Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 58: Ken Bruce - Part 1
57 Plays8 months ago
On this week's episode we invite animator and author Ken Bruce to join us and chat all things Disney. Ken is a huge Tiki Room fan and the author of the book "Before the Birds Sang Words" and share many amazing stories about the classic attraction.
Be sure to tune back in next week for part 2 of his conversation with us to!
For more on Ken and the Tiki Room check out his website HERE
DISCLAIMER: We are not an affiliate of the Walt Disney Company nor do we speak for the brand or the company. Any and all Disney-owned audio, characters, and likenesses are their property and theirs alone.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to 'Sharing the Magic' Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome to Sharing the Magic, the podcast that takes you on a journey through the enchanting worlds of Disney. Each week, we're joined by a special guest, whether they're a magician creating moments of astonishment or a Disney expert sharing the secrets behind the magic of the happiest place on Earth. Together we'll uncover the stories, inspirations, and behind the scenes tales that bring these worlds to life. So, get ready to be spellbound and transported to a place where dreams come true.
Guest Introduction: A Night with an Author
00:00:54
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the latest episode of Sharing the Magic. I'm your host Barry. We have an author joining us tonight, someone that I think we're gonna really enjoy. But before we get into talking with him, let's talk to our co-hosts and see who we have on tonight. And starting we have Dawn. Dawn, how you doing tonight? Hi, I'm really good. All right, next up we have Rachel. Rachel, how you doing? I'm doing good in the panhandle of Florida. Looking forward to our conversation tonight though. Awesome. Next up we have Brian. How are you doing, sir? I'm doing great. Very super excited about our guests tonight. And we also have Matt. Matt, how are you doing?
00:01:38
Speaker
I am doing okay. I apologize if I don't sound too good. We had a power outage. I'm on my phone. I'm trying to charge it, so I'm here, and hopefully I will be able to stay. But I'm excited for the show, so I had to try to get on. We're in the apocalypse. What is happening? It's like po apocalypse podcasting. I'm so happy. I'm so grateful to be here. We just had like an alien abduction, and and I'm okay. Yeah, it's it's it's always the ah waking up on the wrong side of life for me. So, I mean, alien abductions happen pod collapse. Right. Instead of apocalypse. Yeah. ah yeah but And last but not least, we have Jeff right now. I'm just happy to be here. Oh, of course. Oh, no, it's coming out. I'm happy you're all here. Yeah. oh
00:02:34
Speaker
All right. All right. yeah all right like So before we chase our guests off, let's go ahead and maybe have a conversation with them. So. As I mentioned before, we have an author on. I've seen so much good stuff from this latest work of of his, and I'm so excited that we have him out here to talk about his ah his book. And I'll let him introduce himself.
Guest Background and Tiki Room Book Introduction
00:03:07
Speaker
I'm nothing important. who Who am I? But I did write a really cool book. No, I come from animation. I live here in a Los Angeles, where where you do not have a hurricane happening right now.
00:03:18
Speaker
uh, grew up on Disneyland, of course. I think my first trip was five years old, and then I saw the Tiki Room when I was seven. Again, in animation. So I've been in animation my entire career. I'm currently working on Family Guy, but I've worked at that Pixar on Up and Toy Story 3, and I've worked at Nickelodeon on Fairly Odd Parents and Ren and Stimpy and other movies like Fern Gully and Shrek. My career has been animation, but um this side project has taken me into a whole new world. Obviously, when you spend, what, 10 years thinking up and then six years writing a book on the tiki room, you better like the tiki room. So yeah ah that was my passion project.
00:03:59
Speaker
that the book is out now and I am very happy about it. And um so yeah, I'm just sort of happy to meet new people who might want to know a little bit more about it. And of course, pick up the book if you have a chance and do a deep, deep dive on how the Tiki Room came to be. So that's my that's my introduction. So Ken, why don't you go ahead and tell us how you fell in love with Disney? Oh gosh. I was always a fan of Disney animation. um I think the first Disney animated film I saw might have been One Hundred and One Dalmations or it might have been Mary Poppins, but there was something so fascinating and kinetic and colorful and sort of jaw-dropping about Disney animation. I certainly liked other animation as well. I wasn't a Saturday morning a cartoon kid.
00:04:50
Speaker
uh when I was younger for the most part but I did like Warner Brothers cartoons as well but there was something about Disney animation that I knew was quality and above the rest and it was just sort of mesmerizing so at a very young age I was like I want to do that and I was serious and that uh that eventually did happen I got into the animation world after after that and and it's primarily because of of the amazing animated films of Disney they were they were amazing The reality can for for us, we we absolutely love getting into the guests.
Unveiling Disney Myths about the Tiki Room
00:05:28
Speaker
get into the research and the mind and get back into the history of whether it be rides, the ideas that Walt founded things from and everything else. And I know one of the things you really dug back into with this book is not just the origin of how the Tiki Room idea itself came to be, but actually that very convoluted and detailed story behind the process of the idea that was far more entailed than I think people expected. And it it seems as though with what you wrote, you went into great detail. Can you just give people a little bit of background from the original idea from being in New Orleans in 1946 to how that began and and started moving forward?
00:06:23
Speaker
Well, i start with I start with the idea of breaking apart myths. the actual you know There's a lot of Disney myths out there that people sort of glom onto and then repeat over and over again to the point where everybody just assumes that's the way it happened. and they And there are simple stories that have ah an element of magic and dream and and all that stuff. the fans Fans love them. But the actual story of how these things come to be is far more complex and crazy and chaotic than the Tidy story. And that first Tidy story was, oh, Walt Disney was
00:06:59
Speaker
in New Orleans in 19 I think 1947 with his with his wife he goes into an antique store he sees an antique a mechanical bird he falls in love with it he gives it to his wife and from there the tiki room happened and that's very simplistic and a lot of the Disney ah a lot of the Disney myths are are are just like that that story of Walt on a bench in Griffith Park you know coming up with the idea Disneyland not Yeah, he did sit on a bench and he did think about Disneyland, but he didn't come up with the idea that he was dreaming up a park ah decades earlier. And the same goes, the same is true with the Enchanted Tiki Room. that That mechanical bird did have a part to play, but ah the the real story is a lot more complicated.
00:07:46
Speaker
i'll then I'll then go back to an earlier bird, that ah a mechanical bird that that Walt saw when he was 17 in World War I as a kid ah attacks ah tasked with telling people, VIP is there, ah what they should check out in the in France, and that was one of them. So he loved that that mechanical bird in ah in the Strasbourg Cathedral. It was part of the astronomical clock there. But neither of those birds you know gave birth to Jose and his pals at Disneyland. um the link The link is probably closer to Walt's love of mechanical toys in general, and probably even more so his love of miniatures, which is a hobby that he just jumped into ah full bore when he was in his 30s.
00:08:39
Speaker
So yeah, I go all the way back to those stories of Walt's love of of all of that. And that feeds into Disneyland and then later into, of course, the Enchanted Tiki Room.
The Tiki Room's Impact on Disney History
00:08:50
Speaker
So with your with your career in animation and doing the things you've done, what was the passion for you to come back to Walt and the Tiki Room? Because I have a personal tie to the Tiki Room. My daughter's initials are TK. We've all looked forward. It's older Tiki. um That's been a name we've called her since she was very young. And our first trip to Disney, she thought that was her room, you know, like we went in and it was Tiki's room. So yeah, yeah we we my connection. Yeah, too. So what's your connection to that? Because my connection to it is ah well, certainly bowled over by it when I was seven years old, but it was just the craziest, dappiest magic trick I'd ever seen.
00:09:38
Speaker
And then you know once I got into animation, it became ah it became about going back to Disneyland multiple times to to figure out figure it all out, sort of become a student of Disneyland, which is the same story that Brad Bird told tells in in in my foreword. My specific passion for the Tiki Room is is it as a as a pop culture masterwork. I think it's the most consequential ah theme park attraction of all time. I think it's certainly the most consequential theme park attraction at Disneyland. It's probably probably um the attraction that's most personal to Walt at Disneyland. And it changed everything. The moment it showed up, ah the trajectory of Disneyland changed forever.
00:10:23
Speaker
and um an entire industry yeah changed forever. use this um We have to put it in context. of The Enchanted Tiki Room is 1963. It's before all of these major blowout e-ticket extravaganzas like Pirates of the Caribbean and Haunted Mansion and Small World and on and on. The Disneyland before the Enchanted Tiki Room was a completely different animal that I assure you, A, you wouldn't recognize, and to B, you wouldn't think was that great knowing what we now knowing what we know Disneyland to be. So the moment the Enchanted Tiki Room came, it blew people's minds and opened up the door for all sorts of new automated shows and a run on high tech.
00:11:19
Speaker
Disneyland got more high tech, it got more fanciful, it got more um surprising and magical the moment that thing hit. And we go in and we cool off because it's a hot day today. Um, we're, we're, we're familiar with it, but back then, jaw dropping, life changing, almost a spiritual event for, for some of the people that went in there. I had the pleasure of checking out old photos from the early days and people's jaws literally are just fallen. So it's an important story.
00:11:56
Speaker
and And your important story has good words. And one of them what it was consequential. And I was like, oh my gosh, i' that's the question. I'm like, well, you you answered that. You went into detail. So you did a great job of explaining. You dropped words like consequential. well What does that mean? Well, it means exactly what you just described. It changed everything. yeah Man, what is there another great word that you I mean I don't know what do you what do you guys you know I was thinking today and and I write it in the book and I'm actually preparing a keynote slash PowerPoint a presentation that I'm about to give shortly and I think the important thing to realize too is
00:12:43
Speaker
the the the the the power of Walt's showmanship in that show, and that North Star that Imagineers continue to reach for today, but ah come you know often don't really hit, but it but it is their North Star, and that i that is to provide a guest's surprise, yeah to give them something they did not expect. Now, we've all seen the Enchanted Tiki Room, but again, it has 10. bona fide, you know, crazy over the top surprises. Yeah. 10 of them all in a row, where the people that saw it were like, didn't see that coming. Yeah. And they pile on to one another over and over and over again. um And that showmanship and that is not an easy thing to accomplish. um And it takes ingenuity and and patients and um
Walt's Showmanship and Disney's Element of Surprise
00:13:38
Speaker
a creative acumen. And that stuff is tough. itta And the Tiki Room did it. it is ah it is ah it's ah It's a masterwork in that vein.
00:13:50
Speaker
And I also wrote, them you know, I wrote the book, too, because I want to remind people that this thing is important because I have fear that, you know, again, like so much at at the parks, it's it might go away and it shouldn't because it's that important. They always say Disneyland is not a museum. It's not. It has to remain relevant. Right. But some things, some things feel like they're sacred. And if anything, if anything, that that deserves to be in a museum. Right. It's so personal. It is it is It's a work of art. Truly. And I think like words like that are capturing. So you you say words like consequential or I don't know, maybe you said whimsical earlier, whatever. But the sort of these these are words that are, I think, packed. They're packed. And so when you say words like that, it's like, oh.
00:14:41
Speaker
But when you unpack it, well thank you captures, well, you're well very welcome. But I think it captures our imaginations and our hearts. Right. Yeah. And um and I agree with you. And I wonder, here' here's here's my question now is like, well, OK, there. It seems like nothing is sacred right now, but yet everything is sacred at the same time. And that is the debate. It's like, well, it's not, this is not a snapshot in time and space and history where like we got to keep everything the same, but yet is there really good thought saying, well, do we want to just bulldoze everything to the ground either? And just like,
00:15:27
Speaker
You know, just, well, the thing is, you know you know, Walt, Walt, Walt got his, Walt was very, very personally involved with the enchanted TQ room, right down to the fact that it was built with his own money out of his own wallet. That was not studio money. That was his money that built that thing. Um, so, uh, undeniably passionate about it. And it really is a a snapshot of if you really dig deep into his personality and and his values and, um, and his, and his, his, the, the child in, in Walt. So Walt's gone now. And we have that quote that was written for him about like, well, you know, Disneyland will never be completed as long as there is imagination, yada, yada. Um, you know, we were going to keep building and changing.
00:16:12
Speaker
Um, Walt's not here anymore. And so we're, so we we are stuck with this, this conundrum, which is there is a thing in Disneyland that is all Walt, that is such an expression of, of him. Yeah. So personal. do what do we really adapt it for a different show do we should we turn it into a stroller parking lot yeah do we do we you know cancel culture it because we think of something like cultural appropriation right i would argue please no it's it is what it is right and uh what it is is
00:16:47
Speaker
amazing and worthy of we're worthy of being looked at like like a a wonder of the world yeah it it's a should answer and i think the should answer is no it's like should we and the answer is no we probably shouldn't do that because it it does carry with itself a richness of history and um Yeah. And you can update it. You could, you you know, you could tweak it here and there, but ah but do it with respect. And, you know, they cut a number from it. They, I think kind of, and a few minutes, it used to be what a seven, I don't even know how, it like three or four minutes they removed from it um in 2005, I believe.
00:17:26
Speaker
And you could actually return that cut number and dress it up for a new audience. And you could take the tiki room and and and and and dress it up to be um kind of a monument to to Walt and his creative sensibility and do that with with respect. So there are things you can do to keep bringing an audience in. But it's so funny because I had i had so many nightmares when I was writing this book about, oh my God, I'm gonna be, Finishing this book and the Disney Company will decide it to, you know, towards the place because of something they found, you know, upsetting. I had so many dreams like that. ah Thankfully, it's still there and I just celebrated it. its sixty first birthday fors Sixty-first birthday. And I do believe that the powers that be know what they've got there.
00:18:10
Speaker
But yeah, the fire under my hiney to write the book was so much about like people need people need to know now how important this is before they start. Yeah, tinkering with it. I love it. So I have a um I'm going to turn it over here. I'm going to turn it over right now. But I will say, so I don't have a lot of my video from a kid being in Disneyland, but one that I do have is being in the tiki room. And then you see little Jeff over here looking up in the tiki, tiki, tiki. And that and sometimes when I'm.
00:18:45
Speaker
How old were you, Jeff? Oh, probably like four years old. Wow. Yeah. I watched, I probably saw some Captain EO and then I went right over to the Tiki room and and I'm like, and it it really was. It felt like a spiritual sort of magic. Oh yeah. And you know what? my my I tell this story too. I think my first jaw drop at Disneyland was um going on Small World. I was five years old. And I grew up in Palos Verdes here in you know next to LA by the water and we got fog every morning. And so literally I had a gray childhood. Didn't go to theater. It was that. Going to Disneyland, no, didn't go a lot. But when we did, it was like, what? Five years old, I'm on small roll. And that is pageantry and color. And through the eyes of a five-year-old, it rearranges your brain cells. It does. it's
00:19:39
Speaker
And then sends me on a trajectory for the rest of my life into, you know, into this. yeah yeah um and with That stuff is powerful. And so I had a friend who brought his his kid to the small world for the first time. I think pretty much the same age. This was a while ago. And I said, take a picture of his face when he's on small world yeah ah and and save it. And he did. And it is that it is that look that like, yeah, ah that ah That is that is a rewiring of a child's brain. While it is happening. and So when you so so Jeff, when you talk about like, you know, someone took a video of you when you're seven, I don't know or how to watch it back. It's like, yeah, I could see my brain rewiring. But on playback on a 74 inch TV, whatever I i have now.
00:20:31
Speaker
The side note that i that i that i never met I've never mentioned ah on any podcast or with other people, and it's coming to me now, is is that magic of technology getting to a point where you can just suspend your disbelief. yeah And we don't do that anymore with a tiki room, ah but it was easy to do back in 1963. people initially were like, wow, a magic trick. But then four or five minutes later, it's just a bunch of birds putting on a show and they are in it. They are absolutely, they have absolutely bought into the magic of this. yeah And that is, that is the Disney company at its finest when it ah is able to put you in an experience where initially go, wow, the tech here is through the roof.
00:21:25
Speaker
But then you forget about it. There is a there is a show in England right now that will probably go over to ah it'll probably go over to Vegas. I've seen it twice where it's just a they're not real holograms, but it's it's an Ava concert. It's the Ava concert where it's it's a it's a digital show and the performers are up one stage back like they were. It is a it is a big fake Ava concert. And the tech is so unbelievable. yeah five The first five minutes, everybody's jaw is on the floor. And then for the rest of it, they're like, oh, I'm here at an Ava concert. These people are very old now, but they're very young on stage now. yeah And they are there. And I'm with them. And it feels very real and very now. That is magic.
00:22:15
Speaker
I love that. But now I'm gonna build a bridge to what you said. And then I'm gonna turn it over to Brian and and everybody else. ah You're gonna love this. Everybody's gonna love this. Here I go. So when my wife... Hannah. Her name is Hannah. She's never been, she never went to Disney, you know, back in the day, whatever. The first time she's ever been Disneyland World anything was back in 2021.
Host's Personal Tiki Room Memories
00:22:40
Speaker
So she's never been to the Tiki Room, but ah we went to both our, our, our, we went to Disney World in 2021. We went to Disneyland for a honeymoon and
00:22:53
Speaker
later. I think I forgot my wedding anniversary. But here's what I think is the cool thing, is this. Well, we stepped into that tiki room and you know, I could remember the first time she's now she she has no dog in the fight. This is the first time she's ever experienced anything like this. Now I do, I have video, I have the tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki room. I'm like, oh, oh, I was so excited. I'm like clasping the bottom of my seat. It is just, so I'm just so happy to be here. And you're right, it's hot as hell out there. I'm, but I'm just like,
00:23:37
Speaker
and i'm thinking of the videos that i have as a kid i'm thinking of all of this stuff no but she's not she's not she is experiencing this for the very very first time and and i'm just like i'm glancing over at her like this like What do you think, you know, during, she loved it. She loved it. And, and I, I agree. It's like, wow, there's so much technology is so amazing nowadays. Yeah. I took my nice i kept my remark yeah i took my niece and nephew,
00:24:15
Speaker
nephews to the tiki room, you know, not that long. They were older. So they were like, what, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, who knows how, you know, around there. So they were older and more jaded. Um, took them in the tiki room and I was just not going to tell them anything. yeah And, uh, one of them turned to me and and three words and those three words were like this. They they were, they, they were. They were perfect. she She turned to me and she says, Ken, what is this?
00:24:47
Speaker
ah what is Because you walk into a room and you know you don't really see the birds right away. You're just in a room and you're facing a central fountain. It just looks like a restaurant, which it was planned to be. ah yeah and you know It just looks like taxidermy up there if you even see them. So when she turned to me and said, what is this? I it was just, all I could think of is just, just wait. And the magic work, because, you know, again, everything starts to unfold in that room. And, um, and it was like, bang. yeah And so at the end, she's like, whoa, wow. That was amazing. Yeah. Same experience with my wife. So I digress. What do y'all, yeah it up and I know Matt is looking to fire up a question before his phone matt is struggling. Where is Matt? I'm sitting in the dark of my car. ah I'm trying to choose Matt man, but um the power is draining faster than it's charging. But you know better get some questions in because Matt, the word again.
00:25:50
Speaker
I love that there's a book about the Tiki Room. I love when we get these in-depth breakdowns of some of these classic attractions. i'm ah I'm a history teacher, so I love the history part, but I also am always fascinated when we get to talk to somebody that does something like this. when it comes to the actual process of how you did this like how did you find all of this information what was that process like kind of you you know i'm i'm assuming you had to reach out to tons of different people and dig through archives and do all this stuff to create a book like this what was that process like for you and do you have like any like oh this is a pretty cool story that i can share with you about creating this book
00:26:31
Speaker
um There's so many different things
Researching the Tiki Room Book
00:26:33
Speaker
I could say. First of all, you know you you when you write a book like this, you you initially think, oh, I should go use the disney go to the Disney Archives. Yay. and um Well, first of all, they would have never let me in because who who am I? um had they Had they let me in, had I actually been able to figure out how to do that, it's a double-edged sword. So that would have it would have been like, yay, Archives B, they would have been they would had every they would have had every lawyer that they had on me. And I would have to create I would have to write a story that wasn't what I wanted because they are very passionate about um kind of kind of holding on to some of the mythology. And I didn't want to write that book. The the book actually started with a collection ah for of of someone else. His name is Kevin kidney. And he used to work at Disneyland when he was younger and Kevin and his partner Jody have been like
00:27:29
Speaker
ah you know, headliners in the in the creation of a lot of collectibles. They've they've made parade they've they've designed parades. ah They restore a lot of ah old um Disneyland ephemera that collectors buy. their Their work is amazing. They've got their own art that they sell that is very Disney-centric, just beautiful stuff. So Kevin ah just had a collection of a material that he had gathered over many, many years. And we got to talking at a party I was at. And he was like, I have this great collection. You obviously seem to be as interested in the tiki room as I am. If you want to take a look at it, I've got you know got it on CD-ROMs. And I was like, ah cool. Yeah, sign me up. I'd love to look at it. And he said, I have no
00:28:16
Speaker
I have no idea what use this is to anybody, unless maybe they were going to write a book. And when he said that, I was like, you know, I've always wanted to read that book, not just a little bit a lot. Like, why hasn't anybody done a book on how they and China Tiki Room came to be? And thinking more and more about it with his collection, it was his collection was the tip of the iceberg, iceberg, there were plenty of other things I had to hunt down. But it was a great launching point. And ah eventually, after 10 years of plotting it out, I was like, I'm going to I'm going to write this book. um So the additional information like it's yeah, it's out there. There are old, you know, there there are books everywhere. They're all the pieces are kind of out there. And then there are private family collections and things like that. And and newspaper archives and magazine archives and
00:29:08
Speaker
And you you can find it, but it's a process and and it takes a long time. I bought things at auction that were helpful. One of the best pieces that I got was ah a tiki room, an early tiki room script that was owned by Bill Cottrell, who was Walt's right hand man at ah at Imagineering or WED. and that thing was chock full of just great information, less ah almost less in what was written and more in what he erased. So it's out there, it just it's like it's just you have to be a detective and right and you have to have time too. So I luckily did have
00:29:50
Speaker
I just gave myself a lot of time, you know, I forget when, you know, again, it took me about 10 years to plot it out and six years to write. But in those 10 years, I was gathering and gathering and gathering and thinking about how I was going to plot out the book. And but that that is a really, really good question. It's it's out there. You just have to dig, dig and dig and be patient. It is not an exact science. And now we don't really have to dig and dig. We can just go redo it. And you did all the hard work for us. And you know one of the most important things I learned too in creating this book ah or just being a historian ah was a timeline.
00:30:29
Speaker
The things that you, when you like see a date, when you see something, something out there, a bit of information and it's attached to a date, you start plotting out a timeline. And once you start to see that timeline, you actually see how the work flowed and how, how these things happened. And I swear I found out so many interesting things just by going, wait a minute, if this happened here and this happened here, that means that this thing must have happened in between. And, um, It's a big, giant puzzle, but but but plotting out that timeline and building it and building it and building it, that is that that was probably the most important document I ever had in creating that book because that starts to give you an idea of how to tell the story. It was a ginormous
00:31:19
Speaker
project, but so rewarding. And I feel like I learned so much that, you know, everybody's like, oh, another book, another book about Disney. Well, I was so delighted when I was writing this because I was like, you know, i'm finding out stuff that no one's ever written about. and And I'm plumbing the depths of Walt's creative process in ways other books haven't. I'm seeing how he worked and how these projects came to be, and that they don't just pop into people's heads. They are trial and error and they grow. They start as one thing, and then they turn into another, and then that turns into another thing. And it's all this back and forth and back and forth and that idea of, oh, if we can do that, can we do that?
00:32:02
Speaker
um so Yeah. it's Thank you, Matt, for that question. That's a good question. It's it's it's it's tough, but it is but that material is out there. Yeah. that is I have a question when you have a minute. um I was just going to say you were talking about terms and important words that would define the tiki room. Well, ah game changer is really a hyphenated word, but animatronics, it obviously is a game changer. um in 1963 that was the first animatronic as we know and I know it's not supposed to be a museum but I still feel like there should be you know the the regular Disney goer it would be nice if there was a plaque or something that uh tribute to the fact that it was the first animatronic and Walt's design I know I have
00:32:54
Speaker
raised my children on Disney. So my three boys in those carriers that are impossible to carry that we've seen women carrying around when you'd park the stroller outside. I remember bringing each of my boys in there in that carrier and putting it down and they were just in awe as you said. jaw drop at the birds and that was a do not miss. Well Don, Don I'm going to actually have your jaw drop a little bit. the cheekki The Tiki Room at Disneyland is the first audio animatronic presentation, musical review, but it wasn't the first audio animatronic presentation.
Evolution of Animatronics and the Tiki Room Show
00:33:27
Speaker
they um They used that word to describe animals that had been um put onto the mine train through nature's wonderland at Disneyland, which was a slow moving ride past ah a lot of outdoor ah creatures. and ah And they had just patented what I will call audio animatronics 1.0. It was a very, very crude implementation of audio animatronics, but they called it that. So technically, the first audio animatronic characters were on that ride. and They were simple. So the only thing that they did that that was sort of synced to audio was ah when their mounds moved
00:34:07
Speaker
the sound would come out and the sound would actually, that audio of and animatronics, that audio would actually flap their mouth open. And, you know, if they they could do another another movement too, like if it was synced to the mouth. um And I like to tell people too that there is a raven tree, a tree full of bird ravens outdoors, which are the actual first animatronic birds. So Jose and his pals at Disneyland weren't the first audio and metronic birds technically.
00:34:38
Speaker
yeah so um So by the time by the Tiki Room came out, they had a new patent that that allowed them to program many, many different movements on audio tape using little little blips and bleeps that what is called a tone read could hear. and then trigger additional movement. So it went from, oh, we can do one movement to we can program an entire room ah full of characters ah you know to to put on a musical review, all on audio tape, the music, the sound, the cues for the lighting, and the animation tech. But but yeah. well
00:35:19
Speaker
we if you if you want to If you want to call the... yeah Yes, the tiki room is the first fully push button presentation. ah The animals on the mine train through Nature's Wonderland were primarily cam-based, which means they just had short cycles. They just they just did their thing for 30 seconds or even less and repeated and repeated and repeated. ah they weren't And the cams ah could do that. ah They were not capable back then of anything longer than that. So the Tiki Room was able to take these figures and have them perform for an entire 20-minute show cycle, which was unbelievable at the time, using and using defense ah defense hardware to do it. That you know if walt if Walt had to have come up with that himself,
00:36:12
Speaker
the tiki room would have not happened because they just didn't have the funds to figure that out so there you go there's there's some information and then to me the uh dole whip i know that didn't come around for another 20 years but you can't enjoy the tiki room without a good dole whip hand in hand for me ah very cool yes people love that dole people love that dole whip No, I don't think you're wrong, though. That's the thing. It's like, you know, it it all fits together. And, you know, it's modern. Where are you where you grab your dole whip? Now you would originally have grabbed a separate ticket to the enchanted tiki room. ah During its earliest days, you actually had to buy a separate ticket ticket to that. Because since it was Walt's money, um the finances between the money that Disneyland Inc made and
00:37:06
Speaker
um Imagineering early in the early days had to be separated so You had to actually buy a separate ticket and you would buy them there where now you pick up your doll lip Wow 75 cents adult going to ask you how much 75 cents. Yeah, I think it was 75 cents, which back in 1963 was, you know, it was like seven bucks, eight bucks, 10 bucks above and beyond. So above and but and beyond what you would have normally paid. So people didn't know what this was. So how do you how do you get them interested in it? Well,
00:37:39
Speaker
One of the first things they did was they cartered out an animatronic bird and hoisted him above the entrance. He became known as the barker boer bird and he would tell people what this thing was and to come on, buy your ticket and come on in. um oh myness he was And he was there for he was there for a while. So yeah, can you imagine? and But those that did, those that were like, I don't know, that's okay, let's do it. Word of mouth was what it sold the tiki room initially. People would would go in and go, wow, you just have to go see this. So that was that was the way it was sold in its earliest days. You just told people that thing is miraculous. Get in there, buy that, buy that ticket.
Tiki Room's Origin as a Restaurant
00:38:18
Speaker
What happened to the fact that it was going to be a restaurant at one point? So yeah, it's most of its most of its. Most of its planning was all about it being a restaurant. They that is all giant rabbit hole, but.
00:38:37
Speaker
The building that they stuck on, ah well, there was one, okay, there was one, I'll just try to tell this as quickly as possible. There was one giant building that, to where one side of it faced Main Street and one side faced the Jungle Cruise. So you'd walk through the Main Street side and immediately were being fed onto the onto the the docks of the Jungle Cruise, where the boots were returning, not the dock, well, yeah. So the visual the visual like what the heck ah was awful and everybody recognized it but you know there was a lot of work to be done so eventually it was decided we're gonna just take this one building that shared one kitchen
00:39:21
Speaker
and we're going to have the Main Street side really be the Main Street side and the Jungle Cruise side. the ju and but what it But what it had was a scene. So one side of the building, as you're walking into an Adventure Line, you could clearly see it. You could see the thatch and the grass on one side and the ornate Victorian gingerbread on the other, and it just looked ridiculous. It looked like a schizophrenic building. And you know, Walt and his cronies every Saturday morning when they were walking the parks would see that, you know, like we got to fix, how do we fix that? ah Lots of things were broached, but eventually the tiki room became the Band-Aid.
00:39:54
Speaker
they didn't quite know what to do with the with that building band aid. It was going to be open, open air. And maybe you'd sit there and get a drink and listen to the music ah out ah you know towards the water. Then it was sealed in. Then it was like, we'll do a Tahitian tea room. And and then it it came time to like, well well, we need a sketch for how what the interior looks like. And that meeting was the most fortuitous meeting in the history of the enchanted tiki room because for no other reason than to decorate up the sketch and make it look pretty john hench who did it just put birds in there roosting
00:40:37
Speaker
And he didn't think anything of it. he He didn't think it was going to cause a problem. He just did it. It it made his sketch a little bit more interesting. And quite frankly, the sketch he did, ah as far as an interior of a tiki bar or restaurant of its day, didn't look any different from all the other sketches people were doing you know for Don the Beach Combers and all. it There was nothing really special about it. But what was unique is that he just decided to put birds in there. And Walt saw that and said, we ah what are you? What? Why are they there? take Why did you put them? And John Henshaw was a little bit you know little bit on edge around Walt. Had to think fast. And he did. He was like, well, they're not real birds. They're just stuffed birds. They're just decoration. And again, he's making that up at the time.
00:41:27
Speaker
and walt And Walt, and again i will tell I told this story too, was vehemently against any sort of taxidermy to anything at his park at that point. They had done it and it was disturbing to Walt. He didn't want that at his park. So he was like, we don't stuff birds and put them in our park. And John kept going. He's like, oh oh, no, they're not stuffed. And again, he's just making this stuff up as he goes. They're little mechanical birds. And that's when Walt lit up. And then the room lit up because Walt's like, well, we can do that. They had actually already worked on some mechanical birds, not only for the
00:42:01
Speaker
mine train ride, but they were working on some mechanical little birds that were working for this Chinese restaurant idea that was eventually mixed. So so Walt was like, yeah, we could do that. And that could be that could be really special. You're sitting in this restaurant and this happening. Again, very subtle happening, happens. You're just eating and maybe the lights dim. and then maybe the birds chirp one bird starts chirping a song and then another one picks it up over here and then it just snowballed from there. The mixing of the restaurant was many different reasons but probably the main reason was it just got to a point where um
00:42:39
Speaker
Walt was confident that no one would finish their meal. they they weren't going to And they needed to. If this thing was going to make money, restaurant goers needed to finish their meal quickly to let the next the next ah next group of people in. And he was like, this thing has gotten too extravagant and too cuckoo crazy for people to be able to easily leave. They're not. They're just not going to leave. so That was one of several reasons. um um And then he nixed the idea. But well into, well into, but I mean, the the the show was already doing test runs and and was doing just fine when, yeah, and when he changed his mind. And John Hench would have been this on this thing for a year plus designing for a restaurant ah to his dying day was upset about that. He was like, you can't, you can't design for one thing and change it so quickly at the end of the game. But,
00:43:35
Speaker
I don't know. The audiences who have adored the Enchanted Tiki Room probably had the last laugh on that count. yeah So, yeah. So, yeah. For most of its development, it was it was a restaurant. Very, very much a restaurant. What a story. I never knew that. I'm like, I feel my brain is about to explode. Well, you just need to read my book. I'm going to. I'm going to.
Conclusion and Invitation for Part Two
00:44:03
Speaker
Well everyone, that's it for part one of our conversation with Ken Bruce. Be sure to hit that follow button to catch part two next week and stay up to date on all of our latest episodes as they come out. We'd also like you to follow us over on our socials. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok at SharingTheMagicPod. Thanks again for tuning in, and until next time, keep sharing the magic.
00:44:35
Speaker
again