The Poor Decisions & Neglect That Led to the Closure of Disneyland’s Country Bear Jamboree

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Figured this was deserving of its own thread. Feel free to add anything if you wish. :

Speaking of attraction sabotage, similar thing happened with the Country Bear Jamboree at Disneyland aswell. Maybe not intentionally but by some poor choices in title/signage changes and then in other ways, seemingly deliberate. If you were really paying attention, Bear Country/Country Bear Jamboree at Disneyland always had a bit of an issue when it came to marketing and folks knowing it was there. Due to it being in a back/secluded area. Granted, Splash Mountain opening in ‘89 with the Critter Country rebranding helped draw more attendance. But changing the name from Country Bear Jamboree to the “Country Bear Playhouse” in ‘86 (which I think in hindsight was stupid, as by ‘87 Knott’s had a Knott’s Bear•y Tales Playhouse at the time also that was a walk through attraction) was a bad idea. WDW’s never had this issue/weird name change. They should’ve called it ‘The Country Bear Theatre’ all around to make it more clear it was a sit-down show. Besides that, funny thing is, on the Disneyland signage itself, they seemingly couldn’t decide whether or not to call it a Playhouse or Theatre. They changed these signs multiple times through this period it seems, as evidenced below. On the smaller signs, while the larger text called it the Country Bear Playhouse, it said that they “regretted that this ‘theatre’ cannot accommodate strollers). Also the show sign inside the lobby called it… kid you not, ‘The Country Bear Theatre’, which again, funny when you consider everywhere else they called it a “Playhouse”. Besides that, when it was proven at Walt Disney World that the Vacation Jamboree/Vacation Hoedown show wasn’t as popular as the original, they reverted that one back to the original Country Bear Jamboree come ‘93 or so. This never happened at Disneyland however, so all these little changes drove down attendance levels I believe. The real death knell though came when they changed the old Crocodile Mercantile shop to a ‘Pooh Corner’ shop in ‘96 and started selling Winnie the Pooh merch there, alongside Country Bear merch (cause, you know, that’s the place you expect to purchase Country Bear merch, right?) and then they put a Pooh & Friends meet n greet there, the queue ropes expanding near where the “Country Bear Playhouse” was. Guess then what happened.
Same exact thing that happened with Journey Into Imagination & Honey, I Shrunk the Audience. That then gave them the intel that Pooh was “more popular” than the Country Bears and thus it had to be removed/changed.
Why they didn’t put any of the Pooh related offerings in Fantasyland instead is a mystery… but yeah. Admittedly, the Country Bear Jamboree/Theatre shouldn’t have been removed from Disneyland either. The Pooh ride really isn’t all that great of a replacement, and I say that as a huge fan of the character and on that note, it hardly gets much attendance. View attachment 898799View attachment 898800

View attachment 898801
View attachment 898802

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

And just incase you thought “wait, that photo is from Tokyo Disneyland. That’s what they call it over there.” Nope, that was at Disneyland. Literally they couldn’t figure out what to call this attraction, if it’s a Theatre, if it’s a Playhouse, if it was the Country Bear Vacation Hoedown, if it was the Country Bear Vacation Jamboree, at the time. Pretty “funny” stuff.: View attachment 898804
View attachment 898805

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

And besides that, it also didn’t help matters that they released the Country Bears movie too late after it closed, and, to make matters worse, hired a director that honest to God, wasn’t passionate or a fan of the attraction to direct it, and the end result showed sadly. And it’ll never fail to make me laugh, that in the credits of that movie… they thank Marc Davis for creating the original attraction, despite all of that. *facepalm* lol! So, so baffling. Why they didn’t make a traditionally animated feature and/or series that kept everything true to form (I mean, Pooh had traditionally animated features still being released at that time), rather than changing them to a country rock group and changing the bears themselves, and released it at a time it would’ve actually helped save the Country Bears at Disneyland, I’m not sure. But yeah.. weird, weird stuff.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

How ‘The Country Bears’ Became the Strangest Disney Movie Ever

20 years later, its director tells us what happened.

screencrush.com

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

One other fun fact btw, brought up by former imagineer, Terri Hardin who was Big Al’s puppet/suit performer. In the end credits, there was supposed to be a scene where Big Al sang his iconic “Blood on the Saddle” song. Guess what was cut in the final film? I swear.. lol!
And yet, the funny part about all of this, nearly everyone you talk to that was nostalgic about the Country Bears at Disneyland (my family included). Will ‘always’, ‘always’ bring up to you, how they loved Big Al and him singing “Blood on the Saddle”. You know what you didn’t hear them reminisce on? Big Al singing about losing the love of his life while on a hike, only having a swiss army knife on him. Same goes for Teddi Berra’s “Come up and see me sometime” line, know what you didn’t hear them reminiscing over? Her singing “Singin’ in the Rain”. So yeah.. something was certainly “fishy” going on over there during its later years in the late 80s-early 2000s… They knew the original was more popular/memorable and yet they kept the show the vacation hoedown in California specifically. Not in Florida, not in Tokyo. Tokyo rotated between all 3 shows. (The way it should always be). So yeah, I don’t get it. lol :