Was Country Bear Jamboree brought to Disneyland due to its popularity in Florida and built in record time?

[wityblack]

I miss when there were more animatronic shows. American Adventure at Epcot is probably my favorite thing to do at the park, yet it's almost always empty. Muppet-Vision struck a perfect balance between media and animatronics.

 

[TP2000]

Now I gotta find some other Disneyland cold cases you can look into.

So, are you opening a tab with the bartender, or how are we working this exactly?

 

[DL-fan]

So, are you opening a tab with the bartender, or how are we working this exactly?

I’ll keep throwing Disney theme park questions out there until one stumps you.

 

[DL-fan]

One thing I’ll never understand is why Disney execs decided to just take out Country Bear Jamboree all together. You knew the attendance numbers were down and that it was a tough location to have them in. Why didn’t they replace it with Pooh a year and a half prior and use one of the two theater’s props and animatronics and relocate them to Grizzly Peak. You knew you were gonna have a land dedicated to California’s bears, it was the perfect fit.

This way you have a little bit of that Disneyland synergy and magic in the park and it’s in a more prime location that’s easier for guests to find. The show already had California Beach Boys style songs and could have easily changed to a more California themed show instead of vacation themed. I think it would have done well in DCA and would’ve given that park some of that much needed Disney Magic. In hindsight I just feel it’s one of those unforgivable Disney things because it just didn’t have to go the way it did.

I know the park already was putting in Muppet-Vision and it’s Tough to be a Bug! but an argument can be made that the park could use all the family friendly attractions it could get at the time. One other thing I didn’t understand was how could you take out the Country Bear Jamboree ahead of a movie based on the attraction which was coming out literally within a year of its closing? I know the film was god awful but still.

 

[Distorian]

One thing I’ll never understand is why Disney execs decided to just take out Country Bear Jamboree all together. You knew the attendance numbers were down and that it was a tough location to have them in. Why didn’t they replace it with Pooh a year and a half prior and use one of the two theater’s props and animatronics and relocate them to Grizzly Peak. You knew you were gonna have a land dedicated to California’s bears, it was the perfect fit.

This way you have a little bit of that Disneyland synergy and magic in the park and it’s in a more prime location that’s easier for guests to find. The show already had California Beach Boys style songs and could have easily changed to a more California themed show instead of vacation themed. I think it would have done well in DCA and would’ve given that park some of that much needed Disney Magic. In hindsight I just feel it’s one of those unforgivable Disney things because it just didn’t have to go the way it did.

I know the park already was putting in Muppet-Vision and it’s Tough to be a Bug! but an argument can be made that the park could use all the family friendly attractions it could get at the time. One other thing I didn’t understand was how could you take out the Country Bear Jamboree ahead of a movie based on the attraction which was coming out literally within a year of its closing? I know the film was god awful but still.

Funny enough, I was just thinking this exact thought on my walk home this afternoon. California has a strong country music tradition with such artists as Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakam, Linda Ronstadt, Jon Pardi, Molly Tuttle, and Gene Autry, to name a few. If I have the time later I might drum up a potential tracklist for such an attraction. Off the top of my head, "California, Here I Come," "Folsom Prison Blues," "Theme from Zorro," "San Fernando Valley," "I Left My Heart in San Francisco," "Route 66," and "California Sun" all seem like good candidates to be represented within such a show.

 

[Distorian]

Here's my theoretical setlist for a California themed Country Bear Jamboree:

"California, Here I Come" by Al Jolson (verses 2, 3, and 4) - Five Bear Rugs (~1:00)
"California Dreamin'" by the Mamas and the Papas (verse 1 and chrous) - Wendell (0:40)
"Streets of Bakersfield" by Buck Owens (verses 4 and 5) - Wendell and Henry (0:35)
"Two More Bottles of Wine" by Linda Ronstadt (verse 1)- Trixie and Gomer (0:35)
"Route 66" (verses 1, 2, and 3) by Chuck Berry - Liver Lips McGrowl and Gomer (~1:00)
"King of the Surf Guitar" by Dick Dale (verse 1, 2, and 3) - Liver Lips McGrowl and the Sun Bonnet Trio (1:10)
"California Nights" by Lesley Gore (verses 1 and 2) - Sun Bonnet Trio (1:15)
"San Fernando Valley" by Bing Crosby (verses 1 and 2) - The Five Bear Rugs (0:40)
"So Sang the River" by Bill Staines (verse 4, chorus) - Ernest the Dude and the Five Bear Rugs (0:30)
"I Left My Heart in San Francisco" by Tony Bennett (verses 2 and 3) - Teddi Bara and Henry (~1:00) (SF)
"California Sun" by The Rivieras (verse 1 and chorus) - Terrence the Shaker (0:25)
"Act Naturally" by Buck Owens (verse 1) - Big Al (0:25)
"Theme from Zorro" by The Wellington- Henry and Sammy (0:30)
"California Girls (Bears)" by the Beach Boys (verses 1, 2, and chorus 2x) - Cast (~1:00)

Here's a long list of songs I also considered but chose against for one reason or another:
"San Diego" by Charlie Walker, "The Hills of California" by Johnny Mercer, "Folsom Prison Blues" by Johnny Cash, “Roving Gambler,” "California Blue" by Roy Orbison, "California Zephyr" by Hank Williams, "Hooray for Hollywood," "Pacific Coast Highway" by The Mama and the Papas, "California Soul" by Marlena Shaw, "Back to California" by Carole King, "26 Miles" by The four Preps, "The Little Old Lady from Pasadena" by Jan and Dean, "Avalon" by Natalie Cole, and "Do you Know the Way to San Jose" by Dianne Warwick.

Like I said before, there's a lot of potential with a California themed Country Bear show. I did try to get each region of California represented, but I didn't end up having anything for Napa Valley (perhaps "Heard it through the Grapevine" by the California Raisins could work lol) or San Diego. It is definitely favorable towards SoCal, but I figure the show would be in SoCal so that's not too big of a problem. I did manage to get representation for the Sierra Nevada in the set list with "So Sang the River," a great folk song with a violin backing that I thought would work well for Ernest. My main goal was to tie the songs to the singers. Of this my favorite is "California Sun" for Terrence with its drum beat and references to twisting and shimmying; I found it to be just a perfect fit. All in all, the music only runs for roughly ten minutes, which still provides a couple minutes for dialogue and other necessary pacing moments, but overall the show should be under fifteen minutes which seems to be the ideal length based on recent CBJ changes.

Was this the best use of my time? No. Did I have fun? I guess. Do I think this is a good idea? Absolutely. Make it happen, Josh D'amaro.

 

[TP2000]

My goodness, Distorian, that idea is brilliant!!! Truly brilliant. And here I thought I was the only one on this website who could rattle off Lesley Gore's lesser known hits in casual conversation. Impressive! Only thing I'd add is perhaps a version of "I Love LA!", maybe sung by Henry uncharacteristically wearing RayBans for that number.

Building on your brilliant idea.... using the new technology, have each show have a few songs that can be instantly swapped around and changed. So the show perhaps starts the same, ends the same, and has a couple standards in the middle; but also has 2 or 3 songs from your suggested repertoire that rotate randomly for the amusement of the local (Magic Key) audience.

Kind of like they do with Guardians Of the Galaxy's songs. You never know what mid-show songs you'll get!

Honest to God, they pay TDA execs big money, they pay Imagineers big money, they all waste money at supersonic speed, and here we are on a backwater message board coming up with better ideas after Midnight than they've ever had!

 

[TP2000]

I just checked, and I had no idea that Disneyland and Anaheim's Katella Avenue featured so heavily in the 1983 music video for "I Love LA!".

Fun Fact & TP2000 Brush With Greatness: In the 2000's/2010's, I went to several parties at the Stovall home. The Stovall family owned several of the highly-themed Best Westerns around Disneyland, including the Cosmic Age shown in this music video below. Mrs. Stovall always played the grand piano as a treat for her party guests, and was a genuinely warm and lovely person.

Now "I Love LA!" has to be included in our repertoire for a California Bears show, it just has to.

What a fun video! And such a fun snapshot of early 1980's LA, on the cusp of the '84 Olympics and a wonderful era for that city.

I only wish the current LA had this same sort of sunshiny optimism and unique style today, with the '28 Olympics only 2 years away. Instead of the decay and destruction now found from Santa Monica to Boyle Heights and other locations in this video

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

I'm not necessarily doubting those of you that were actually there, but basically everything you ever hear about the Bears was that it never really pulled its weight in California.

The low attendance numbers to the land was cited as a reason for building Splash. And they certainly didn't just put in the different versions of the show purely out of the goodness of their hearts.

So was it really just a precipitous decline in popularity in the mid/late eighties, or were the numbers fairly steady throughout the bulk of its run in spite of how people tend to talk about it performing at DL?

The entire problem (IMO) was them changing the name of the attraction from Country Bear Jamboree to Country Bear Playhouse in the mid 80s (which Knott’s had a Knott’s Bear•y Tales Playhouse that was a walkthrough attraction by the late 80s also) , the signage not being able to decide to call it Country Bear Playhouse, Country Bear Theater (which the signage ‘inside’ called it, not outside, Tokyo called their’s Country Bear Theater which made it clear it was a sit down theater show and not an indoor playhouse or walkthrough attraction) and whether it was the Country Bear Vacation Hoedown or Country Bear Vacation Jamboree seemingly couldn’t be decided , and they kept a version of the show that was proven to be not as popular in FL. They switched back to the original show in ‘92 in FL, but kept the not as popular or memorable Vacation Hoedown in CA throughout the rest of its run for some strange reason (despite the sign outside clearly displaying.. the ‘original’ show designs for the characters (Zeke, Big Al, and Tennessee) & without rotating between all 3 shows like TDL has and still does to this day.

It also doesn’t help that in the early-mid 90s, they rethemed the Crocodile Mercantile gift shop to a Pooh Corner store (why they didn’t place that in Fantasyland where it’d actually fit, I’m not entirely sure.). Would most expect to find Country Bear Jamboree merchandise inside a Pooh Corner store? Probably not, and why they couldn’t have simply sold Pooh merch there alongside CBJ & Splash Mountain merch at the time (if they honestly insisted on it), I’m not so sure.. and by that time, CBJ merch to my knowledge wasn’t even being made or sold much in that store anymore by that point. There was a beanbag plush set titled simply as “Critter Country” but it was a mixed up set of Country Bear character that had some dressed in their original show outfits, and the others as Vacation Hoedown. Not a coherent set or two separate sets that made sense. So weird..
but yeah, I believe that ultimately is what led to its downfall to be replaced with a Pooh ride that honestly is totally mixed up and makes no sense. Really. It starts with the narrator saying Pooh’s off in search of honey, then the show scene doesn’t even show Pooh reaching for Honey at a beehive like WDW’s, he’s just got a balloon near a tree. Then the flood/rain scene happens, and ‘then’ we meet Tigger and we see Pooh begin to have the nightmare of Heffalumps and Woozles (which is in reverse from the actual film it’s based on. Why or how they managed to get that mixed up, I’m not sure). But then that nightmare seemingly ends happily w Pooh eating honey in the honey tree.. (which.. isn’t what happens in the film, he wakes up to find the flood happening) and Piglet tells Pooh to wake up to celebrate… his birthday party rather than a hero party for rescuing Piglet from the flood. Thanks to the now needlessly mixed up story. And while I understand say, Alice in Wonderland doesn’t quite have its scenes in full order, I can understand how the two story space for each scene would account for some limitations perhaps. That and the nature of Alice in Wonderland isn’t supposed to have a specific order really. It’s just crazy scene after crazy scene. But here, I feel there’s no excuse. Florida’s was able to make coherent sense no problem in comparison. Oh yeah, and they’ve replaced Paul Winchell’s audio of Tigger w Jim Cummings in Anaheim’s for some strange reason. Despite them deliberately using Paul Winchell in the WDW version because they were upset he got taken off The Tigger Movie because, according to that film’s producers, his voice didn’t sound like Tigger anymore. This story can be recounted in the Magic Journeys book by Kevin Rafferty and Jim Hill in one of his podcasts. But yeah..

Ultimately, I feel had they simply continued to rotate the shows, merchandise the bears correctly, and market it better. We wouldnt have had the cheap, mixed-up Pooh ride replace the Country Bears.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

And as others have said.. they had 2 theaters there. Why they couldn’t have simply ran both the original ‘and’ vacation hoedown shows or put another show or Pooh show or whatever in the second theater while keeping the Country Bears in the other. Again, not sure.
Though admittedly, their mixed-up 2002 Country Bears movie they came out with to “bring attention back to them) (stupidly ‘after’ they closed the show at DL) had mixed-up & a downsized number of characters, now realistic bears (who look like they came out of a Chef Boyardee commercial about taming the hungry beast part of you) rather than the distinctly Disney looking bears found in the show, part of a country rock band rather than regular country show performers (with Zeb looking like a cross between Tennessee & Big Ted, Teddi Berra being named Trixie for whatever reason, Tennessee looking nothing like Tennessee, etc.) and headed by a director that honest to God, didn’t love or was a fan of the attraction. He even said so upon being interviewed (you can find it if you look for it). And Terri Hardin who performed Big Al in the film, even has gone on record to say the execs ruined that film. They cut a scene where Big Al was supposed to sing his iconic “Blood on the Saddle” song from the original show. Yup, cause that makes a whole lot of a sense.. Such a mess..

They had backstories and everything for the bears in the old record album, etc. , great designs & humor by one of Disney’s greatest animators & designers of all time behind some of Disney’s most popular characters to implement.. and instead they said, “nah, go and mix that up in ways that make no sense instead and deliberately make it ‘not’ like the characters and show people love. That’s a brilliant idea!” And who woulda guessed, it failed. As the old saying goes, that so many up in Burbank & Glendale seemingly still don’t understand, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. This stuff was designed the way it was for a reason. No kidding when you go and mess with things you make a point not to understand & change the core of, despite being marketed as the same thing you love. It fails. It doesn’t cater to its built in fanbase, it lacks love & passion, and it doesn’t get the reach to others because it’s deliberately trying to be something it isn’t. Go figure

Btw, one last thing, funny how they could keep Pooh & Friends the exact same characters we know with proper integrity & love put in their features made at the time, produced in full traditional hand drawn animation. But yet the Country Bears, get a mixed up live action movie that takes none of their backstories, designs & intent of their show & behind all the characters into proper consideration making it. Good grief

 

[Distorian]

While walking to the library in the downpouring rain, a few more songs came to mind. "It Never Rains in Southern California," by Albert Hammond, "Country Boy (You Got Your Feet in LA" by Glen Campbell, and "Meet me in Montana" by Marie Osmond and Dan Seals, particularly verse 2 and the chorus for Teddi and Henry. I wouldn't actually swap any of my setlist for these numbers, but just to keep exposing the trove of potential in such a show.

 

[DL-fan]

The entire problem (IMO) was them changing the name of the attraction from Country Bear Jamboree to Country Bear Playhouse in the mid 80s (which Knott’s had a Knott’s Bear•y Tales Playhouse that was a walkthrough attraction by the late 80s also) , the signage not being able to decide to call it Country Bear Playhouse, Country Bear Theater (which the signage ‘inside’ called it, not outside, Tokyo called their’s Country Bear Theater which made it clear it was a sit down theater show and not an indoor playhouse or walkthrough attraction) and whether it was the Country Bear Vacation Hoedown or Country Bear Vacation Jamboree seemingly couldn’t be decided , and they kept a version of the show that was proven to be not as popular in FL. They switched back to the original show in ‘92 in FL, but kept the not as popular or memorable Vacation Hoedown in CA throughout the rest of its run for some strange reason (despite the sign outside clearly displaying.. the ‘original’ show designs for the characters (Zeke, Big Al, and Tennessee) & without rotating between all 3 shows like TDL has and still does to this day.

It also doesn’t help that in the early-mid 90s, they rethemed the Crocodile Mercantile gift shop to a Pooh Corner store (why they didn’t place that in Fantasyland where it’d actually fit, I’m not entirely sure.). Would most expect to find Country Bear Jamboree merchandise inside a Pooh Corner store? Probably not, and why they couldn’t have simply sold Pooh merch there alongside CBJ & Splash Mountain merch at the time (if they honestly insisted on it), I’m not so sure.. and by that time, CBJ merch to my knowledge wasn’t even being made or sold much in that store anymore by that point. There was a beanbag plush set titled simply as “Critter Country” but it was a mixed up set of Country Bear character that had some dressed in their original show outfits, and the others as Vacation Hoedown. Not a coherent set or two separate sets that made sense. So weird..
but yeah, I believe that ultimately is what led to its downfall to be replaced with a Pooh ride that honestly is totally mixed up and makes no sense. Really. It starts with the narrator saying Pooh’s off in search of honey, then the show scene doesn’t even show Pooh reaching for Honey at a beehive like WDW’s, he’s just got a balloon near a tree. Then the flood/rain scene happens, and ‘then’ we meet Tigger and we see Pooh begin to have the nightmare of Heffalumps and Woozles (which is in reverse from the actual film it’s based on. Why or how they managed to get that mixed up, I’m not sure). But then that nightmare seemingly ends happily w Pooh eating honey in the honey tree.. (which.. isn’t what happens in the film, he wakes up to find the flood happening) and Piglet tells Pooh to wake up to celebrate… his birthday party rather than a hero party for rescuing Piglet from the flood. Thanks to the now needlessly mixed up story. And while I understand say, Alice in Wonderland doesn’t quite have its scenes in full order, I can understand how the two story space for each scene would account for some limitations perhaps. That and the nature of Alice in Wonderland isn’t supposed to have a specific order really. It’s just crazy scene after crazy scene. But here, I feel there’s no excuse. Florida’s was able to make coherent sense no problem in comparison. Oh yeah, and they’ve replaced Paul Winchell’s audio of Tigger w Jim Cummings in Anaheim’s for some strange reason. Despite them deliberately using Paul Winchell in the WDW version because they were upset he got taken off The Tigger Movie because, according to that film’s producers, his voice didn’t sound like Tigger anymore. This story can be recounted in the Magic Journeys book by Kevin Rafferty and Jim Hill in one of his podcasts. But yeah..

Ultimately, I feel had they simply continued to rotate the shows, merchandise the bears correctly, and market it better. We wouldnt have had the cheap, mixed-up Pooh ride replace the Country Bears.

These ride layouts are from Parklore.com:

Disneyland:

Magic Kingdom:

You can see how much more space the WDW version has compared to DL’s. It was literally shoehorned into CBJ which is why scenes are all over the place with no particular order because there was no master plan and more of a mix and match depending on the space. The DL version runs about 3 minutes but goes at a slow pace while the MK version runs at 4 minutes.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Disneyland:
It was literally shoehorned into CBJ which is why scenes are all over the place with no particular order because there was no master plan and more of a mix and match depending on the space. The DL version runs about 3 minutes but goes at a slow pace while the MK version runs at 4 minutes.

All the more reason it never should’ve been done. Terrible replacement for the CBJ and just a poorly made ride overall.
Why they couldn’t have simply put a Pooh show at the Fantasyland Theatre, again, not sure. Merch could’ve been sold near there which would’ve fit the area, and we wouldn’t have had to worry about the Country Bears leaving DL.
And now with the Hungry Bear Barbecue Restaurant and the Big Al statue at DCA, it seems only right/fitting that they return to Disneyland at some point. I’d prefer the original theatre (this time actually called a theatre rather than a playhouse) show return but hey, ya know how at some point, how the plan was to have something called the moonshine express for the log flume. (One section of the land is where you had the nice bears playing music, the other you had bad bears making moonshine. You were supposed to be hired by a sheriff bear to stop a group of bad bears making moonshine, etc. (would’ve been a shoot up ride similar to Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters) but it would’ve been tied into the same Country Bear universe & had the same Marc Davis stylizations, etc.). Well, why not say, add some theming to Grizzly River Run by expanding it to there instead of the log flume.. and while you don’t have to follow the same exact story. You could still do something in the Country Bear Jamboree style that’s original that basically acts as an expansion of that universe, etc. w funny/humorous characters & scenes, etc.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Always felt they could’ve made this character actually star in the ride. If you were to simply do Marc Davis styled/staged audio-animatronics of this guy, give him a name and include some friends/fellow bear river rafters w him, acting as an expansion of the Country Bear Jamboree characters & universe, I think it’d work wonderfully.
(Maybe he could be the unseen stage hand, Rufus from CBCS & CBVH (Christmas Special & Vacation Hoedown), river rafting is his main hobby/occupation, but his job as a stage hand at the Country Bear Theatre is just a additional job he has. He isn’t the best at it (of course) but it pays the bills. Lol

 

[DL-fan]

All the more reason it never should’ve been done. Terrible replacement for the CBJ and just a poorly made ride overall.
Why they couldn’t have simply put a Pooh show at the Fantasyland Theatre, again, not sure. Merch could’ve been sold near there which would’ve fit the area, and we wouldn’t have had to worry about the Country Bears leaving DL.
And now with the Hungry Bear Barbecue Restaurant and the Big Al statue at DCA, it seems only right/fitting that they return to Disneyland at some point. I’d prefer the original theatre (this time actually called a theatre rather than a playhouse) show return but hey, ya know how at some point, how the plan was to have something called the moonshine express for the log flume. (One section of the land is where you had the nice bears playing music, the other you had bad bears making moonshine. You were supposed to be hired by a sheriff bear to stop a group of bad bears making moonshine, etc. (would’ve been a shoot up ride similar to Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters) but it would’ve been tied into the same Country Bear universe & had the same Marc Davis stylizations, etc.). Well, why not say, add some theming to Grizzly River Run by expanding it to there instead of the log flume.. and while you don’t have to follow the same exact story. You could still do something in the Country Bear Jamboree style that’s original that basically acts as an expansion of that universe, etc. w funny/humorous characters & scenes, etc.

If it were to ever come back, it would most definitely be the same version that WDW has now

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

If it were to ever come back, it would most definitely be the same version that WDW has now

Fair enough, though.. I wonder if there’s any way they could play both the Original show in one theater ‘and’ the new Musical Jamboree in the other. And alternate between the Christmas & Vacation shows every once in a while. If Liverlips is still such a problematic name (despite him infact not being a negative depiction of an african american, his song is sung by a caucasian white man and he, from my knowledge, was never designed or intended as a racist characture. All he had was big lips, just like Big Ted on the Corn Jug), there’s nothing stopping them from simply renaming him to Romeo McGrowl in that show also but keeping the rest of the show the same. That fixes that issue if that’s the main thing stopping it from returning, as it was.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

If we can have a hillbilly beaver Nibbles Maplestick in Zootopia 2 with a whole cast of fellow hillbilly animals in a swamp, making off-beat edgy jokes & references similar to the original Country Bear Jamboree show w no huge controversy. I see no reason why the Country Bears can’t be the same. They’re hillbilly bears who by nature are silly & off-beat, the majority is not taking them that seriously. I 100% believe that.

 

[DL-fan]

For all the wrongs that Disney unleashed on Disneyland from 1992-2001, they never really made up for them. Mission to Mars, Motor Boat Cruise, Skyway all closed with no replacements. PeopleMover, Rocket Jets and he Country Bears Jamboree all closed and were replaced with inferior replacements. The only time Disney tried to rewrite one of those wrongs when it came to a major attraction was with the Submarine Voyage but many feel the subject matter does not live up to what the attraction should be.

I think Disney should try to rewrite this wrong as well. Why can’t CBJ be brought back and put in a new location? It would be the least problematic and wouldn’t break the bank in terms of a new offering. If they’re gonna keep bringing up CBJ nostalgia around the parks, why not just bring back the classic in a new way like MK.

 

[DL-fan]

Fair enough, though.. I wonder if there’s any way they could play both the Original show in one theater ‘and’ the new Musical Jamboree in the other. And alternate between the Christmas & Vacation shows every once in a while. If Liverlips is still such a problematic name (despite him infact not being a negative depiction of an african american, his song is sung by a caucasian white man and he, from my knowledge, was never designed or intended as a racist characture. All he had was big lips, similar to Big Ted on the Corn Jug), there’s nothing stopping them from simply renaming him to Romeo McGrowl in that show also but keeping the rest of the show the same. That fixes that issue if that’s the main thing stopping it from returning, as it was.

But why create the same problem again? I think CBJ did so well in WDW is because Country music is more prevalent in that part of the country and the surrounding states who come and visit. This has never been the case in California which is a locals park and country music is secondary here compared to the vast amount of different music that is created here and the different tastes. At least with the Musical Jamboree, it’s universally loved Disney Songs being sung with a little bit of country twang and solves that problem I think.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

But why create the same problem again? I think CBJ did so well in WDW is because Country music is more prevalent in that part of the country and the surrounding states who come and visit. This has never been the case in California which is a locals park and country music is secondary here compared to the vast amount of different music that is created here and the different tastes. At least with the Musical Jamboree, it’s universally loved Disney Songs being sung with a little bit of country twang and solves that problem I think.

The question is, was it Infact a problem? Or was it simply due to lack of proper marketing, simple show spfx enhancements that could’ve improved it without coming at the expense of the show itself, and signage that it didn’t do as well as it could’ve by that point? Still, even with that considered. Pretty sure it got plenty more foot traffic as the original show than it ever did being renamed to a playhouse and only showing the Vacation Hoedown rather than having the option to see both shows. Only would’ve added more variety for the guests to see and would’ve garnered more repeat visits.
The Christmas Show was popular seasonally. So it must’ve been popular enough to get a Christmas overlay, similar to Small World. Infact, it’s what started the Christmas overlays to other attractions seasonally. And if those shows did so well, then it would’ve been further reason to do yet another overlay via Vacation Hoedown if they didn’t feel they should’ve just closed it entirely then & there. Weird to do that with an attraction that supposedly wasn’t popular rather than one that was considered to be. (Like say, the Enchanted Tiki Room, in comparison), but yeah.