Plans for a Chinese Disney theme park surfaced even before Euro Disney had reached an agreement – Michael Eisner and his team were eager to further expand internationally, especially given the still very optimistic outlook on the European park in the late 1980s. In an LA Times article from May 21, 1987, Jim Cora, head of the Disneyland International division, stated that once Euro Disney would be completed in 1992, he would “get ready for China” (quoted in Galavante 1987: 2). It was clear Disney was aiming for several more inter-national theme parks at that time – allegedly, the company had even gotten an inquiry to build a park in what was then the Soviet Union (Galavante 1987: 2).
China had only recently allowed foreign visitors back into the country, and had re-integrated into the world economy under the “reform and opening up”
policy under Deng Xiaoping that began in 1978, following the death of Mao Zedong in 1976 (Pinggong 2007: 54). Yet it was already clear that China, just because of its sheer size, would become an important market. Tourism was one of the areas that the Chinese government pushed with favorable policies from the early 1990s on, by investing in the country’s preservation of natural and cultural heritage (Pinggong 2007: 3). They also fostered the construction of new tourist sites, leading to (mostly cultural) theme parks (such as the Folk Culture Villages in Shenzhen) to “[spring] up like bamboo shoots after a rain”
(Pinggong 2007: 4).
The struggle of Euro Disney likely contributed to the postponing of the Chinese Disneyland project for a few years, yet by 1996, “Disney appeared to be on the verge of announcing plans to build a park in Shanghai when the Chinese govern-ment suddenly ceased negotiations because the company had backed the film Kundun (1997) directed by Martin Scorsese, which dramatized the life of the four-teenth Dalai Lama and China’s invasion of Tibet” (Groves 2011: 138). Working with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) would continue to be difficult, and thus for the moment, Disney turned to what seemed to be the next best solution:
building a park in Hong Kong. This option had also been considered back in 1985 (Matusitz 2011: 670).
Hong Kong was and is a unique location. It had been a British colony from 1843 to 1997 and thus had developed largely independent from the rest of China.
During the 1946–49 civil war between the Communist Party of China (CCP), and the Kuomintang (KMT), the British government had restricted contact between the colony and the mainland. During the Cold War, Hong Kong was even integrated into the US’ Pacific strategic circle “to contain the potential threat of an emerging socialist China” after the PRC was founded in 1949 (Pinggong 2007: 54). The relationship with Mainland China hence was always complicated: when the Communist Party took over, many Chinese fled to Hong Kong (Fung and Lee 2013: 46). From 1951 on, Hong Kong people required entry permits to even be able to access Mainland China, and in the 1980s, there were still strict immigration controls. Yet on July 1, 1997, Hong Kong was officially handed over to the PRC, and British colonial rule ended, although the region continued to be (and still is) governed independently.1 Hong Kong was supposed to be democratized, but on June 30, 1997, the Beijing authorities dissolved the Legislative Council, and the Basic Law authorized also stipulated that the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government was to be elected by an electoral commission instead of a popular election (Choi 2010: 580). Thus, when the official negotiations between Disney and the HKSAR government got underway in 1999, the new administration had only officially been acting for roughly two years (Choi 2007: 139).
While there had been rumors in the media of talks between Disney and the HKSAR in 1998, the negotiations were initially held in secret, leading to criti-cism from legislators about their lack of transparency; an official announcement containing all the details was made only after the deal was reached on november 2, 1999 (Choi 2010: 578). The chosen location for the park was a 130-hectare location on Lantau Island, the largest of the islands that comprise Hong Kong (Groves 2011: 138) – most other potential sites would have “compromised the Disney experience” (Groves 2011: 138) because of surrounding high rise buildings.
Lantau Island was left untouched by comparison and only a mountain range now surrounds the park, which raised environmental concerns (Choi 2010: 574). Hong Kong Disneyland was a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company and the HKSAR government, called Hong Kong International Theme Park Ltd., that held ownership (Choi 2012: 393). Disney invested $316 million in the project and
1 It goes beyond the scope of this chapter to go into further detail on the long and compli-cated history between Hong Kong and Mainland China that also recently resulted in the violent protests in 2019 and 2020. It would make for a worthwhile study to also eventually chronicle the effects of these events on tourism in Hong Kong and thus also Hong Kong Disneyland in the long term.
received 43% stake in the company, HKSAR invested $419 and holds 57 percent (Groves 2011: 139); yet HKSAR also
Loaned Disney $718 million over 25 years; it spent $1.81 billion to build the new theme park; and it spent another $1.75 billion on associated infrastruc-ture works. The latter included a new rail link between Sunny Bay station on the suburban line and Hong Kong Disneyland capable of carrying over 7,000 passengers per hour. (Groves 2011: 139)
The Walt Disney Co. received royalties (10% on admission, 10% participant, 5%
merchandise, 5% food and beverage, and 5% hotel revenue), as well as a base manage-ment fee of 2% (Choi 2010: 578). Many thought of the deal as unfair (on 2006:
n.pag.), yet the government agreed to it because in the late 1990s, following the East Asian economic crisis, Hong Kong struggled with recession and a rise in unemploy-ment, and pushing tourism seemed a good strategy to counteract both of these issues (on 2006: n.pag.). Hong Kong Disneyland or HKDL, as it is often abbreviated, was not just going to attract visitors (an estimated 5.6 million during its first season) (Matusitz 2011: 670), but was also expected to create up to 30,000 jobs (Matusitz 2011: 670), and “produce an estimated US$19.2bn boost to the economy over 40 years, equiv-alent to 6% of gross domestic product” (Hills and Welford 2006: 48). Thus, besides environmental concerns and the non-transparent negotiations, the project apparently received overwhelming public support (Choi 2010: 574), and consequently, “[f]acing a fait accompli and fervent public approval of the HKDL project […] the Legislative council approved” (Choi 2010: 579) the deal and Hong Kong Disneyland begun its official planning phase. The ground-breaking ceremony took place roughly three years later, on January 12, 2003, a date picked with the help of the Chinese almanac that promised luck and prosperity for the venture (Groves 2011: 146).
Designing Hong Kong Disneyland
To all who come to this happy place, welcome. Many years ago, Walt Disney introduced the world to enchanted realms of fantasy and adventure, yesterday and tomorrow, in a magical place called Disneyland. Today that spirit of imagination and discovery comes to life in Hong Kong. Hong Kong Disneyland is dedicated to the young and the young at heart – with the hope that it will be a source of joy and inspiration, and an enduring symbol of the cooperation, friendship and under-standing between the people of Hong Kong and the United States of America.
With these words, spoken by Michael Eisner and Donald Tsang, then Chief Exec-utive of HKSAR, Hong Kong Disneyland was officially opened on September 12,
2005 (another date picked in accordance with the Chinese almanac). HKDL was planned as a rather small and modest park in the beginning, much different from the lavish Euro Disney – possibly to avoid the issues the high cost of this park had caused. Its design resembled the original Disneyland in Anaheim with few glocal-ization efforts. The most obvious concession to local culture was the consultation of feng-shui experts. “Feng-shui is the ancient Chinese system of siting buildings in the landscape in order to obtain good fortunes for their inhabitants. […] While the Chinese Communist Party banned feng-shui on Mainland China, it thrived under British rule in Hong Kong” (Groves 2011: 143). Yet, as architecture scholar Derham Groves has pointed out, Disney’s design strategies were in many ways already close to feng-shui practices (such as the avoidance of outside intrusions) (2011: 144) and its influence is hardly noticeable. The cooperation with feng-shui experts was thus done out of respect for the local culture, but also for marketing purposes – besides Groves’ academic account of it, it was also frequently positively mentioned in press coverage of the park (Ashman 2005: n.pag.). other Chinese elements (besides Fantasy Gardens in Fantasyland) were not integrated into the park, even though the HKSAR government had suggested to do so, yet apparently Disney rejected this idea so that the park “should provide an authentic [Ameri-can] experience for visitors” (Fung and Lee 2013: 49). only the food served in the park is mostly Chinese or of other Asian origin, and the official languages spoken are Mandarin, Cantonese, and English. Hence, Hong Kong Disneyland followed a similar idea as Tokyo Disneyland had – providing an authentic American, and most importantly, an authentic Disney(land) experience – “Disney wants tourists to feel as though they were visiting the original park in Anaheim” (Fung and Lee 2013: 45). Yet a short overview will show that the Hong Kong park lacked many attractions in comparison to Anaheim and thus was, at least when it first opened in 2005, a comparatively cheap theme park that saved Disney money and time in its design. Glocalization really is almost only reflected on an operational level, such as through food and beverage offerings. no wonder that as soon as the park opened, “a significant number of Hong Kongers believed that the HKSAR had been shortchanged by Disney, which the Hong Kong media eagerly pointed out at every opportunity” (Groves 2011: 139).
Starting at Main Street, U.S.A., the entrance area to Hong Kong Disneyland closely resembles the quaint, charming street of the original Disneyland park, down to the Disneyland Railroad departing its circle around the park from here.
Smaller changes were made to some of the locales, such as the Corner Café at the right end of the street toward the Central Plaza. The Corner Café, in addition to Chinese and American dishes, serves afternoon tea, a British tradition highlighting the Hong Kong setting more than the Midwestern, turn-of-the century theming – a trend that continues throughout the park. The Plaza Inn, however, while looking
the same from the outside, now resembles a Chinese restaurant as one would find it in the United States and thus tells a story of Chinese immigrants in America.
Aside from that, Main Street, U.S.A. is in almost all regards a carbon copy of its Anaheim counterpart. It feels more expansive because of the unusual vista of the mountain range right behind Sleeping Beauty Castle, but also less lively, as it lacks many of the transportation vehicles of the other Main Streets.
Sleeping Beauty Castle, the park’s icon, as usually found on Central Plaza, had originally been another clone from Anaheim. Yet, in november 2016, as a reaction to the opening of Shanghai Disneyland, the park announced expansion plans until 2023, including a milestone of any Disneyland to date, the re-design of its castle set to open in 2020. This was likely motivated by the need to have a bigger and more imposing offer in comparison to Shanghai Disneyland’s icon, especially as allegedly, there had been a miscommunication and the HKSAR government had thought that the park would feature the more lavish Cinderella castle from Florida and Tokyo. It is unclear if this means the castle will eventually be rechristened, but it definitely signals a change for the park to become more unique.
Leading away from Main Street, U.S.A. to the left, Adventureland makes up the biggest part of Hong Kong Disneyland, and features the unique design choice of placing the Jungle Cruise’s rivers at the center of the land, making it overall feel lusher and fitting to its subtropical location. As there is no Frontierland in Hong Kong Disneyland, the rivers of the jungle also stand in for the Rivers of America. The Jungle Cruise also is one of the attractions where the park’s loca-tion is most recognizable – guests can enter different queues according to their preferred language; Mandarin, Cantonese, or English and will be guided by a skipper narrating in either of these. The Tarzan Treehouse (a rethemed version of the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse that can also be found in Anaheim since 1999) is surrounded by the rivers and can only be accessed by boat, similar to Tom Sawyer Island in the American and Japanese parks. The Festival of the Lion King show, based on the animated film from 1994, rounded out the attractions found at Adventureland on opening day. As of 2018, the section also features a live show based on Moana (2016).
In 2013, as part of a first wave of significant expansions to the park, Mystic Point opened. It is a unique land that thematically ties in with the adjacent tropical jungles of Adventureland and the colonial backstory of the Jungle Cruise (Surrell 2015: 51). Its backstory is connected to a narrative surrounding the fictional Society of the Explorers and Adventurers (S.E.A.) that can also be found in the aforementioned Tokyo DisneySea theme park, as well as in the now-defunct Explorer’s Club Restaurant in Euro Disneyland/Disneyland Paris, among other attractions. It is a conscious effort on part of Walt Disney Imagineering to prac-tice transmedia storytelling across its parks (Mittermeier 2020a). The land’s main
attraction is Mystic Manor, which takes on the function of the missing Haunted Mansion. Much like in Japan, the attraction had to be changed because of Chinese views of ghosts, who believe spirits should be “honored and respected – and avoided at all costs!” (Surrell 2015: 49), and is more lighthearted in tone. It is housed in a uniquely styled building, a “Colonial British traveler’s house with worldwide influences as varied as Lord Henry’s travels: Gothic arches, Cambo-dian temple features, and a Russian onion dome,” (Surrell 2015: 53). The ride makes use of a trackless ride system to tell the original story of Lord Henry Mystic, a collector of rare artifacts, and member of S.E.A. and his monkey Albert, who curiously opens an enchanted music box and brings to life all the artifacts in the house. In addition to the ride system (also used in Tokyo Disneyland’s Pooh’s Hunny Hunt), it makes use of sophisticated audio animatronics and is set to orig-inal score by composer Danny Elfman.
Frontierland was completely absent in the original design of Hong Kong Disn-eyland, possibly because of the perceived lack of resonance with Chinese culture.
Yet, since 2012, Grizzly Gulch de facto makes up for this, as it is themed to an abandoned mining town. It however does not feature any of the well-known Frontierland attraction staples. As Imagineer Joe Lanzisero has put it: “It wasn’t a traditional Frontierland, by any means, but it certainly possessed the same kind of feeling” (quoted in Surrell 2015: 48). It is home to a unique roller coaster ride, Big Grizzly Mountain Runaway Mine Cars, set in an area reminiscent of the California Sierra nevada Mountains during the gold rush days, and follows a storyline of grizzly bears wreaking havoc in the mine. It combines the theme of Big Thunder Mountain and Disney California Adventure’s Grizzly Peak raft ride (Surrell 2015: 48) and thus presents a Western theme largely devoid of any kind of frontier ideology.
Hong Kong Disneyland’s Fantasyland features the usual remediated attractions such as Dumbo the Flying Elephant, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, and Cinderella Carousel, yet pales in comparison to other Fantasylands around the world, as it lacks many of the other classics. Even It’s A Small World was not added until 2008; likely because it is a fairly elaborate attraction and consequently expensive to build. However, the only truly unique attraction in Hong Kong Disneyland as it was on opening day can be found in Fantasyland: The Fantasy Gardens, an elaborate Chinese garden where guests can take pictures with Disney characters “to satisfy the Chinese public’s passion for taking photographs” (Groves 2011: 142). While such meet and greet locations are a feature of all Disney parks, the feng-shui styled garden is unique to the Hong Kong park. The overall design of the land follows in the footsteps the medieval fairground theme of its Californian counterpart, but because of its small size, feels rather uninspired and is overall much less immersive than other parts of the park.
In 2011, the first bigger addition to the park was the Fantasyland-adjacent Toy Story Land, themed to the Pixar movie franchise of the same name that features several attractions aimed at smaller children. As it is also found at Disneyland Paris’ second park, Walt Disney Studios, it was a rather cost-effective expansion.
A Frozen (2013)-themed land is slated to open in 2021, further expanding on the Fantasyland area; it will feature two headliner attractions, a clone of Epcot’s Frozen Ever After dark ride, as well as a roller coaster called Wandering oaken’s Sliding Sleighs.
Another rather uninspired land here is Tomorrowland, as it does not pay so much homage to the original Anaheim Tomorrowland than to its post-1994 rethemed incarnation and the lack of thematic coherence that came with it. Its design is so lacking because it does not truly present any visions of the future – the only attractions found here on opening day were clones of the American parks’
Space Mountain, the orbitron spinner ride and Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters, an interactive attraction based on the Toy Story movie franchise that had become a staple of all the Tomorrowlands after it first opened at the Magic Kingdom in 1998. In 2006, the land received two new attractions, Stitch Encounter, an inter-active movie presentation mostly aimed at children (and presented in Cantonese, Mandarin, and English), and a modified version of the original Autopia. Hong Kong Disneyland’s version is the “first Autopia powered by electricity instead of gasoline” (Choi 2007: 289). According to Kimburley Choi, “[l]ocal Disney production staff objected the suggested use of electricity because Hong Kong’s hot and wet weather is not suitable for electricity-powered racing cars. nevertheless, the US-based Disney Imagineers insisted on the new Autopia” (2007: 289). This apparently led to the attraction having problems and being delayed (Choi 2007:
289) – the electric cars were likely an attempt at infusing Tomorrowland with a bit of actual visions of the future, yet it seems the attempt was overshadowed by more pressing problems of the present.
Recent expansions have focused on the Marvel Cinematic Universe that also brought much needed variety to the attractions roster, but replaced both the Buzz Lightyear ride and Autopia. The Iron Man Experience, a 3D-motion simulator ride, as well as an Iron Man character greeting opened in 2017, followed in 2019 by Ant-Man and the Wasp: nano Battle!, an interactive target shooting ride. An Avengers-themed attraction has also been announced for 2023, rounding out the offerings of what is overall called the Stark Expo Hong Kong. Much like the afore-mentioned S.E.A.-themed attractions, the Marvel lands, such as the upcoming Avengers Campus at Disney California Adventure park in Anaheim, will narra-tively tie in with each other and foster transmedia storytelling.
Recent expansions have focused on the Marvel Cinematic Universe that also brought much needed variety to the attractions roster, but replaced both the Buzz Lightyear ride and Autopia. The Iron Man Experience, a 3D-motion simulator ride, as well as an Iron Man character greeting opened in 2017, followed in 2019 by Ant-Man and the Wasp: nano Battle!, an interactive target shooting ride. An Avengers-themed attraction has also been announced for 2023, rounding out the offerings of what is overall called the Stark Expo Hong Kong. Much like the afore-mentioned S.E.A.-themed attractions, the Marvel lands, such as the upcoming Avengers Campus at Disney California Adventure park in Anaheim, will narra-tively tie in with each other and foster transmedia storytelling.