“Join us now in a presentation of the latest colossal in Mickey's illustrious career. Mickey Mouse, bigger and better than ever, appears in a completely new dimension, leading his friends in a medley of Walt Disney musical highlights.”
―Pre-show film narrator
Mickey Mouse Revue was an Audio-Animatronic musical show featuring Mickey Mouse as the conductor of an orchestra, with the orchestra members represented by various characters from several Disney animated films. It was meant as a tribute to Walt Disney, who had passed away five years earlier, and his animated characters.
Guests entered the attraction through a lobby painted in hues of rose and pink. The walls were lined with trompe l'oeil paintings of Mickey (and one with Minnie) in costumes from several of his more famous roles, from Steamboat Willie to The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Guests waited here before a host signaled that it was time to enter the pre-show theater. At that time, they were ushered through a small portal and into a room lined with several tiers of viewing platforms separated by lean rails.
The pre-show was an eight-minute film that traced Mickey's career and the use of sound in his films. The first portion of the film was narrated by an animated soundtrack that wiggled and jumped its way across the screen in time with the sounds it was making (an effect similar to one used in Fantasia and in The Three Caballeros, where Donald Duck gets mixed up in the soundtrack of a crazy Latin song.) At the end of the pre-show film, the focus was shifted to Mickey's role as the host of the Disney theme parks. The final scene was live-action footage of Disney costumed characters pouring out from the front of Sleeping Beauty Castle and dancing to a jazzed-up version of the Mickey Mouse March. Mickey came to the front of the scene and urged the guests to follow him into the main show theater as he said "Come along folks, it's time for the Mickey Mouse Musical Revue!".
Main show[]
The guests entered the main show theater through one of several pink automatic doors on the opposite side of the pre-show theater. The cavernous main show theater contained 13 rows of seats facing an 86-foot long stage. The proscenium was draped with a huge red curtain and flanked by two smaller stages resembling box seats. In the center of the curtain were Mickey versions of the traditional theatrical comedy and tragedy masks. Once everyone was seated, a host reminded everyone not to smoke during the show.
The room grew dark and the sound of an unseen orchestra tuning their instruments filled the room while the curtains opened. In the center of the stage, Mickey rose from a pit and into view on a bright red pedestal, with the orchestra soon rising around him.
At the conclusion of the overture, Dumbo's tuba intoned the first few notes of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?" as the wolf's shadow snuck across the rear curtain towards center stage. Further right, a section of the curtain rose to reveal the Three Little Pigs in a cross-section of Practical Pig's brick house. The pigs played and sang a few seconds of their signature song before the curtain closed on them and another section lifted to the left.
The next vignette featured Snow White and her forest animal friends sitting on a wooded hillside. She sang a version of "I'm Wishing". As Snow White finished, an adjacent area of the hillside came into view from behind another section of rising curtain. Here, the Seven Dwarfs stood in their cottage, playing "The Silly Song". The dwarfs sang part of the song with Snow White's help before the curtains lowered on their settings.
The next number was "The Three Caballeros", the show's most animated and comical segment. Gunshots were heard as the flying serape rose from the pit to the left of the orchestra. On the serape were Donald Duck, Panchito, and José Carioca. They sang their theme song in a blaze of music and color. Each shot fired from Panchito's pistols sent sparks of bright light streaking across the room. The three had barely begun their song when the lights went out on the serape. Instantaneously, Panchito and José appeared (still singing) on the balcony to the audience's right. Then Panchito fired his pistols again and the glow of the bullet raced across the stage, illuminating Donald on the left balcony. Donald shook his maracas vigorously and continued the song. With the sound of another ricocheting bullet, he disappeared and reappeared on the right balcony. Another shot and Panchito and José popped up where Donald had been just seconds prior. The three were soon reunited on the serape in time to finish their song and disappear as quickly as they arrived.
To the far left end of the stage, the curtain rose on the Fairy Godmother and Cinderella, who was dressed in her scullery maid outfit. The Fairy Godmother sang "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo" and waved her magic wand around. Soon, in a shower of twinkling lights, Cinderella was transformed into her princess incarnation. The curtain closed on them as a projection of Cinderella and Prince Charming, as silhouettes, danced across it in a spotlight, singing "So This is Love" as they waltzed with clusters of hearts framing them on the curtain.
When the projection faded out, Brer Fox, Brer Rabbit, and Brer Bear rose into view from the pit to the right of the orchestra, kicking off the show's finale by singing "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah". As they sang, the orchestra rose beside them, followed by the Three Caballeros reappearing and the rear curtain rising to reveal all of the show's scenes and characters at once. The houses of the Three Little Pigs and Seven Dwarfs were gone, leaving all of the characters contrasted against a brightening sky in the background, and Cinderella now stood with Prince Charming too. As everybody finished the song, a rainbow gleamed across the horizon to reveal a bright sunny field.
After that, the entire stage fell dark, save for a spotlight on Mickey. His pedestal rotated to the audience as the other characters wrapped up with "Mickey Mouse Club Alma Mater". After all the other characters disappeared, Mickey signed off by saying "Thank you, folks. That concludes our show. We hope you enjoyed it". Then, as he let out a little mouse laugh, he took a bow as the main curtain closed.
The first logo for Walt Disney Home Video (affectionately nicknamed the "Neon Mickey" by fans, and used from 1978 to 1986) uses a silhouette of the Mickey Mouse conductor used in this attraction.
A variation of the Neon Mickey logo was also used in 1978 to celebrate Mickey Mouse's 50th Birthday. The appearance of said variation shows the Mickey Mouse conductor's silhouette colored in red with blue lines outlining the animatronic's shape, giving it more detail.
This was the first Disney Parks attraction to feature an animatronic of Mickey Mouse and was also the only attraction to have this distinction until Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway opened 49 years later.
The same also applies to Minnie Mouse, Daisy Duck, and Pluto.
The Mickey Mouse conductor from this attraction served as the inspiration for the logo of Walt Disney Records.
Duplicates of the Alice, Mad Hatter, March Hare, and Flowers animatronics were used in the updated Alice in Wonderland ride at Disneyland when it reopened in 1984, a year after the rest of the "new" Fantasyland. The Alice figure used a new face and hair piece. However, this Alice figure is no longer in the ride, as it was replaced by a brand-new Alice figure during the ride's 2014 refurbishment.
One of the reasons the attraction got removed from Florida was because the representatives of the Oriental Land Co. began touring Disneyland and Walt Disney World in the 1970s and choosing the attractions that would comprise their new Tokyo Disneyland park, the Mickey Mouse Revue made their list. Of course, the least expensive means of achieving that would be to send the original overseas. Due to it being overshadowed by the Country Bear Jamboree, its exodus ultimately turned out to be an acceptable concession; it was the only attraction at either Disneyland or Walt Disney World that was shipped to, rather than replicated for, Tokyo.
This was the second attraction that was shipped over to another Disney park rather than being duplicated, with the first being the Carousel of Progress.
The molds used to create the Seven Dwarfs animatronics in this attraction were reused to create the Seven Dwarfs animatronics in the 1994-2012 Snow White's Scary Adventures attraction at Walt Disney World. Many of those figures are now found in the cottage near the end of the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and in Snow White's Enchanted Wish.
This was the only time Jimmy MacDonald voiced Mickey for an attraction.
Morty and Ferdy, Pinocchio, Geppetto, Humphrey the Bear, Horace Horsecollar and the Big Bad Wolf were originally planned to be part of the animatronic orchestra, but they were scrapped in revisions. But of course, Pinocchio and the Big Bad Wolf did appear at the end of the preshow and the latter only appeared as a shadow projection.
Tigger and the White Rabbit only appeared in the preshow but didn't appear in the show itself.
The original version of the attraction was supposed to include 86 Disney characters, but with five characters being scrapped, would end up with only 81.
The Mickey animatronic used in this attraction currently resides in the Walt Disney Archives.
This attraction marks the only time the following characters appeared as animatronics in the Disney Parks:
Baloo
Cinderella
Dumbo
Fairy Godmother
Goofy
Huey, Dewey, and Louie
Kaa
King Louie
Jaq and Gus
Ludwig Von Drake
Prince Charming
The Three Little Pigs
This attraction marks the first time Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Fox, and Br'er Bear appeared in animatronic form, predating Splash Mountain by 18 years.
Out of all 81 animatronics used in this attraction, 15 are known to still exist.
In 2007, during Tokyo Disneyland's Find Stitch! event, Stitch made a cameo appearance twice during the show: first during the Golden Afternoon number and then in the Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo number.
The original theater at Walt Disney World sat 500 park guests, but the pre-show area only had room for 300, which was a planning mistake.
The audio of Snow White singing "I'm Wishing" that was used for this attraction was also used for the queue of the Magic Kingdom version of Snow White's Adventures. Additionally, both attractions opened with the rest of Walt Disney World.
The attraction is referenced in Space Mountain, with one of the sectors being named after it.
Gallery[]
Disney World (1971-1980)
Tokyo Disneyland (1983-2009)
Mickey and Friends
Mickey Mouse
Dumbo and Timothy
The Three Little Pigs
The Seven Dwarfs
Alice and the Flowers
Donald Duck, Jose and Panchito
Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Fox, and Br'er Bear
The preshow area at Mickey Mouse Revue in Tokyo Disneyland
The Mickey animatronic on display at the D23 Expo
The refurbished Donald, José, and Panchito animatronics in the Gran Fiesta Tour attraction
Stitch's first cameo
Minnie Mouse
Malfunctions[]
On May 15, 1980 (its final year of operation in the Magic Kingdom), the attraction had several malfunctions, such as Timothy Mouse not moving, Rabbit's chair not moving (it moved just 10 seconds after the start of the attraction), Pluto's head not moving, etc.
Splash Mountain:Burrow's Lament • Little Brown Jug • Shortenin' Bread • Polly Wolly Doodle • Froggy Went a Courtin' • Shoo Fly (Don't Bother Me) • Goober Peas • Camptown Races • Dixie • Swing Low Sweet Chariot • When Johnny Comes Marching Home • Comin' Round the Mountain • Ol' MacDonald • Skip to My Lou • Freight Train Blues • Wabash Cannonball • St. James Infirmary • Tennessee Waltz • Show Me the Way to Go Home • Alabamy Bound • Down By the Riverside • My Old Kentucky Home • Blue Moon if Kentucky • Blue Ridge Mountain Blues • Carolina Moon • Deep River Blues • Goodnight Ladies • Honey Comb • Jailhouse Blues • Old Mill Stream • Salty Dog • Up a Lazy River • Tom Dooley • Oh, Susanna • John Henry • Sixteen Tons • I've Been Working on the Railroad • When the Saints Go Marchin' In • You Are My Sunshine
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