868 · Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress: History, Debate & What's Next

The Carousel of Progress reimagining announcement sparked one of the most passionate Disney fan conversations in recent memory.

Some fans are excited. Others are heartbroken. Many are somewhere in between.

And all of it makes complete sense - because this attraction isn't just a show. For a lot of us, it's a memory. A person. A moment that lives somewhere deep.

But before you land on how you feel, there's a story you need to hear. One that starts not with the announcement - but in the 1950s, with Walt Disney himself, and an idea that never made it off the drawing board. Because when you understand where Carousel of Progress actually came from, and how many times it has already changed, what Disney just announced looks like something very different.

In Episode 868, we trace the complete history - from Edison Square to the 1964 World's Fair to every revision across six decades - and into every detail of what is coming in 2027. The new scenes. The Walt Disney animatronic. The off-planet finale drawn from John Hench's original concept art. The fan reaction breakdown. And the case, built on Walt's own words, for why the carousel moving again after 30 years might be exactly what he always intended.

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Disney just announced the biggest change in the history of Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress. And Disney fans are having feelings. Some are excited. Some are heartbroken. Some are already calling it a mistake.

Because after more than 30 years, one of Walt Disney World's most beloved attractions is about to become something entirely new. But here's a question I don't think anybody's stopping to ask. Is Disney changing Carousel of Progress or finally doing exactly what Walt intended?

I think the most interesting reaction is the one that holds both grief and excitement at the same time. And when you understand where Carousel of Progress came from, you may see exactly where it's going in a very different way.

Hello, my friend, and welcome to WW Radio, your guide to Disney parks and experiences around the world. I am Lou Mongello, and this is show number 868.

Whether this is your first time listening or you've been with me since the very beginning for more than 20 years, welcome home. Thank you for being here.

Before we dive in, come join the community and conversation over in the WDW Radio Clubhouse over at WDWRadio.com/clubhouse, watch the live show and chat every Wednesday at 7:30pm Eastern on Facebook and YouTube. And sign up for my free weekly email [email protected].

And when you're ready to plan your next Disney trip and to catch Carousel of Progress before it closes, visit my friends over@m MouseFanTravel.com for completely free expert and personalized vacation planning. But for now, sit back, relax, and enjoy this week's episode of the WDW Radio.

You know the song, you probably heard it playing softly in the background as you wandered your way through Tomorrowland, maybe even not even realizing what it was, or maybe you heard it at the beginning of a show that you have been experiencing, like me, since you were a little kid. Or maybe it's just somewhere deep in your memory.

Maybe it's tied to a person or a trip or a time that you spent with family or friends many, many years ago. Hey, look, it might even be on your Spotify. Spotify playlist. But it is a song about tomorrow, and it always has been.

And this past week, Walt Disney World told us exactly what tomorrow is going to look like for one of the most, I think, personal, most historic, most beloved, maybe sometimes quietly, attractions, I think, in the history of Disney parks. The Internet being the Internet, predictably had its feelings. So do I.

And with me today is someone whose passion for Disney and Disney storytelling and theme park history is something that I admired for a very long time. I want to welcome back to the show James Grosch from guide to wdw. James, welcome back.

Lou, thank you so much for having me on. You know, there is a great big beautiful tomorrow not only for the Carousel of Progress, but also now is the time.

Now is the best time to talk about this attraction because it has a history that I think a lot of people don't necessarily realize.

So I'm really excited to dig into that and talk about not only the past of this attraction, but the tomorrow of this attraction in Tomorrowland at Magic Kingdom.

Yeah, man. It has been a wild couple of weeks here in Walt Disney World.

And I think right now, the wildest ride in Walt Disney World is not Big Thunder Mountain, but it's the Internet and all of its feelings about Carousel of Progress. Because there are people who are celebrating this week.

I think there are people who are grieving this week, people being maybe a little dramatic this week, but I think there's also some people who are in the middle trying to figure out how they should feel about it. And I think we can hold all of that today and I think and talk to it about it.

And with respect for all of it, I respect everybody and how they feel about it. And look, you've been on the show before. We've had a lot of time to talk at different events.

And I like that you're here for this one in particular because I think this is not a simple conversation and I very intentionally wanted to wait. When the announcement came out, I didn't really share much, if anything, on social, even in the WWE clubhouse or community in terms of my feelings.

I just sat back and I watched and I listened a lot and I waited because I think this attraction and its legacy and its ties to Walt and its fans deserve a much deeper, thoughtful, richer conversation than just a 15 second angry TikTok rant.

Absolutely. And you know, feelings. There are a lot of big feelings around this attraction.

I think the emotions around this attraction speak to how successful it's been over its 60 plus year history. And, you know, when things change, everyone's going to feel different things. I've felt different things.

My wife has felt different things about Carousel of Progress and the changes that are coming to it. And so I think it's a. And there's a lot of fascinating different things. I've, I've been flooded with comments.

My comment section is the Wildest ride in the Wilderness and it, it spans the gamut, everybody. It has kind of a different take. And it's. I, I think that this is a very important attraction to Magic Kingdom, to Disney parks in general.

And I think that's something that everyone realizes. I think that's what everyone's kind of touching on this wavelength of just like, okay, this is important.

And they're making a massive change, the biggest change in this attraction's history. So they better get it right. That's. I think that everyone's kind of feeling that pressure and I'm sure Imagineering is feeling that pressure too.

It's like the same time, the same way, and the first time that they introduced the Walt Disney animatronic in Disneyland. With great power must also come great responsibility. I'm not sure I would want to be on this project or the, you know what? Put me on Bluey instead.

Because people are so. And look, this speaks volumes about Disney fandom as a whole. How passionate people are about this doesn't exist, James, anywhere else on the planet.

The type of fandom and the way people are so connected to these attractions that maybe they don't go on every time. But you know, I keep calling it sort of the ex, jokingly sort of the ex girl effect.

But when you say that Carousel's changing, you are instantly brought back to memories of going with your parents or Going with grandma or taking your kids for the first time. And when you. When these emotions start to well up, obviously the reaction is sometimes very loud, it's very noisy, sometimes a little bit over.

Dramatic. Like, I think there's a lot of, you know, sort of look at me on TikTok when people are flailing about the ground about carousel progress. But I think.

I think it's to. To your point, I think it's a testament to just how much this place and these attractions and these memories mean to people.

Yeah. So, Lou, you do follow me on TikTok?

Absolutely.

That's what I'm reading.

I thought the tears were much, but it's pod man. I get it.

Yeah. It's a, you know, it's a. It's. There's, you know, it's a charged topic. You know, pun intended.

With the going back to the histories of, like, the dawn of electricity for this attraction, I. Yeah, I think that it's. It. However, I want to be kind of make this. This is a safe space for however anybody feels about this.

I also think, talking about this generational connection that, you know, it's a ride that I went on with my grandmother who has passed. It's a ride that I've taken my kids on. It's a ride that reminds me of my childhood.

I think that connection is so important to understanding where this attraction is going.

Yeah. And I think you're right, too. I think it's, you know, it's okay that we all have. Like, I think this is true for a lot of things in life.

Like, it's okay that we feel different ways about this thing, but hopefully, you know, at the end of the day, it's something that unifies us all around just our love of Disney.

And when that curtain opens for the very first time, no matter where we are today in terms of our feelings, we're happy with what imagineering produces and happy with what this next step, this next sort of turn of the carousel is in the Disney parks. But I want to, you know, and I really want to touch on, and we'll get to it, the emotions and things like that.

But I want to start with the facts because I think there's also been a lot of noise this week, and, you know, again, the Internet, not all of it is entirely accurate. So I want to make sure that we're all working from the same information. And so here's. If you.

If you haven't heard or haven't sort of seen, here's what Disney officially announced.

No specific date as yet. The important part is this is not a closure for routine maintenance. This is a top to bottom reimagining of every single scene in the show.

If you remember, at destination D23 last August, I think Chris Beatty from Imagineering announced that a Walt Audio Animatronic was going to be added to the attraction. That was the news at that time.

What we didn't know then, what we do now is that the Walt scene is just the beginning. Cue the tears. Every single act is being updated to a new time period. Excuse me. We'll obviously go through these more in detail.

Act one is now going to be the summer of 69. It's going to be the moon landing. The family gathered around the tv, watching humanity step into another world for the first time.

And the final act, rather than trying to, which has always been sort of the issue with Tomorrowland, rather than trying to predict a near future that eventually is going to very quickly become the past, this is moving to a distant off planet future, a home beyond Earth, which is using some of that original concept art from Disney legend John Hench, who's one of Walt's closest and most trusted collaborators. So some things are changing, Some things are staying.

So the families of John and Sarah, the kids, Uncle Orville, Rover, Grandma, Grandpa, the sister that disappears at some point. We'll see if she comes back. They are here. The Sherman Brothers theme. There's a great big beautiful. Tomorrow is not going anywhere.

And the other thing that has changed is there is a new attraction poster which is clearly a Loving homage to the original. It's gorgeous. That's the announcement. That's what we know.

James, give me your initial or maybe sort of having some time to think about it reaction to those four time periods being laid out and that off planet future. Like, what is sort of your gut reaction to that framework and does it work for what this show has been always trying to do?

So my gut reaction surprised me, I think, because going back to destination D23, when they talked about adding the first scene with the Walt Audio Animatronic introducing the show, they mentioned it was just one of those little lines that they said, and we'll have updates about John, Sarah and the rest of the family coming soon.

And that was one of those things where it's like, if you look into it, it's like, okay, if they're adding a new scene with Walt, if they're going to update something with the family, my bet at that time was this is going to be a big change. Like in the same vein of Country Bear Musical Jamboree, which Chris Beatty also came out on stage, I think, two years previous to announce.

So that's in my mind, I was always thinking, like, okay, this is going to be some type of significant change. I did not predict the time jump.

But I was surprised since Carousel of Progress is a personal favorite of mine and is one of those things that it's like, it has that connection to Walt. It has such historical significance.

And.

And today there is nostalgia not for those time periods, but for the attraction itself. And so in a way, it's become an attraction about how important the attraction is and about its connection to Walt.

And it less about that original, optimistic message about, look at the progress that your family's generations have lived through and where it's going to bring us into the future or where it's brought us to. To today. Because that final scene was like, okay, this is the house of today. This is how life is today.

And it was spanning of really clean like every 20 years back in the 60s. And they've updated that last scene. And I think that it's the time period that they picked, I think is a really smart time period.

Not just because there's that clean parallel of like, oh, it's the last 60 years going back to that. But on a deeper level.

If you look at starting with the moon landing and then going to the 80s, which is the dawn of the personal computer that was like right around the time the first Mac, first Macintosh was came out. And then 99, that's like the first imac. And the I in imac is for Internet. And so all of those things of.

And you know, I think cell phones would have been like, you know, you have those big chunky cell phones right around those times.

And then I just think moving to a far flung future just kind of cements this as like, this belongs in Tomorrowland in a way that it's always kind of had that issue of like, okay, even when they added the VR headsets and everything in 93, you know, that felt dated very quick. So I, I think that they're going, they're, you know, setting it off planet. Like, you know, if.

If this starts feeling dated in the next 10 to 20 years, it's. We have bigger problems. Some, something has gone awry. So I, I think, I think all the changes are smart for giving this show kind of the.

Giving the life that Walt wanted it to have.

And I think that is the single most important part of this whole conversation and what you said. And I want to talk more about that. But you know, Walt is the most important part. And I think before we really.

And before I share maybe some of my thoughts about where the carousel is going, I think it's important contextually to go back to where it came from because I think history is essential context for everything that else that we're going to talk about today. And I think honestly it's a story that most people don't fully know.

And I want to sort of paint a little bit of a picture of the history of the carousel so that as you're forming opinions or maybe as you're thinking about your opinions, it might potentially change it a little bit. So, you know, sort of if we dial the Wayback Machine, this does not start, really in New York. It doesn't start in the World's Fair.

This really starts at Disneyland.

In the late 50s, when Walt was thinking about expanding Main Street USA, he had this vision of a new area called Edison Square, which is going to be an extension of Main street, anchored by this walkthrough experience about harnessing the lightning. Insert dramatic music here to show how electricity and technology had transformed the American home and the American family.

Obviously, Edison Square was never built, but no good idea ever dies in imagineering or inside Walt's mind. And I think that's important because it means that the Carousel of Progress wasn't something that Walt assigned. It wasn't sort of this core.

Walt developing attractions for the World's Fair, he comes back to this idea of the Edison Square concept. Working with the imagineers, he evolves into this centerpiece of what is going to be General Electric's massive Progress Land Pavilion.

Again, I think we hear that word lot, James.

But not everybody knows what Progressland was, because it wasn't just a theater with the rotating show, this was a full, like, experience and exhibition. Guests moved through different exhibits. They engaged with the future.

And at the center of it was the show about the American family living through a century of technological change. And, yes, the rotating theater, where the audience moves and the stage stays still, was very innovative at the time.

Walt was very much not just Ford, but I think, almost obsessed with this idea because he wanted the audience to feel like the show was discovering something new in each act, not just sort of watching it happen. Sherman Brothers, same duo who had just done Mary Poppins, which was in theaters that very year, wrote the theme song. You've heard it.

You know, it was not just a score. It wasn't background music. It was very much like many of the things the Sherman brothers did. It was a statement, it was a belief, it was a promise.

And Walt was very much in this. Like, his handprints are all over this. Like, the details matter.

You know, we heard the story about Uncle Orville's toes had to wiggle in the bathroom scene. Like he was so personally invested in it. And I think that's the design principle that made this work.

This was not meant to be history to them. It was memory. So that grandma sitting in the theater could point to say, I remember when. That's how we wash clothes.

Grandfather could look at his grandkids and be like, this is what having an icebox really was like on a day to day. That was the point. It was connecting generations, I think, through shared experiences.

And so that not just the show, but the parents and grandparents could say, look at how far we've come, look at how good we have it right now. And look, there's more coming in the future.

Absolutely. I think that concept of memory, of shared memory is really important. This weekend, you know, had some downtime.

So I did what everybody does and I picked up Designing Disney by John Hench, because they mentioned John Hench and I was like, okay, let me look in and see if there's any insights. And one of the things that John Hench talks about is how they can tap.

Use memory, use shared memory of the audience, not only for attractions like he mentioned specifically Indiana Jones Adventure. You have the memory of those iconic scenes from the movie.

But he talks about how it is really influential on Tomorrowland and when they were designing the original Tomorrowland, of how they tap into popular culture and science fiction and current innovations and how you can use memory to evoke certain feelings in people.

And that when they were making Carousel of Progress, it was the biggest thing that they were trying to do was make something that would emotionally resonate with the audience. It wasn't just like, it wasn't about like, oh, Walt wants to depict this exact timeframe or this or that. It was what will connect with the audience.

And they were really inspired by the play Our Town. There was just the things that they were drawing from that. It's reading what John Hench wrote about it.

It's much more about that connection to the audience, the emotional connection, things that will give people a feeling of optimism by playing on that memory.

Right. That emotional resonance is not there because nobody's watching the show now.

I mean, if you are, God bless you is looking back at that first scene and going, I remember when, you know, when all these things first started to Happen. But I think, James, when the World's Fair closed and thankfully the attraction was moved to Disneylands Tomorrowland, it was updated and revised.

But I think the most significant change was to the final act, right? The act that everybody, you know, we vote for years, people have always had very, very emotional thoughts about.

And he reworks this conclusion to showcase Progress City, his own very personal model for the future and what he called Epcot.

This experimental prototype community, not a theme park, a real community where people would work and live and play in a world that was designed around innovation and human potential.

And in the 67 version, guests were transported at the end of the show via speed ramp to a second floor where they could see, they could sort of stand above and look down over this massive, extraordinary scale model of Walt's vision of the future. What you see on the Tomorrowland Transit Authority People Mover now is but a very, very small piece of that.

Walt passes away, obviously, way too early in December of 66. Disneyland version opens in 67.

So when we talk about Walt, James, this is one of the last major attractions to carry his direct creative fingerprints. And I think it's important because this is not about ending with a look at fancy appliances.

It's what Walt's dream of human civilization could become. And I think this version for a lot of people is. And I can only imagine what it was like when they changed this version.

But this was sort of the peak of what they feel this show was always meant to be.

I think that Walt's fingerprints on this both are the cause of why there are so much emotion around this. Because it is Walt Disney's carousel of progress. It was his baby. It was. I think Disney has described it as his passion project.

And it talks about his optimism and talks about how, like critics at the time, some people thought it was corny, you know, cringe, as the kids would say these days. And talks about how he keeps on reinventing himself and keeps moving forward and moving forward.

And there's a quote about Disneyland where he says, quote, since Disneyland opened, this is quoting Walt. I've poured another $25 million into it. To me, it's a piece of clay. I can knock it down and reshape it to keep it fresh and attractive.

I don't think any part of Disneyland was sacred to him. It was all precious. But nothing was too sacred to reinvent or change. It was that piece of clay.

And so I think, like, looking back on, like, okay, it's impossible to say, would Walt approve of this change or that change?

But I do feel like if, you know, Walt had the blessing of more time, I feel like he would keep returning back to Carousel and keep tinkering with it and keep making those changes, because that's just the type of person Walt was. And I think that it was something that it's okay for it to change.

So that's kind of where I land on it, where it's like Walt's influence is both, like, this thing of just like, well, this is, like, one of the very last attractions he personally touched. So don't mess with anything about it. On the flip side, I feel like you have to change it to carry on his spirit.

I think the clay quote, which is not one that you hear very often and I think should be, because I think it reinforces, you know, we say, oh, Walt said it was never a museum.

But when you hear that about taking something down and getting it back to sort of just that very malleable clay, I think that gives you a better insight into his mindset. And again, you know, when all these things are happening, there is no Internet. There is no place where people have loud voices.

The original Sherman Brothers song was set aside for this version, really, at GE's behest, right? GE's like, wait a minute. You know, there is a great big beautiful tomorrow, but we're trying to sell appliances today and tomorrow, and it's why.

Go down to two guys, or it was maybe Sears, maybe, right? And go by. And I actually, you know, 19. So just don't bother doing the math.

I was born in 68, so I was, like, right in this sort of sweet spot, I think, going To. And I've been to Walt Disney World again. I've been very fortunate as a kid going from New Jersey to Disney every single year with my family.

It was our. Our yearly vacation. I loved, I loved and I still do. I love best time of your life. I love the messaging. I love the song.

I still, of course, I still love great big beautiful tomorrow. And if you still. If you walk through Tomorrowland, and I think it's 99% sure it's still there.

It does play in the background music, so if you hear it. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, like that's.

Yeah, don't do that.

I'm gonna start singing it. And trust me, if it's either in the shower, in a car by myself, there's no reason anybody wants to hear me sing. Now is the time. Now is the best time.

It is the version that we know that's really the last major overhaul. The Sherman Brothers original song came back much to the joy, I think, of a lot of people. New voices were added.

And I think more importantly, that final scene was updated to reflect what was sort of then the present day. Ish. A holiday gathering with family, showing off the latest, maybe a little glimpse into the immediate future in terms of technology.

So I think this is sort of the math that makes the clearest argument for change. Sorry, I'm a little for clumped. The original show covered about 45 years through its first three acts.

Yeah.

And the show's now skipping more time between its last two acts than it covers in the first three combined. Look, the attraction didn't become a museum because it was Designed to be one.

I think it became a quote unquote museum because for better, for worse, Disney stopped turning the carousel. Which I think that irony is very much on the nose. But I think, James, that's what happened.

And that's why it started to feel, I think for a lot of guests, maybe stale, maybe stagnant, maybe not the thing that we did every time. Maybe it was the place that she went to go in to get air conditioning, which is not what that attraction is about.

Yeah. And it's one of those things where you could keep it as it is right now and not change anything about it.

And I feel like it just would not have a great future. It would just be this thing that would kind of limp along and at some point they would say, okay, it's going away for something else.

And that would be truly heartbreaking to me because I do think it is so core to the identity of the Disney parks and the connection to Walt and all the things that we've talked about. But if we do try to preserve it and keep it as a museum piece, unfortunately, I think that's where the direction it would be going.

And so I think the easy update that Disney could have done would have been, hey, we're adding the Walt animatronic and we're updating the final scene because that's the criticism everybody has. But having that giant 80 year time gap as you mentioned, it really kind of undermines the story that this is telling.

And a lot of the innovations that they talk about, they are great innovations and they are innovations that we take advantage of today. You know, refrigeration, air travel, all of that. But there are things that we take more for granted now.

And it is good to look back and go like, oh, there used to be a time before, you know, indoor plumbing and running water and all of that.

And I'll just have to be like, let me tell you a tale of, you know, 28 kilobit per second Internet. We waited days for JPEG.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So. And that's things that we use today that have changed so dramatically within, you know, you're my lifetime.

But, you know, it's it's something that, you know, we can convey to our kids that it's like, hey, you don't necessarily either remember this or you don't realize it, but the things that are so great about the progress that we've made over the last 60 years, like, it wasn't always that way.

And I think that this is going to help give this show a new life and help resonate with audiences in a way that, you know, just updating the final scene wouldn't necessarily do.

You know, over the years, James, and years ago, I did a show which I relatively recently put up in the archives. Go back to show 710, which I really gave a deep dive look into carousel progress with the late great Jim Corkus.

But the conversation was always about, well, how do you update the final scene? What should the final scene be? The challenge is really, how do you make.

How do you update the final scene without it becoming outdated, much like what Tomorrowland was sort of going through? I don't think. And I've always thought that the final scene has not really always been the only challenge.

And I want to share a little bit about why I think this makes sense, why I am excited about it, and why I think if you look at it clearly, the update is not what some people are, again, very vocally. And that's the beauty of the Internet. Everybody has a voice. This is not a betrayal of what the carousel was always meant to be.

I think it's a restoration of it. And so here's why I think this is the right call. And I welcome you, James, or you, our friend who's listening to agree or disagree.

So one to your point about the gaps in time, the emotional math has got to work across generations. You made the point about that original show worked because multiple generations had sitting in that theater, confined themselves in it.

The grandparent who sat there, like, pumping water manually, the parent who grew up with an icebox, the kids who only knew about electric appliances.

That was the experience that Walt designed because that was sort of the emotional handshake, not just between scenes, but I think between generations of people who are sitting in the audience. And that math stopped working like a long time ago. The generation that personally remembered those early century scenes is long gone.

But if you look at the new timeline, a grandparent is gonna watch their grandchild's face during the 69 moon landing scene and go, I can remember that night I was watching on that same tv. And this is what we thought and this is how we felt. There's such an opportunity for connection between parents and grandparents and kids.

I think two, the future problem is finally solved. Like, I think Imagineering cracked the code that none of us could really come up with.

Because if we would have said, well, let's go 10 years in the future, we're going to catch up in three. Right? Because the way technology is advancing, every version of the carousel's final act always had that same unavoidable problem.

So this new version solves it, for the most part permanently and in the most tomorrowlandish way possible by not predicting the near future at all by what I think Walt was doing, right? Walt. We did a whole episode about Walt and Disney in space dreaming about this far off future that is off planet, right? It's off Earth.

Drawn from John Hench's concept sketches, which I love. Connecting the old and the future. It's not trying to be next year, it's trying to be that distant horizon.

And I don't think, at least in my lifetime, I'm not imagining that you're going to sort of date a colony in space and that dream is not going to become obsolete. I think Tomorrowland, both in Disneyland and world, has always been about this.

Very optimistic, fantastical possibilities, not about predicting what the future is going to look like in three, five or 10 years. I think this new finale puts the carousel right in the spirit of the land that it's living in.

And I think the final point that I make, because I too, I'm a purist, I'm a nostalgic, I love and I have the most incredible respect for Walt. I think Walt's name is parenthetically and literally is still on it And I'm not sure if this is what the quote, unquote, purists are arguing.

Look, Walt himself updated this show. The Disneyland version was different than the World's Fair version. The World Disney World version was different from both.

Walt did not build a monument. He built a carousel, something that moves by definition and by design. I don't think the naming of Carousel of Progress was an accident.

I think it was very much not just the progress showing the history, but the progress of the future.

It's one iteration across a long line of iterations, I think was always meant to be followed by another. And I think what's authentic to Walt is not any specific date or sets of appliances. It's the spirit, right?

It's the optimism and family and technology as a source of wonder. And that tomorrow is something that we should still get excited about. And I think that's what this update is very much trying to preserve.

And I think the fact that Disney is reinvesting in a full reimagining of this, and as we've seen other classics, this is about exactly what imagineering and what we've heard Disney talk about. They want to leave this attraction better than they found it.

And I think, to me, that shows a genuine love that the company and the imagineers and the people who are making the decisions have for not just the attraction, but Walt himself.

But you would have to do work to restore the 67 version to have that deep connection. Because it's like, yeah, Gene shepherd was not the father in that version. At Disneyland, there's so much that has changed.

There was so much that changed between the 75 version and the 93 version of, like, things that I think of, like, you know, oh, hottest Fourth of July we. We've had. It's. They didn't have it about the Fourth of July. It was about. It was the hottest summer we've had in years.

Like, there are certain things that I Think it was at some point it was Cousin Orville instead of Uncle Orville. Like, there are these things that have become totemic about this attraction that are just like, this stuff has always been evolving.

This will be the biggest evolution. But I think that people don't necessarily realize how complex the history of Carousel of Progress is.

I love the idea of the final scene specifically drawing off of the John Hench concept art.

Not just because it's kind of this beautiful mid century retrofuturism that has this timeless feel now, but also in the Designing Disney book, Hench talks about how updating the final scene was a task that he took on from time to time and how he was doing research in. Okay, what's happening? What. What are they saying in newspapers about the new technology of today? What's happening in science fiction?

And in the first original concept art, he says that he made a prediction of his own that people would use computers in their kitchens, which is kind of wild to think about. Of like we take that for granted. Like we use computers everywhere.

But back in the 60s, when they're developing this, it's just like, that's a wild swing that he ended up being very prescient about.

So I love that connection of just like, it's this legendary imagineer who not only touched the original version and had this great concept art, but also was tasked with that impossible task of keeping it up to date. And then also just kind of bookending the show of. You start with the moon landing, which is this great moment of optimism, collective optimism.

I'm thinking about the recent Artemis launch in that mission that kind of captured this feeling of optimism and possibility. I remember watching Launch, I had my son, who's 5 years old, on my lap. I was on the phone with my dad.

We were all watching live stream at the same time. It was this moment where we all just were sitting in awe of what we were seeing on the screen. And I feel like that is a really rare thing.

And I think there's something that's just really smart about that and feels fitting for Tomorrowland and feels fitting for the optimistic feeling that Walt wanted to instill in the audience with this show.

So I don't really remember, but I can imagine what it was like for families to sit around that TV and watch Man Step Foot on the moon for the first time. You want to talk about just not just a unifying moment and a shared moment, an experience for the family.

But even like Artemis, those two events that happened so many years, I think they're not just unifying moments for families to share together. I think they're nationally unifying moments like, look where we can go. Look what we can do together.

I think it very much is in alignment with the way we should all feel all the time, but also the way Walt felt. And you brought up.

This is something that has been, especially in the past couple of weeks, this idea of, well, bring the original version and put it in Disneyland. You know, I'm a positive guy, James, but I do have to push back on that a little bit.

And I think that pushback comes from a guest perspective and from a business perspective.

I think what people forget too, James, is, look, Disney is about guest experience and guest satisfaction, but it is a business about both of those things. And just like, when I know I'm going to get pushed back on this and it's okay, I'm ready. It's like when Tom Sawyer went away.

I understood the business justification for it.

It is not going to be an attraction attract an attraction that is going to attract the, you know, metaphorical, you know, mom, dad and two and a half kids from the middle of Iowa who haven't been to Disneyland in five or 10 years. It's not going to generate revenue, and it's taking up very, very valuable real estate.

And we have to sort of understand it from a business perspective in terms of guest satisfiers if you bring this attraction over and there's not. If there's not a bluey like line for the version of Carousel of Progress, well, how do you justify it?

And how does it not look like, you know, again, there's the small percentage of us, and I think there is a small percentage of that would love to be able to have that experience. Same thing with Horizons. If you put Horizons back where it was, the way it was. Yes, those of us who wrote it and miss it might ride it.

But Horizons didn't close because it was the most popular attraction in the parks. And I think we have to sort of just understand that a little bit when we think about it and react to it.

Yeah, I made a comment about, like, if I was in charge, I would make a park that had every single version of Carousel Progress, the Carousels of Progress, maybe stack them on top of each other and Horizons and the original journey into imagination. And that's why I'm not in charge.

Like, I think you and I would have a great time for the week that park is open and profitable, and then it would have to close because it's just.

I think there is something very interesting in terms of, like, the business decisions that Disney's making with this, in terms of, like, the broader strategy for how reinvesting in this attraction and all the other reinvestments that they've made with Big Thunder, with Buzz, with, you know, even with more recent rides, like, well, Rock and Roller Coaster is also 99, but like Millennium Falcon, they're doing a lot of these things to reinvigorate these rides, because I believe it was. CFO Hugh Johnston recently said, like, basically they are operating at effective capacity at Disney World.

And so really, without doing much expansion, they can't really add more guests into the park without damaging the guest experience.

And one of the ways that you do that is pure expansion, which they're doing with, you know, Piston Peak, with Villains Land, with Tropical Americas, with Monsters.

But if you only do that, that kind of gets that, like, adding a lane to a highway problem of just, like, it's going to have more people go and it's just going to. Crowds will keep on being a problem.

But I think Disney's doing the savvy thing of, like, especially right now, while those bigger projects are in development, under construction, things are going vertical.

And when more guests start to utilize that attraction and it, you know, they make updates to make it more reliable and things like that, that will also effectively expand the capacity of the park because there are people are, you know, Carousel of Progress has an amazing capacity for, you know, the rotating theater and all of that.

That it's a brilliantly designed theater system that, you know, for many of the times that I've been over the last couple of years have been mostly, mostly empty.

If they can do something that it's getting, you know, a few thousand riders in per hour, that does amazing things for lowering lines at the rest of the park and effectively adding more capacity. So I think it's this smart thing of like, they are reinvesting in this thing that is so important to the park thematically. And it isn't just a.

Like, you know, I kind of think about, like, if it was going the opposite way, where it didn't have like a Pavilion sponsor and like, they were like, okay, GE is now the sponsor. And it opened up and had a big logo of GE like it used to in the 80s.

Like, people would melt down or like, say if it was like, you know, it opened up and it was a big Apple logo and it was like, Apple Presents Carousel of Progress. But it's going to open up and be Walt Disney and it's going to. And I think that they're. They talking about this prime real estate.

It is also prime real estate and they are updating it in a way that isn't just like, you know, I know they couldn't do this for licensing reasons, but like, oh, it's Tony Stark's Carousel of Progress. Like, they are still keeping it true to Walt Disney. And I think that is something that should be commended.

And I think with Imagineering's recent track record, with all those updates that I just talked about, I'm very optimistic that they are going to get this right.

Yeah, I think the only way they could pull it off is if it was Bluey and Grogu's counter civil progress, they would fill every single seat, every single time.

And look, I want to be respect, you know, I'm so happy that we can have this dialogue and share our thoughts and opinions, but I want to be respectful to the fact that there are other very loud, very vocal, very emotional and very passionate responses. The reaction to the announcement has been everywhere this week.

And I have, and I said at the top of the show, very intentionally and very deliberately reading through as much as I could. The comments, the post, the threads.

Because I think it tells us something very important, not just about the attraction, but I think overall about what Disney parks mean to people on a deeper level.

And I think that the reaction's been fascinating because it's not falling into what is sometimes just the Disney changes something, fans get angry category. I think what we're seeing is something that's a lot more nuanced, and I appreciate that, and I appreciate a very thoughtful response.

So I think a lot of what I'm seeing, and I'm obviously paraphrasing, is we've seen this a lot. I hate it. But I also understand it, right?

I think we've talked about sort of the emotional rollercoaster before, and I think some people understand and appreciate the idea of updating the Carousel of Progress, but they're also mourning the loss of the version that has been there since the 94 refurbishment.

So I think there are those who, on one, I sort of imagine, like, these little, like, camps of different people, and sometimes people are running in between. Like, there's those who want to just preserve it, keep it as a museum piece. It should, like, don't change anything.

It should be one of those untouchable. And we've talked about this in the past, like, are there any attractions that are untouchable? Some people feel the Carousel Progress is untouchable.

It is one of the last remaining direct connections to Walt's vision of the 64 World's Fair. It's not about losing scenes. It's about losing context.

And the feeling, again I'm paraphrasing, is that the attraction's value today comes from looking back, not from trying to predict the future. You talked about. I think you said something about trying to figure out what Walt would have wanted. That's the other group, right?

Is that the Walt would have wanted change group. And this may be one of the larger, if not the largest, who say, look, the entire premise of the Carousel Progress is progress.

It's not meant to be a history lesson. It needs to be updated.

And I think even Disney directly addressed this in their blog post by saying, quote, carousel progress designed to celebrate change, not to stand still. It's. The attraction is a powerful reflection of optimism, innovation, and family over time.

And I think in that post, which I think is required reading, if you care, they emphasize that the attraction has always been evolving through scripts and voice actors and decades and final scenes and refurbishments, and that it was not meant to remain frozen in time. So I don't think for this group of fans, it's not betraying the attraction's purpose. I think it's actually fulfilling it.

I think there are some who are, we'll call them, cautiously optimistic. Right? They're nervous, but they're happy that the Sherman Brothers song is gonna be there and the same characters are gonna be there.

The same structure is going to be there. And I think the feeling is that as long as they keep the spirit, I'm willing to give them a chance.

It's just about, okay, let's see how Disney's going to execute it. And I think sort of that last catch all group is the mixed feeling. And I think there's a lot of people, James, who just genuinely feel conflicted.

And we talked about imagineer Chris Beatty, and he said one of the goals is to make sure. And you touched on this earlier. It has to be relatable for today's audiences.

And even people on the imagineering team grew up during these decades themselves.

And it shows that the attention and the care and the thoughtfulness that's being put in there is by people who understand the attraction because they grew up loving it. They also understand, I think, the feelings that they have, but they also are able to make it much more relatable.

So I think it's not about Disney's destroying Walt's version of Carousel of Progress. I think it's the people who love Carousel of Progress are trying to update it.

I 100% agree.

I think that there's also kind of a nuance and kind of existential reaction that I've gotten a few comments from people of just like, hey, that's not history. That's too recent. Not enough change during that. Like, people need to know history.

And real history is like, way back in olden times, not when I was a kid.

And I think that it's just like, there might be just like this dissonance of, like, people not really recognizing, like, hey, 69 to 99, that's 60 to 30 years ago. And not wanting to stop telling me that.

The 80s was 40 years ago, man. The 80s was like five years ago to me. Yeah. As I sit here wearing my Cavari cheese and hyper color T shirt.

And I think there's just a little bit of that of, like, I think there are some people that are just like, feeling this like, oh, if Carousel of Progress is about when I grew up, that means I'm old or that means that, like. And also it's kind of like the thing of, like, I don't Want to give. I don't want to let go of the thing I grew up with. It's this thing of.

I want Carousel of Progress to be frozen in time because that reminds me of being 10 years old and sitting next to my grandmother and sitting next to my parents. My wife was talking about how that was. She was not a Disney person growing up. They went one time. I. I was like you. I went every year.

It was very fortunate they went one time. And Carousel of Progress was the ride she remembered because she connected with it. And she also remembered talking with her parents.

Her parents remembered going on it in the 70s. And so it was like a thing of, like, oh, I can be here, and I can be connected to the past of my parents and all of that.

So I think there's, like, a really complicated texture to this that isn't really a part of the fabric of any other attraction. And I think it gets into all those different camps that you were talking about and why.

It's kind of like people are having such big emotions about it because it's not only about their changing. This attraction that I love, and I'm afraid they might not get it right or whatever it is.

It's literally about the passage of time and that it can be just a daunting thing to really realize and look at.

And I think people are internally having a tough time reconciling this. Personally, I think there's internal conflict going on because fans are worried about losing the final scene or losing the humor.

And is Uncle Orville gonna feel like Uncle Orville? And there's gonna be that same sort of campiness to it. Is it still gonna feel like Carousel of Progress? But on the other hand, like, wait a minute.

I'm intrigued by. I'm excited to see what Walt is gonna be like in this 64 television special. Are they going to.

Is that going to be bringing this attraction full circle? Because you're inserting Walt into this attraction and reconnecting it to its origins. Is the moon landing scene something that.

And it seems like a lot of people are excited for that because they understand it or they were there or they remembered it. It's not just individual families, but, as I said earlier, like, it's humanity, like, experiencing progress together.

And I think, look, and I think this is what makes this fun and interesting, is I think that the conversation. James, is not, well, should Disney be changing the carousel progress? Has the carousel progress always been changing?

And maybe we just didn't realize it. Maybe we just sort of forgot the world's fair version was different. The Disneyland version was different. The 75 version was different.

The 94 version is different. This is clearly a controversial update, but that's where sort of the irony is.

The message of the attraction is that progress is inevitable, but every generation is also wanting to freeze their version of it in time. And again, we talked about, it's not a museum. It's not meant to stand still. And I think that's where the tension is at the heart of this discussion.

The attraction is teaching us to embrace progress until progress comes for the thing that we love. It's the most Carousel of Progress thing that could possibly happen.

Yeah, I'm just nodding along because I agree 100% that it is like, it is part of just the premise of it, of the carousel of Progress. It keeps spinning on. It spins on into the future.

And I feel like for the first time really ever, it really earns its spot in Tomorrowland, being about the future. And I think that that feeling of optimism, you know, when I go on Carousel Progress, I feel nostalgia more than I feel optimism now.

And I think it's because of that personal connection to those time periods. And it's more about when I go on, I go, oh, I remember being a kid and I remember seeing the scene.

I remember seeing the VR headset SC for the first time and thinking like, that is the coolest thing I've ever seen. And I also remember seeing it for the 10th time being like, okay, when are they going to update this? So I'm. I'm really. I'm very intrigued.

I'm optimistic about their vision for this, and I'm interested to see how I will feel sitting down for the first time and watching the show start to finish.

Yeah, and I think we have to wait and see how we're going to feel.

But I was sort of giving a broad stroke of the brush when I was talking about how people I really did go through and I read the comments and the posts and the threads. So I pulled out a couple of quotes for some people because I think it shows just where people are.

So Becky Menken from Mousefan Travel in the clubhouse went right to Walt's own words. And I'm quoting, a wise man once said, keep moving forward. It's been updated before, it'll be updated again.

Helps it stay relevant to the current generation and generations to come. I applaud the idea that Disney parks will never end up as a dusty museum.

Tim Brown, also in the clubhouse, responded with, which I think is one of those very emotional, honest Takes, he said, I can agree wholeheartedly with all this and still feel nostalgic for what will be lost. I think both can be true, and I think that's important. Right? You can feel both ways. Other people, I think, sort of capture the tension.

Sean Roberson said, this is one of the untouchable spots that I look so forward to. My favorite ride is Pirates, and I know it's not the best version. If they updated Pirates here to match Shanghai, would I be sad? Yes.

Would I be first in line to ride it? Double yes.

Like, that's not contradiction to just being a Disney fan, but I think a lot of it, too, I kept on seeing was about the timeline being out of date, not just for themselves, but for their kids. And the ability to show kids the life that you and your husband, wife, whatever it is, and your parents lived.

It's okay to miss the old one, but it might be time for a new story.

Absolutely. I think it's just. It's a hard attraction to let go of because we have these deep connections to it.

But at the end of the day, I think themed entertainment is a feelings business. It's how do these experiences make you feel? And I just want to read just a short little thing from the John Hench. Designing Disney.

We're talking about carousel progress. He says, in designing attractions, our philosophy is rooted in the belief that life is wonderful, life is wonderful, after all.

We work to bring guests an approximation of events that will affect them deeply.

Our story about the advent of electricity in the home provided optimistic events for guests to experience, letting them know what could have been and what might be inspiring them.

And my hope for this new version of Carousel of Progress is that it will bring back that inspirational feeling that when you go on it for the first time and you leave, you walk out into Tomorrowland feeling inspired about the potential of what life can be.

Right. Because, you know, I keep on seeing in a number of different places talking about carousel progress as a time capsule. And it's not like.

It's not a time capsule. It's not what Walt built. He built a carousel.

It is in the name of the attraction and, you know, the themes that we keep on seeing, all the erasing Walt's vision and they should have just added scenes instead of replacing, which you can't really do.

Right.

I'm not sure if I trust Disney to do this, which, again, you can feel however you want. I think, you know, I think I feel the opposite.

I think Disney has, one, earned my trust, and I think two, the Imagineers very much went on record about this update and how they had mixed feelings themselves, but how they care about this ride so very deeply. You talked about how the quote from John Hench how important that was. And I think that's not the signal of carelessness.

I think it's the signal of people who understand the responsibility that they have been given. I understand the grief that people feel. But I think it is something that we have to make sure we wait and see and look.

There's things that Disney knows that they have to get right. The Walt Disney animatronic, like did he. It's got to be right.

That attention to detail, much as what they have done in Disneyland, I think is going to be important. And I know there was a lot of conversations about when that animatronic figure went to Disneyland.

Like where was the line between honoring Walt and having him now be sort of like a park character? He was very private. He didn't want to a figure of himself.

But I think what we've seen out there, I think the reaction, the positive reaction that we've seen out there speaks for itself. I think it's very important. I think it's notable, you know, that Sarah is going to. For 60 some odd years, John has been the one telling the story.

He's the narrator, he's the one that walks us through each era. I love the fact that in Act 2, Sarah is now going to take center stage. She's gonna be the one showing the gadgets and the appliances.

And I think the possibilities of what everyday like life is going to be like. I also do know, know and appreciate because I know that there was a lot of feels about the short notice problem.

Sort of less than six weeks from announcement to closing. And I know for a lot of people who maybe don't live close by, that's not a lot of time to say goodbye.

And I think people are sad that they don't have that longer Runway to say goodbye on their own terms. I think that is absolutely fair. That's why now is the time, like booking ship to Walt Disney World as quickly as possible. But.

It's not just sort of a jokey fact. It is sort of the most performed stage show in American history. And whether that's accurate or not, I think the spirit of that is real.

This show has been playing continuously for 60 years and more times than people can wrap their heads around. And I think if a show like this stops evolving, it starts to become an artifact, which is not what this attraction was meant to be.

Walt said Disneyland wasn't meant to be finished, I think, and I know we can't sort of speak for it, but knowing Walt's vision, what do you think he would say? Right?

Do you think that what is happening now is in furtherance of his own overall spirit and then what he wanted for the parks and maybe even individually for this attraction?

You know, it. It's one of those things where it's like, it's so hard to say, like, oh, would he like this? Would he not like this? Would he want this here or there?

My gut feeling, and this is just my gut feeling is that Walt would have said, what took you so long? Why? Why has it the carousel of progress been the same for 33 years now?

You can email James at.

James,.

I'm just here for the comments. I'm just gonna go to James Instagram and just follow along on the comments.

Yeah, DM me. It's fine.

Yeah, look, I think, you know, this is one of those things that there. There is no quote, unquote, right or wrong answer, right or wrong way to feel. I very much can understand and appreciate it.

I feel the loss, I feel the nostalgia. I feel the same, but I also feel the optimism and I feel the excitement.

I think from what we heard and hearing how the imagineers understand, like, they know how we're going to feel, they know how we're going to react, and they know how incredibly important this attraction is. And I think seeing what they've done in the past and knowing that the love and the care they're going to give, it has me excited.

It has me excited to go see Carousel progress in a way that I have not felt in a long time. And I love that. I love being able to have that feeling again.

Yeah, I 100% agree. I think grief is actually a really apt word because even with thinking about, I think all of the changes that they've described are exciting.

But there is something that's hard about letting go of the past. There is something hard that's about saying goodbye to something that we've loved. And so I understand when people are like, I don't know about this.

I don't know if I want to say goodbye, especially with that short notice thing that you talked about of just like, you know, I'm sure there are a lot of people that were like, oh, I thought I would have more time to be able to go on it one more time, and I can't make it there until July.

And realizing now, oh, that whenever I went, you know, last Year or two years ago, whatever, that was my time to say goodbye to this attraction that they didn't realize. So I think it's. I think, you know, we're talking a lot about emotions and it's. I think any emotion is valid.

And I think that it's just a testament to how special this show is and how much people love it, that it is not just a thing of people, like, oh, yeah, they're. They're updating it, whatever. Like, I think that would be the absolute worst reaction of just, like, apathy towards the show.

I think that the fact that so many people have this love for the.

Show.

And hearing what. Imagine how Imagineering has talked about it, the reverence that they have, I think they understand the weight of this task, and I'm.

I'm very hopeful for what they're able to do with this show.

Yeah.

And I think my June meet of the month is going to have to be in Tomorrowland so that we can all experience the carousel progress together one more time. Stay tuned to Instagram and the podcast and the newsletter, and I'll announce when and what time and how we'll do a group.

A group experience on Carousel of Progress. And look, James, just to sort of like wrap this up and I appreciate you're so generous with your time.

I have ridden this attraction relief for most of my life. And the thing that I keep coming back to is that it was never called Walt Disney's monument to the past. It is the Carousel of Progress.

And the carousel, by definition, it moves. It's what it's done. It's what it's always done. And the fact that after more than 30 years of standing still, it's moving again.

And I don't think it's a tragedy. I think it's the most faithful thing Disney can do to honor what Walt built. I don't know yet what the new version is going to be like. None of us do.

I hope it will be even better than we hope it could be. I believe the right intentions are there and I believe the right team is on it.

Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress is going to be doing exactly what Walt Disney designed it to do, which is connecting generations through that wonder, through that excitement, through that laughter, through those memories. Like, that's it, man. Like that's the whole thing. It's always been the whole thing.

And there's still going to be a great big beautiful tomorrow shining at the end of every day. I definitely want to hear from you, our friend, who may be screaming at us, and that's fine. What does the carousel mean to you?

Come be part of the conversation over in the clubhouse at www.comclubhouse. I would love to literally hear from you. I'd love for you to call. If people remember what voicemail still is, call the voicemail at 407 that belongs.

Call my answer.

That'll be in the 90s scene.

It is a show that I did with Jim Corkus about the legacy details and at the time, what we thought the future of the attraction was going to be. It's part Wayback Machine, part Disney scene investigation. We do a very deep dive into the histories and the stories.

And Jim has so many stories from people who worked on the attraction and who knew Walt. And I think questions that are more relevant now than ever. And then please go and check out everything that James is doing over at Guy to ww.

James, anything you want to leave us with, including but not limited to where people can find, connect with and yell at you.

Yes. Yeah, yell at me at the DMs. I'm @wdwradio. No, no, don't yell at me there. You can find me at guide2wdw everywhere except Instagram. I'm guide2disney.

I also have guidetowdw.com I'm working on a big revamp of that that's launching very, very soon. And I call it Disney Intelligence for Smarter Vacations. Kind of diving into the craft behind what makes these places so special.

So that whether it's your first time or your 50th time going, that you can have the best possible vacation. So.

And I have a lot that's coming to my channel about Millennium Falcon, about Rock and Roller Coaster starring the Muppets about Carousel of Progress and beyond. So it's a very busy and very.

Exciting time, and I will link all that in the show notes [email protected] and I want to leave you with one last thing that you mentioned, James.

You talked about how there is this short Runway of time to experience carousel progress, and I hope that if you want to, you all do get a chance to ride it.

I think there's a bigger takeaway lesson here that I think sometimes we all think that we're always going to have more time to do the thing, to say the thing, to experience the thing. So don't wait.

Don't wait to ride Carousel, don't wait to do that thing, to say that thing, or to go have that experience, because you just don't know when I might not be there anymore. So now is the time. Now.

Now is the time.

But there is definitely a great big, beautiful tomorrow. All right, James, thank you so very much. All right, last question. What scene are you most excited for and why?

I was born in 86, so the 85 scene, like, there are things that I know, but that one will be okay. This is in my primetime, so I'm very excited for that one.

And if they say, James, you could put one artifact in that scene, one cool piece of memorabilia, what do you put in there?

Hmm. I feel like I would put my Tamagotchi, if I could sneak my personal Tamagotchi into there. That was, like, very big at the time for me.

I think that's a cool question. I'm gonna. I'm gonna post this in the clubhouse for. Pick whatever scene you want, whatever one resonates with you.

What artifact from the 60s, the 80s, the Y2K? If you could, would you put into Carousel of Progress? Be specific. Is it a video game? Is it a toy? Is it a phone? Is it a piece of technology?

Is it something from the kitchen? Whatever it might be, I'm going to put that in the clubhouse over at wdwradio.com clubhouseoregon you can call the voicemail.

James, this was fascinating. It was a lot of fun. I sincerely appreciate you, and I cannot wait to experience the new carousel when it opens together with you.

We can think back on our conversation.

That would be fantastic. Thank you, Lou, so much for having Me. This was a lot of fun.

It's time for this week's Walt Disney World tribute question of the week, where you can test your knowledge of the sights, sounds, secrets and stories of Disney. You can test your knowledge, have some fun, amaze your friends with fun facts and enter for a chance to win a Disney prize package.

But before we get to this week's trivia question, let's go back review last week's and select our winner.

So last time we were talking about the incredible food and options at Disney's Animal Kingdom, from counter service to restaurants like Tiffin's, and your question was to tell me what does the word tiffin actually, actually mean? Like, where does that term come from?

Thanks to all of you entered got this one correct and know that a tiffin is actually a little snack or a container for carrying food. It comes from India and the entire restaurant is really themed around that concept and pays tribute to it.

Because you can find little tiffin containers displayed at the restaurant sign above the entrance as well as in a display case when you first walk in on the right hand side. Now, now that you know this, you can share this little fun fact with your friends or family next time you go.

Anyway, I took all the correct entries, randomly selected one, and last week you were playing for a prize package that includes a WWRADO keychain, stickers pin, a new WW embroidered patch, and a mystery prize. And last week's winner, randomly selected is. Ava S. So, Eva, congratulations. Your prize package is already on its way.

But if you played last week and didn't win, that's okay, because here's your next chance to enter in this week's Walt Disney World Trivia Challenge.

So this past week, a video popped up in my Facebook memories that I recorded from Star Wars Weekends many, many years ago over at Disney's Hollywood Studios. I loved it. I miss it. Including the big finale, the Hyperspace Hoopla. If you know, you know. But tell me, who were the hosts of the Hyperspace Hoopla?

That's your question this week. Who are the hosts of the Star Wars Weekend's Hyperspace Hoopla Dance off at Disney's Hollywood Studios.

Again, you're gonna play for the keychain, the stickers, the pin, a patch, and another mystery prize that I brought back from an overseas Disney destination. It could be the adventure. It could be Disneyland Parish. You never know that. I will include in your prize package. So good luck and have fun.

That's going to do it for this week's show. Thank you so much for being here.

I do know and appreciate how valuable your time is and the fact that you spent and shared some of it with me this week means a lot. This episode matters to me. The attraction matters to me. Clearly to you as well. And the fact that you spent part of your day here with me means a lot.

If the episode gave you something, whether it's a new perspective, a reason to try and go see it one more time before it closes on the 6th, or maybe just know that there might be somebody else who wants to hear this perspective. Please do me a favor and and share it with them. This is how we find each other. This is how the community and conversation grows.

I want to hear from you. Don't forget. Please come be part of the community conversation over in the [email protected] clubhouse be part of the live show.

You can connect and chat with me on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. I am Umongello. Tell me what you thought. Tell me if you're going to go try and see one more time and tell me what new scene you're most excited for.

I really do want to know. And speaking of embracing what comes next, nice transition Mongello.

If you are ready to stop waiting and start building something that you love from what you are passionate about. My Momentum Weekend workshop is going back to Walt Disney World this October.

It is a full immersive weekend workshop for creators, podcasters, entrepreneurs and solopreneurs. Anyone who is serious about turning their passion into something real. It is four days, one room, 50 people.

A hands on interactive workshop where you leave with clarity, a real plan and more importantly a community of people building right alongside you to help you along the way in the most inspiring place on the planet. It's also during Food and wine Festival. We're 50% sold out and you can still lock in the lowest price.

I'll offer sessions, speakers and more details are coming soon over@lou mangello.com but don't wait. I promise this is going to be the best momentum yet. I cannot wait to see you there.

If you have any questions, email me louwwradio.com thank you again for your love, support, friendship and just for being here and listening this week week. Always remember to choose the good like even with the closing of carousel, find the positive in everything that you do.

Be a positive example for others and always remember that now really is the best time of your life. Have an amazing day and even better tomorrow. So until next time, see ya.