MickeyBlog News for November 1, 2020
Welcome to November! Yes, Halloween’s in the past, and we’ve almost completed this accursed year.
Sadly, 2020 won’t go down without a fight. So, I have more frustrating information to share with you in the latest edition of MickeyBlog News.
Walt Disney World Lays Off 18,000
I’m at Walt Disney World right now, and I’m pleasantly surprised to say that cast members are as kind and helpful as ever.
I’d wondered about that because these thoughtful workers have plenty of reasons for low morale.
The job’s MUCH harder during the pandemic – I’ve seen several jaw-dropping examples of it – and everyone knows about the impending layoffs.
Park officials dropped a bombshell the other day when they confirmed that 18,000 layoffs will occur at Walt Disney World.
Since Disney had previously announced a total of 28,000 layoffs, that number sounds devastating both in total and as a percentage.
The recent update revealed that 11,350 union members would lose their jobs, almost all of whom currently work at Walt Disney World.
There’s a Sword of Damocles aspect to this story in that some layoffs won’t occur until New Year’s Day.
Yes, some of the workers don’t know whether they’ll have a job at the start of the year in the already devastated Central Florida job market.
Word leaked in slow drips at first, as various Disney show performers told friends and loved ones about their plight.
The Actors’ Equity Association, the same group that Disney struggled to negotiate with earlier this year, has since stated a shocking fact.
Among its Walt Disney World members, 720 out of 780 have received layoff notifications. You can imagine the far-reaching implications of this information.
Longstanding shows like Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue and the Citizens of Hollywood have lost their entire cast.
Hoop-Dee-Doo dated back to the Gerald Ford administration in 1974. It had survived any number of tourism slumps, but it couldn’t overcome COVID.
More about the Shows
I don’t want to dwell on this too much. However, you’re probably wondering which shows will remain offline due to these layoffs.
Here’s a park by park list:
Disney’s Animal Kingdom
- Festival of the Lion King
- Finding Nemo – The Musical
- Pandora Utility Suit experience
I was actually at this park earlier today and can confirm that Disney is still operating UP! A Great Bird Adventure Show.
Also, that baby gorilla at Gorilla Falls is adorable…and driving its mother crazy.
Disney’s Hollywood Studios
- Beauty and the Beast – Live on Stage
- Citizens of Hollywood
- Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular
- Green Army Men (the Toy Story Land experience)
- Trials of the Temple (Jedi Training Academy)
- Voyage of the Little Mermaid
Rumors had suggested that Disney had killed Voyage of the Little Mermaid even before this turn of events.
As for Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, it’s apparently used up all its nine lives.
EPCOT
- Voices of Liberty
Oddly, EPCOT feels more active than the other parks now, at least with regards to live performers.
The reverse had been true as recently as July.
Magic Kingdom
- Citizens of Main Street
- Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor
Disney has suggested that many of its shows will return once normalcy returns to society. I sincerely hope that’s true.
New Rise of the Resistance Procedure
So, there I was the other day. I was standing in line at Soarin’, stuck in a part of the building with spotty WiFi.
Suddenly, I got a message that Disney was changing the procedures for acquiring Boarding Groups at Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance.
Since we were scheduled to visit Disney’s Hollywood Studios later in the trip, I tried and tried without success to get the information.
As fate would have it, the new change doesn’t impact me, as it goes into effect the same time that we’re on a plane back home. Such is 2020.
Something chaotic could blow up your plans at any point…or not.
Here’s the deal. Starting on November 3rd, Disney will modify the Boarding Group booking process.
On that morning, guests at Walt Disney World should load the My Disney Experience app at (really, a couple of minutes before) 7:00 a.m.
The catch here is that you no longer need to be in Hollywood Studios when you do so.
From now on, guests across the Disney campus may access the digital queue.
The only catch is that you must possess a Park Pass to Hollywood Studios on the applicable day.
As long as you do, you may enter the Boarding Group section and book a FastPass from the comfort of your hotel room or bus or boat or wherever.
This method obviously adds convenience to the booking process. However, it will lead to some grumpy folks at the park who lose the lottery.
As a reminder, if you fail to snag a Boarding Group at 7 a.m., you still have the backup option at 2 p.m.
Disney can change the policy because it recently added plexiglass barriers on the ride. So, Rise of the Resistance seats two parties to a cart now.
Disneyland Paris Closes Again
The more things change, the more they stay the same during life in the age of COVID.
This past week, Disneyland Paris became the second Disney theme park to reopen for a time, only to close later.
The most popular paid tourist attraction in Europe, this park reopened at the same time that Walt Disney World completed its restart on July 15th.
Since then, analysts have politely described sales as sluggish, while the pandemic has stubbornly refused to vanish.
This past week, President Emmanuel Macron accepted the advice of health officials and introduced a second nationwide lockdown for all of France.
The President stated that his country risked being “overwhelmed by a second wave that no doubt will be harder than the first.”
So, here we are. Disney couldn’t very well operate a tourist attraction with the entire country on lockdown, which is why Disneyland Paris closed initially.
On October 30th, the parks remained closed for the first time since mid-July.
Meanwhile, Disneyland Paris executives are evaluating how to proceed in an impossible circumstance.
Disney lovers and European tourists (yes, there are still some) have requested that the parks open during the holiday season.
Currently, Disney intends to honor this request.
Presuming that nothing changes – which isn’t a safe presumption – Disneyland Paris will reopen on December 19th.
Guests with reservations may visit the parks from that date through January 3rd.
After the holidays, Disneyland Paris will close again until February 13th.
Assuming all goes well, that’s the current plan.
Hong Kong Disneyland, the other park that has experienced something similar, has reopened twice now, most recently on September 25th.
Nobody on the planet has settled on the best way to combat COVID.
Okay, I’m off to ride something fun. Have a great week, everybody!