what the director wishes for the viewer to see. Each Doom Buggy can rotate on both the vertical and horizontal axis, allowing the vehicle to tilt back while it moves up and down, and to turn left and right to face any direction the set designer wishes.

  “We did a lot of conceptual work ahead of time, but there were times when we just went down there and took a look at what they were building,” recalled Marc Davis. “When Bob Gurr…came up with the Omnimover cars, that helped a lot, because here you had a car that pointed you at the right place at the right time.” [10]

  “We find it delightfully unlivable here in our ghostly retreat,” the Ghost Host says as the Doom Buggies continue into the murky depths. “Every room has wall-to-wall creeps, and hot and cold running chills!” Moving deeper into the Haunted Mansion, the carriages turn to face an old conservatory that contains many types of exotic plants and flowers, all withered or rotting away. Two large decomposing wreaths are also on display, positioned on either side of a coffin that contains a restless inhabitant. A large black raven caws incessantly from atop one of the wreaths as the coffin’s tenant tries to force his way out by pushing up on the nailed-down coffin lid from within. “All our ghosts have been ‘dying’ to meet you. This one can hardly contain himself,” the Ghost Host quips, as muffled cries of “Let me out of here!” can be heard emanating from the rattling coffin. (This part of the Ghost Host’s narration has come and gone over the years, though it is apparently excised for good.) The eerie, green-skinned hands coming from within the coffin and the raven are two of the many robotic beings that inhabit the attraction, the raven being a remnant of X. Atencio’s original script for the ride. As we noted earlier, Atencio intended the raven to act as a sort of feathered spirit guide in the attraction, but as it exists, it becomes a bit of a jester, jeering you on as you journey through the Haunted Mansion, appearing again in the seance circle, against the back wall of the ballroom, and in the graveyard.

  This short-lived Phantom of the Opera character haunting Disneyland’s Main Street was also briefly considered for a possible live-action resident of the Haunted Mansion. Photograph from the collection of Jeff Baham.

  Let’s take a brief tangent. In the 1980s, Imagineering tossed around a few ideas for adding an element of unpredictability into the Haunted Mansion, in an effort to keep the attraction on the spooky side of the tracks. So Cast Member Joe Dagostino was one of a select few chosen to portray a physical character inside of the attraction—a live-action knight in armor. He recalled:

  I was a character that played the Knight in the Mansion in 1985. The role was originated through the Disneyland Entertainment division and pioneered through a gentleman named David Mink. For the first year, he was the only character authorized to be the Knight. [11]

  After this trial period, others were allowed that character, but only after a training session and test. The character was so popular that at one time there were two knights on duty, one relieving the other after a thirty-minute shift. The costume only had a front side to it. You had to be dressed in tights and a plastic breast plate, and thigh pads and elbow joints went over this. This meant that your back was exposed to the elements, and it was very hard to be frightening while dressed head to toe in tights with a chilled breeze going up your backside!

  Originally we were armed with a six-foot battle axe. We were supposed to slam this on the floor to add to the guests’ experience, but other creative uses soon popped up. Hooking it around the Doom Buggy before the car swung around to reveal you to the guest was a popular move, as was slamming it on the back of the car. Needless to say, we were soon disarmed for safety sake. Some of my best shifts were as the Knight in the Haunted Mansion, and the character was so popular that there was talk about adding a live-character groom in the attic. The costume was even designed and produced, but both characters were discontinued before anything happened.

  Another Cast Member who took on the role of the Knight was Kyle Clark. “The idea of dressing up as a knight in armor and scaring people was, at that time of my life, too much fun to behold,” Clark recalled. “I could cause people to scream, cry, laugh and jump from their seat. But the job also had its problems. I can remember a fellow Knight having his nose broken by an overly frightened female cheerleader. He got too close, touched her, and she promptly punched him square in the face.” The close quarters inside the Haunted Mansion where the Knight was stationed—between the conservatory scene and the corridor of doors—probably led to a lot of sticky situations. “This created a new rule in the character department—to stay at least six feet from the guests and to never touch them. Later, other rules included not scaring senior citizens and young children. I can only imagine why those rules were implemented,” Clark said.

  After sixteen years of operating day by day without human characters, the sight of the Knight must have been a shock to many guests. “Even the long time patrons of Disneyland were not aware of what they were about to encounter,” Clark said. “This made for some very interesting sights and sounds. During my time spent in the hallway, I was witness to the best and worst of human behavior. I received many compliments…but at the same time, I witnessed drug use, vandalism, and several ‘make out’ sessions featuring topless women—you should see the look on a girl’s face when a knight tells her to put her clothes back on.”

  Cast Member Graydon Van Ert, who also performed as the Knight, shared some more recollections. “Playing the Knight was both one of the coolest and one of the most disturbing things in characters,” he said. “Sitting on break behind the wall was disconcerting. You would always hear noises and sounds you swore you hadn’t heard before, and some days you didn’t feel as if you were alone. Also—behind the doors you could hear, repeatedly and very clearly, one of the voices saying, over and over, ‘Ohhhh…let me out of here!’” Van Ert also mentioned that the supervisors were fond of “sneaking in while you were out on set and waiting in the little hallway between the corridor and the break area to scare you when you walked off set.”

  Van Ert recalled some other characters that might have been. “The Character Department had also tested a phantom character in the transition hall to the attic and in the attic, but lighting in the transition hall and space in the attic was an issue,” Van Ert said. “The idea of a spe
cter in the Graveyard had also been mentioned, but never tested.”

  Media consultant Tim O’Day, who worked with Disneyland at the time, credits the original idea of the live-action Knight to Randy Bright. “Mr. ‘Scary Knight’ only lasted a year or two due to complaints at City Hall about the Haunted Mansion now being too scary!” O’Day recalled. “We also re-instated the Phantom of the Opera briefly in the Main Street Cinema—lasted less time than the Knight.” [12]

  Leaving the conservatory and continuing through the halls of the Haunted Mansion, the patrons are carried down a corridor of many doors, all of which seem to be barely restraining the restless spirits trying to break through. Eerie sounds, screeches, and howls emanate from behind each door, while bronze knockers and door handles are rattled wildly by unseen forces. “Unfortunately, they all seem to have trouble getting through,” the Ghost Host notes ominously. Freakish family portraits of skull-like visages cover the walls, which are papered with Coats’s repeating pattern of stylized demonic eyes and heads. Most of these portraits are photographs of heads that were sculpted by Imagineer Blaine Gibson for use in the Haunted Mansion as Audio-Animatronic characters. Often, guests riding through the corridor can’t tell if the portraits are photographic or not; the characters certainly appear to be real, though their decrepit features are strange enough to give viewers pause. Gibson described his challenge this way:

  When we were in the territory of a cartoon, my main job was to keep them believable. I definitely respected Marc Davis’s ideas, and even the poses and things like that were very important. But sometimes on the heads, we’d do something to maintain the believability that there was a real skull, even though we’d add some exaggerations. Walt wanted everything believable, no matter how broad the cartoon was. [13]

  Cold air is piped in and blown at the Doom Buggies to create an eerie chill. The carriages then spin past a large needlepoint sampler reading “Tomb Sweet Tomb,” and a grandfather clock in the corner solemnly starts to toll to the hour of…thirteen?

  The Corridor of Doors scene is one that wears its influences on its sleeve. The effects, scenery, and even the wallpaper echo similar scenes in The Haunting , the 1963 film by Robert Wise starring Julie Harris and Claire Bloom to which we have referred earlier. The WED Imagineers were especially taken with the way that the film turned the house into a living, breathing character, and incorporated that concept into their designs for the Haunted Mansion. The chill of cold air was also an effect that played a significant part in The Haunting , though it was more of an after-thought in the ride. Imagineer Paul Saunders added it to solve a problem that was vexing his supervisor, Vic Green. “Vic was kind of disappointed in the Omnimover going sideways looking down that hallway, and he said, what can we do there?” Saunders recalled. “So I said, ‘Let’s put an air conditioner with a pipe coming down to blow cold air down their necks. That ought to give them something to talk about!’” [14]

  One internal Disneyland document also refers to “Clock Hall” as being an independent room of the attraction, though it is really a quick turn and short space that separates the corridor of doors from the next scene to come. A simple device projects a constantly grasping claw over the wall and face of the clock, indicating that an unseen presence is trying to break through into the realm of the living—and it’s reaching out for you, in a cinematic style that brings F. W. Murnau’s 1922 film Nosferatu to mind. As the Story and Song album’s Ghost Host indicates at this point in the ride, it might be best “not to betray your presence by screaming.” “You have a very active imagination,” the Ghost Host notes. “That’s good...”

  Dust to Dust

  When it comes to eternal resting places, can you do better than to take up residence in the Haunted Mansion? After all, while the attraction was being built, Walt himself said “We’re out collecting the ghosts, and we want to make it very attractive to them, so we’re putting in wall-to-wall cobwebs, and we guarantee them creaking doors, and creaking floors.” What self-respecting spook would pass up that opportunity?

  Some foolish mortals try their best to join in the ghostly fun. From time to time, stories of human ashes being spread throughout the Haunted Mansion attractions make their way through the rumor mill. The Disney Company typically stays mum or says the stories are not true, though the leaked details often have an air of authenticity.

  On May 15, 2009, a case of spilled human remains was reported at the Walt Disney World Haunted Mansion in the Magic Kingdom. According to inside sources, EMTs from Reedy Creek and specialized Disney custodians worked for two-and-a-half hours to clean the ashes out of the attraction, where they were spread along the Doom Buggy track.

  The spreading of cremated human remains is not unusual at Disney parks, despite official denials. Disneyland has had numerous cases of ashes being spread in various attractions, though most commonly the Haunted Mansion. Some of these true-life stories give way to legends told by Haunted Mansion Cast Members to each other and to the public. In one such tale, the ashes surreptitiously spread were supposedly those of a young boy, who can still be seen from time to time crying at the exit of the attraction, at least according to the “friends of friends” who have reportedly seen him.

  At any rate, Disney steadfastly refuses to confirm that the ashes found are human. But as sure as X. Atencio’s Grim Grinning Ghosts will continue to come out and socialize, mortals will continue to try to gain residence in the Haunted Mansion in any way possible.

  Chapter Nine

  Act Two—Sympathetic Vibrations

  “Perhaps Madame Leota can establish contact,” the Ghost Host decides. “She has a remarkable head for materializing…the disembodied!” As the Ghost Host is speaking, the Doom Buggies make their way into a dim parlor and take their place around a large seance circle. Throughout the room, ghostly musical instruments and other objects float in response to the supplications of Madame Leota, a glowing, chanting head, speaking from within a misty crystal ball planted on the center of a thick, ornate table covered with Tarot cards and symbols of the supernatural. Perched behind her on a large gilded chair is the raven we first met in the conservatory, flapping its wings in response to the eerie occurrences taking place. As Leota chants, the instruments respond one by one with otherworldly charm, and a mysterious, ectoplasmic vapor in the corner of the room winds around like a serpent with a fading tail, occasionally seeming to materialize into an eerily familiar visage before vanishing into a wisp again.

  The floating objects are illuminated dimly with black lighting, which causes them to glow and limits the amount of illumination on the black cables supporting them. They are attached to a simple motor-driven lift mechanism that rotates slowly, causing the props to seem to float up and down, slowly and mysteriously. The mysterious “ectoplasm” is an interesting effect which is also motor-driven, and activated by a light on the tip of the mechanism. This contraption is positioned behind a semi-opaque portion of the wall, which is coated with phosphorescent dye. When the small yet intense point of light passes directly behind the wall, it activates the phosphorescence, which glows through the wall and is visible to the patrons in the Doom Buggies. As is the case with all light-activated phosphorescent materials (such as a typical “glow-in-the-dark” toy), the phosphorescence quickly fades, leaving a faint tail trailing the moving point of light.

  Leota chants:

  Serpents and spiders, tail of a rat…call in the spirits, wherever they’re at! Rap on a table, it’s time to respond…send us a message from some where beyond! Goblins and ghoulies from last Hallowe’en…awaken the spirits with your tambourine! Creepies and crawlies, toads in a pond…let there be music, from regions beyond! Wizards and witches, wherever you dwell…give us a hint, by ringing a bell!

  The animation of Madame Leota’s face is the first truly magical effect in the Haunted Mansion achievable only through technology. Leota's chanting visage is a projection of a real human face, filmed while speaking the lines. Originally, designer Harriet Burns—t
he first female hired to work at WED Imagineering—was tapped to perform as the face of Leota, and was even filmed by Yale Gracey as a test, according to Disney historian Scott Wolf. However, her facial features were too delicate for the dramatic role, so the job went to Leota Toombs. Toombs, who was working for Burns at WED at the time of the Haunted Mansion's development, had been using her own costuming and modeling skills on other attractions such as It’s a Small World and Pirates of the Caribbean. Toombs also took a shot at recording the audio for the scene as well, but the Imagineers were looking for something a little darker and more threatening, so they turned to one of their more wicked voice talents, Eleanor Audley. Audley is pure villainess, having previously voiced the evil characters Maleficent (for Sleeping Beauty ) and Lady Tremaine (the stepmother from Cinderella ). Audley gives Madame Leota a dark menace, while Toombs provides a striking, grim visual. With the natural glow that comes along with the projection process, the effect is quite eerie.

 

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