Happy birthday today to the park now known as Disney's Hollywood Studios.
"Now known as," you might ask? If you've been around a while, you might remember that the Walt Disney World Resort's third gate opened May 1, 1989 as Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park. Developed in partnership with MGM, the park was seen widely as Disney's preemptive answer to Universal Studios Florida, which would open up the road on June 7, 1990.
The licensing deal with MGM expired, and Disney changed the park's name to Disney's Hollywood Studios in January 2008. By then, Disney had developed more than enough IP of its own to populate the Studios' attractions, which have grown to include Star Wars Galaxy's Edge, Toy Story Land, and Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway. (Follow those links for our opening day reviews of each of those locations.)
But that first summer, the park did not offer anywhere near the line-up it has today. The highlight was a tram-based studio tour - an interesting choice given that rival Universal decided to step away from the trams that defined its Universal Studios Tour in Hollywood in developing its Florida theme park. But Disney went with the trams in Orlando, even as it needed to build a movie studio around them to give fans something to look at on the tour.
If you took the tram tour that first summer, maybe you saw Disney's The All-New Mickey Mouse Club in production - a show that later would launch the careers of Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Ryan Gosling, and Justin Timberlake. (They didn't arrive until 1993, though.) Or, if you missed that, perhaps you saw... the Disney's All-American College Orchestra from EPCOT practicing in one of the other soundstages. (See On stage the first summer at Disney's Hollywood Studios for Laurie's story about that experience.)
Next up for Disney's Hollywood Studios is the debut of the reimagined The Little Mermaid – A Musical Adventure in the Animation Courtyard theater this fall. Please share your favorite memories about Disney's Hollywood Studios in the comments.
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I’ll pour one out for The Great Movie Ride, Catastrophe Canyon, and the Studio Animation Tour. This park has grown up a lot but still hasn’t REALLY reached its full potential IMO. But I do love her. And the lineup of attractions is stong on a “quality-per-attraction” basis. I’m still in awe of what WDI was and is still able to acheive with Tower of Terror, from the moment you enter the queue to the moment you exit the ride.
Well said fattyackin. I also miss Lights, Motors, Action! and the Osborne Christmas Lights but it has evolved into a true park in its own right not an initial half-day add-on.
I always wanted Disney to close this Park for a few years - and re-do it as a stand alone Star Wars park...
Honestly, I was there on that day and I didn't even know that it was the park's birthday. There weren't any signs or celebrations going on. (At least not when I rolled in at ten in the morning.)
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I had to wait until January 1990 to get there but was fun as I do miss the original Studio concept and classic attractions. Still, it's done well building up with more amazing rides and worth remembering for helping push WDW more.