Moviemaking also was changing in America in the early s. Audiences were diminishing for the family films that had been the mainstay of the Company for many years, and Disney was not meeting the competition for films that attracted the huge teenage and adult market.
To reverse that trend, Disney established a new label, Touchstone Pictures, with the release of Splash in The efforts to keep the company from being broken up ended when Michael Eisner and Frank Wells became chairman and president, respectively. The new management team immediately saw ways for Disney to maximize its assets. The Company had left network television in to prepare for the launch of a cable network, The Disney Channel. Films from the Disney library were selected for the syndication market, and some of the classic animated films were released on video cassette.
Using the sell-through technique, Disney classics soon reached the top of the all-time best-seller lists. The late s brought new innovations to the Parks. More resort hotels opened in and Filmmaking hit new heights in as Disney, for the first time, led Hollywood studios in box-office gross.
Disney moved into new areas by starting Hollywood Pictures and acquiring the Wrather Corp. In merchandising, Disney purchased Childcraft and opened numerous highly successful and profitable Disney Stores.
Disney animation began reaching even greater audiences, with The Little Mermaid being topped by Beauty and the Beast in which was in turn topped by Aladdin in Hollywood Records was formed to offer a wide selection of recordings ranging from rap to movie soundtracks. Disney purchased Discover magazine, the leading consumer science monthly.
Over in France, the park now known as Disneyland Paris opened on April 12, Eagerly anticipated, the beautifully designed park attracted almost 11 million visitors during its first year.
Disneyland Paris is complemented by six uniquely designed resort hotels and a campground. The Disney success with animated films continued in with The Lion King , which soon became one of the highest-grossing films of all time. Toy Story pioneered computer-animation techniques, and was followed by successful sequels. In , Disney ventured onto Broadway with a very successful stage production of Beauty and the Beast , followed in by a unique staging of a show based on The Lion King and in by Aida.
By restoring the historic New Amsterdam Theatre on 42nd Street, Disney became the catalyst for a successful makeover of the famous Times Square area. By , there were more than Disney Stores worldwide, and by that number was up to In Florida, the first home sites were sold in the new city of Celebration, located next to Walt Disney World.
Eventually, 20, people would call Celebration their home. The years that followed saw the release of a group of very popular live-action films, such as Mr. A major attraction was the Kilimanjaro Safaris , where Guests could experience live African animals in an amazingly accurate reproduction of the African savannah.
An Asian area opened at Animal Kingdom in Back in California, Tomorrowland at Disneyland was redesigned in As the world moved toward a new century, Epcot became the host of Millennium Celebration, Test Track the longest and fastest Disney park attraction opened, and other attractions were revised and updated.
Continuing collaborations with Pixar brought the computer-animated blockbuster Monsters, Inc. DVD releases became increasingly popular, especially when the company began adding generous amounts of bonus material for viewers. For the first time, in , Walt Disney Parks and Resorts opened two new theme parks in the same year.
The new park celebrated the history, culture, and spirit of California, with areas ranging from a Hollywood Pictures Backlot to the amusements of Paradise Pier. Joining it was an upscale shopping area, Downtown Disney and the Grand Californian Hotel, celebrating the Craftsman style of architecture. Across the Pacific in Japan, Tokyo DisneySea opened in September, looking to the myths, legends, and lore of the ocean as the inspiration for its attractions and shows.
March saw the opening of another foreign park, Walt Disney Studios, featuring the history and lore and excitement of the movies, adjacent to Disneyland Paris. Ground was broken in January for Hong Kong Disneyland.
In October, Mission: Space opened at Epcot to great acclaim, and the following month the Company celebrated the 75th anniversary of Mickey Mouse. Senator George Mitchell became chairman of the board, and movie theaters welcomed The Incredibles. A major anniversary came in as Disneyland celebrated its 50th, and all of the Disney theme parks joined in a Happiest Celebration on Earth. Robert A. Disney parks celebrated the Year of a Million Dreams with special promotions.
In the summer, Disney acquired Club Penguin. Then, all the way on a stage under the sea, The Little Mermaid opened on Broadway. The big news in was the acquisition of Marvel Entertainment. The films Up which would win two Oscars , the first Disneynature film, Earth , and with a return to hand-drawn animation, The Princess and the Frog, were in theaters that year.
In business news in , the Company sold Miramax. Alice in Wonderland and Toy Story 3 were released, and they would go on to win two Oscars each. Also on movie screens were Tangled and Tron: Legacy. The big corporate news was the acquisition of Lucasfilm Ltd. The beginning of saw a big achievement for Tokyo Disneyland.
After 12 years, fans were able to travel back in time to see Mike and Sully go to school in Monsters University, and hearts melted in November when audiences adventured into the world of Arendelle for the first time with the Academy Award-winning film Frozen.
It was also a good year for films when the Company introduced audiences to a new, yet familiar set of horns when Maleficent premiered. Guardians of the Galaxy and Big Hero 6 flew into theaters and were critical and box-office smashes. Snow White soon became the highest grossing film of all time, a record it held until it was surpassed by Gone With the Wind.
The short cartoons paid the bills, but Walt knew that future profits would come from feature films. Work immediately began on other feature projects, but just as things were looking rosy, along came World War II.
The next two features, Pinocchio and Fantasia, were released in They were technical masterpieces, but their costs were too high for a company losing most of its foreign markets because of the war. Dumbo was made in on a very limited budget, but Bambi, in , was another expensive film, and caused the studio to retrench.
It would be many years before animated features of the highest caliber could be put into production. His studio concentrated on making propaganda and training films for the military.
When the war ended, it was difficult for the Disney Studio to regain its pre-war footing. Walt also moved into live action production with Song of the South and So Dear to My Heart, but because audiences expected animation from Walt Disney, these films included animated segments.
Walt opened some new doors by beginning the award-winning True-Life Adventure series featuring nature photography of a style never seen before. The Company was moving forward again. After two Christmas specials, Walt Disney went onto television in a big way in with the beginning of the Disneyland anthology series.
This series eventually would run on all three networks and go through six title changes, but it remained on the air for 29 years, making it the longest-running primetime television series ever. Walt Disney was never satisfied with what he had already accomplished. As his motion pictures and television programs became successful, he felt a desire to branch out. One area that intrigued him was amusement parks.
As a father, he had taken his two young daughters to zoos, carnivals and other entertainment enterprises, but he always ended up sitting on the bench as they rode the merry-go-round and had all the fun. He felt that there should be a park where parents and children could go and have a good time together. This was the genesis of Disneyland. After several years of planning and construction, the new park opened July 17, Disneyland was a totally new kind of park.
It has been used as a pattern for every amusement park built since its opening, becoming internationally famous, and attracting hundreds of millions of visitors. Walt said that Disneyland would never be completed as long as there was imagination left in the world, and that statement remains true today.
New attractions are added regularly, and Disneyland still is as popular as it was in The s saw the release of the classic 20, Leagues Under the Sea, the first in a series of wacky comedies The Shaggy Dog and a popular TV series about the legendary hero Zorro. Plans that Walt left behind carried the company for a number of years under the supervision of Roy Disney.
The Jungle Book in and The Aristocats in showed that the Company could still make animated classics, and The Love Bug in was the highest grossing film of the year. Disney got into educational films and materials in a big way with the start of an educational subsidiary in After the success of Disneyland, it was only natural for Walt to consider another park on the East Coast.
Prior to his death the Company purchased land in Florida, and the Walt Disney World project, located on some 28, acres near Orlando, was announced. It opened October 1, In Florida, the Company had the space it lacked in California. Finally there was room to create a destination resort, unencumbered by the urban sprawl that had grown up around Disneyland. Walt Disney World would include not only a Magic Kingdom theme park like Disneyland but also hotels, campgrounds, golf courses, and shopping villages.
It did not take long for Walt Disney World to become the premier vacation destination in the world. Roy O. While he died before the plans could be refined, they were brought out again in a few years, and in ground was broken for the new park in Florida.
Epcot Center, a combination of Future World and World Showcase representing an investment of over a billion dollars, opened to great acclaim October 1, WED Enterprises later renamed Walt Disney Imagineering , the design and development division for the parks, had several projects in the works during the early s.
As a premium channel, The Disney Channel would air week-long previews four times a year, as well as two free preview weekends periodically with ads targeted to non-subscribers , in the same manner as other premium channels, such as WarnerMedia's HBO and Cinemax and ViacomCBS's Showtime.
On December 1, , Disney Channel began broadcasting on a hour-a-day schedule. Outside of daytime programs for children, the network also aired movies and original specials largely concert specials , largely during the nighttime hours. Early in , the musical sitcom Kids Incorporated , about a preteen and later teen-to-young adult group of friends who formed a pop group, mixing their everyday situations with variety-show and music video style performances.
It became a hit for the channel, spawning many future stars in both music and acting during its year run, including Martika who went by her real name of Marta Marrero in the show's first season , eventual Party of Five co-stars Scott Wolf and Jennifer Love Hewitt billed as Love Hewitt , and Stacy Ferguson, nicknamed Fergie, of The Black Eyed Peas. In , Good Morning, Miss Bliss , a starring vehicle for Hayley Mills of Polyanna and The Parent Trap fame, made its debut; the series was cancelled after 13 episodes due to low ratings.
In early , the channel revived one of the company's early TV staples with The Mickey Mouse Club , which was an immediate hit that proved Disney's basic variety show formula could still work, unlike in the short-lived s revival.
The latest version contained many of the classic elements from "theme days" to updated mouseketeer jackets, but the scripted and musical segments were more contemporary. By , The Disney Channel had a total of about five million pay subscribers nationwide.
In , eight cable providers volunteered to move The Disney Channel to their expanded basic cable packages, instead of offering it as a premium channel; Jones Intercable was the first provider to carry the channel as a basic network, initially carried on the Basic Plus tier on its Fort Myers and Broward County, Florida systems as a test run. Soon after, other cable systems began to transition the channel to their basic tiers, either as an experiment or full-time.
Even as larger multiple system operators, such as Cox Communications and Marcus Cable began to offer The Disney Channel on their basic tiers, Walt Disney Company executives continued to deny any plans to convert the channel to an ad-supported basic service, referring to the switches to basic on some systems as part of a five-year "hybrid" strategy; allowing providers to offer it as either a pay service or a basic service.
Also in , The Disney Channel experimented with multiplexing its service, rather than broadcast three channels of its service like HBO did that same year, The Disney Channel instead tested a two-channel multiplex service to two cable systems. By , Nielsen Media Research estimated that a third of its subscriber base were adults without children in the home; and by , The Disney Channel's subscriber base had expanded to 15 million cable households.
On April 6 , , Disney Channel transitioned to a premium network to a basic network and took on a revamped look and dropped the word "The" in the network's name however, promos often referred to the channel as simply "Disney" and the logo often omitted the "Channel" in the network's name , and split the network into three programming blocks: Playhouse Disney , comprising shows aimed at preschoolers; Vault Disney, featuring classic Disney material, such as Zorro , The Mickey Mouse Club , the Walt Disney anthology television series, older television specials and features, such as The Love Bug ; and the most distinct one, running from afternoon to late evening for teenagers, called Zoog Disney , which used anthropomorphic characters called "Zoogs", who resembled robots but the Zoog characters were given human voices as its hosts.
The Zoog Disney block was introduced in August , shortly after the Toon Disney cable channel was launched. The Zoogs' original looks were two-dimensional, though they were redesigned in , with a more three-dimensional design and mature voices, but were phased out after less than a year.
A new channel logo which featured a s-era Mickey Mouse on a black Mickey ear-shaped TV , was also introduced in The channel also began to carry break interruptions without any commercial advertisements, but promos for network programming and eventually promotions for Disney-produced feature film and home video releases ; the reasons for the channel's decision not to include traditional advertising in its programming include the possible confusion to younger viewers as to the difference between its programming and advertisements, and to prevent increases in license fees for the channel to broadcast feature films however while the channel does not air standard ads, Disney Channel does utilize underwriter sponsorship by companies, such as Best Western and Mattel for its programs.
In , Disney Channel began notifying the remaining cable operators who still offered the network as a premium service that they must begin carrying it on their basic cable tier or cease to carry it altogether, saying it would not renew re-transmission contracts with providers that would choose to carry the network as a pay service, this included Time Warner Cable and Comcast that were the last remaining major cable providers offering the channel as a premium service.
By , Disney Channel was available to approximately 70 million cable and satellite subscribers, largely consisting of those who already received the channel via a basic tier as well as what remained of the subscribers that paid an additional fee for the channel. By this time, the music videos and concert specials that the channel ran since the , re-brand were dropped, citing the inability to receive a stake in the revenue from artists' CD sales and lack of exclusivity for the videos; soon after, the channel began to incorporate music videos from songs featured in Disney's feature films and performed by artists on Radio Disney and signed by Disney's in-house record companies Hollywood Records and Walt Disney Records.
By , Disney Channel was seen in 80 million cable homes nationwide. That September, Disney Channel was gradually remodeled once more. The "Zoog" brand name was phased out from on-air usage, though it continued under separate website until , when it was merged with Disney Channel's main website.
On September 9, , the Vault Disney block was discontinued, primarily to contribute to the network's new "hip" image, in favor of same-day repeats of the channel's original programming and off-network series; as a result of Vault Disney's discontinuance, for the first time in the channel's history, Disney Channel did not feature any programming targeted at adult audience—with the only programming that intentionally targets the entire family being the channel's primetime feature films as of June , Disney Channel is the only one out of the four largest children's cable networks in the United States that does not target a dual audience: kids in the daytime, families and adults at night; Nickelodeon, The Hub now Discovery Family , and Cartoon Network each feature program blocks that target such a dual audience.
Primetime movies were also cut to one each night from two. The channel also stopped producing drama and reality series, shifting focus to live-action sitcoms and animated series.
On October 7, , Disney Channel introduced a new on-air appearance with a new logo designed by CA Square using an outline of Mickey Mouse's head as its centerpiece that was adopted by its international sister channels in May , and unveiling a new graphics designed to fit the network's new look. After these changes, Playhouse Disney was the only one of the three blocks introduced in to continue airing; however, it was re-branded as Disney Junior in Moreover, Disney Channel started a bumper which is still used today.
Every actor must introduce themselves and most actor will say which series or movies are they from. After that, they will say: "You're watching Disney Channel! Anne Sweeney, a veteran cable executive, took control of Disney-ABC Television Group in and successfully remade Disney Channel into "the major profit driver in the company. Around the same time, while Disney Channel's intended target audiences were preschoolers, preteens, and young adolescents, the channel began to make teen idols out of some of the channel's stars, gaining popularity outside the main target audience, as it created increased competition with ViacomCBS-owned Nickelodeon.
In , Disney Channel released its first ever musical made-for-cable movie called The Cheetah Girls ; it received 84 million viewers worldwide.
The success of The Cheetah Girls led to the creation of other music-themed original programming, such as the original movie High School Musical and the original sitcom Hannah Montana. In , That's So Raven became the network's highest-rated series since the network's move to basic cable, as well as being the first Disney Channel Original Series to beat the episode limit becoming the channel's longest-running original series at the time, and became the first to spawn a spin-off Cory in the House , which was cancelled midway through its second season.
In , Disney Channel limited the number of original movie and series premieres to four movies and two series premiering over the course of the calendar year. The channel abandoned its uniform schedules for weekday and weekend afternoons with the exception of the 7—8 p. ET time period , to run a five-hour at one point six-hour schedule featuring hour-long blocks of various original series and the off-network programming that remained on the channel with the schedule changing each day.
That year, the channel modified its on-air presentation. Its logo turned into a ribbon, swirling around the screen until forming the Disney Channel logo instead of bouncing around the screen. Promo cards and bumpers were changed to an abstract atmosphere with ribbon theming and themed to the programs, as opposed to abstract objects bouncing and moving in the screen.
Instead of the Disney Channel logo popping up into a bumper and delivering a message, the ribbon swirled up, formed the logo, and another ribbon swirled out with the message. Also, when Disney Channel's on-air presentation changed that year, the female announcer voiced by Liza del Mundo was removed entirely. Promos for the next program began to only advertise the program airing afterwards and were moved from between shows to near the end of the last promo break of an episode, while a ribbon banner promoting the current program and the two programs afterwards now appeared on the bottom of the screen after the end of each promo break from 11 a.
In September , slightly modified versions of these graphics were introduced for high definition. The channel also moved its original series, mostly the live-action shows, from late afternoon to prime time on weekends from 8—9 p. The Friday block is preempted when a Disney Channel Original Movie is scheduled to premiere that night. The Saturday block has aired on a periodic basis since the change and now serves as a block repeating past week's new episodes.
The Sunday block was added in January In July , Disney Channel extended its Friday lineup to two hours in primetime from 8—10 p. ET, dropping the primetime movie.
A double-movie feature which was added on Saturday nights, which was mostly dropped in March and fully dropped by early Two series debuted in , the That's So Raven spin-off, Cory in the House which ended after two seasons a possible casualty of the Writer's Guild strike, which caused freshman or sophomore series whose production was interrupted midway through the season to eventually be canceled , and the popular Wizards of Waverly Place , starring Selena Gomez , David Henrie , and Jake T.
The four original movies for each featured at least two stars from Disney Channel's original series. Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie also became the highest-rated cable program of excluding sporting events , premiering to The premiere of the crossover special Wizards on Deck with Hannah Montana involving Wizards of Waverly Place , The Suite Life on Deck , and Hannah Montana also beat out its competition both cable and broadcast network programming on the night of its premiere with 9.
The new logo, released May , is the Disney Channel logo encased in a rounded box which looks like a smartphone application icon ; the point was so that Disney could put the logo more towards the middle of the screen like they did with the logo , but with the logo. It came into use on May 7, , though the logo was first seen in March , and at the time, was exclusively used on the weekend evening lineup, with a slow roll-out of a new imaging campaign that was completed in that month's Memorial Day weekend.
Disney also started their campaign "It's On! The logo is still used sometimes in old promos for shows shows that started before the new logo , and bumpers in between shows.
In , the channel launched its first original sitcom intentionally targeted at family audiences: Good Luck Charlie , starring Bridgit Mendler and Jason Dolley Cory in the House , a series some have compared to the shows on sister network ABC's former TGIF comedy lineup of the s. Jonas returned as Jonas L.
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