Anything grand from talks with Marty?

[mousermerf]

Just wondering how the Talks with Marty Sklar went down..

I skipped them because I figured other people really wanted to be there and I was just sorta "meh" on the concept.

Anything neat or exciting learned?

 

[coasterphil]

There was some very cool concept art displayed, mainly for World Showcase pavilions that never were, and some interesting stories that I don't believe were ever told previously. I thought it was a very nice presentation overall.

 

[DisneyMarg]

I thought it was great. I took copious notes and will post them as soon as I get them written up - probably tomorrow night.

 

[Horizons78]

IMHO, that session in the morning would have made it worth making the trip even if it had been the only thing happening. Some of the pictures were amazing, there was a very funny clip of David Brinkley making a report on WDW shortly after Magic Kingdom opened, and then they played an audio mix of many of the opening day attraction songs from Epcot Center.

The most vivid memory I will take away from the session was one picture in particular which showed Marty Sklar and two others in the middle of a field of dirt with a large yellow tarp like "X" on the ground. Marty then told us that it was from the Magic Kingdom construction and that they marked the spot where the castle would sit. You could hear people whispering wow and just blown away in general - just amazed in the moment.

It was great....truly great.

 

[sillyspook13]

The most vivid memory I will take away from the session was one picture in particular which showed Marty Sklar and two others in the middle of a field of dirt with a large yellow tarp like "X" on the ground. Marty then told us that it was from the Magic Kingdom construction and that they marked the spot where the castle would sit. You could hear people whispering wow and just blown away in general - just amazed in the moment.

Thin Marty...:ROFLOL:

 

[Horizons78]

Thin Marty...:ROFLOL:

LOL!

"Thin Marty......Thin Marty......Still thin there......Wonder what happened?" - Marty Sklar Quote

His sense of humor was pretty cool.:ROFLOL:

 

[TheBeatles]

"Marty still pointing"

 

[Matpez]

I found it amazing how early on the EPCOT SSE flower/star logo was being used... it appeared on documents Marty had from the very early 70's about what to do with Walt's concept.

 

[animay]

There was also a great little musical montage of the songs used in Epcot during the 80s. Marty explained how he really wanted to have as much story telling music in the park as possible. The crowd really got into that; clapping along and cheering.

 

[Hoop Raeb]

Things I remember....

Story about Walt coming down to FL before the WDW annoucement and all the marketing folks told him not to use his real name and lay low. So he's having dinner and a waitress is eyeing him. Finally she says, "you look like Walt Disney". Walt says, "I LOOK like Walt Disney??? I AM Walt Disney."

The pavilions that they did treatments for was cool. Costa Rica and Iran stand out for me. The former because it looked amazing. The latter because who whould pick Iran? I mean really.

Another thing was about displaying flags in WS. He said there are a lot of rules about how different flags are displayed and it made it difficult to keep all this straight. Eventually, they said that they really wanted to celebrate the culture of the countries and not the nation or government of that country... so no flags.

The David Brinkley report was amazingly STIFF! My fav quote, paraphrased. "Disney's critizied for not having to deal with racial or poverty issues. Real cities have these issues but they don't really deal with them either." Angry. I love it.

The placement of AA was a work in progress too. At first, they were going to place it where Gateway Gifts is today. It was a totally different building that was circular shaped. It was a raised design that would allow people to walk under it and then enter going up stairs. So you had AA and then the countries would open up behind it, like America was opening it's arms to the world. Marty explained that Walt had a theory about "the weinie" (his word, not mine). It's a visual element that draws people to a part of the park. AA is the weinie that draws people to the back of the park. If they put AA in the front, there was no draw to the back. So they moved it there. Neat stuff.

 

[RHeath2]

Loved the story about the president/CEO of United Technologies wanting the Seas pavillion the brightest shade of white possible. John Hench then asked him which of 34 shades of white would be acceptible. Then the CEO's wife stepped in and said "Why are you listening to him? He's colorblind. I have to pick out his ties for him in the morning."

Absolutely wonderful presentation.

 

[PeeplMoovr]

The Sklar presentation was my favorite part of the day. He really seemed to be talking to the crowd on hand (i.e. EPCOT and Disney freaks), and he didn't dumb anything down.

Very well done.

 

[TTATraveler]

The Sklar presentation was my favorite part of the day. He really seemed to be talking to the crowd on hand (i.e. EPCOT and Disney freaks), and he didn't dumb anything down.

Very well done.

I agree! He had a great sense of humor and was full of knowledge. I would love to hear more from him about the other parks and his involvement.

 

[Hoop Raeb]

Things keep flooding back to me as I think about them. He also showed concept art for Israel and Africa. And he had a rendering of where EPCOT was supposed to be built.... right where the TTC and parking lot is now. CRAZY!

 

[EPCOT Explorer]

Sounds great..wish I coulda been there.

 

[ClemsonTigger]

All great points listed already. Concept art was unbelievable and nice mix of anectdotes. No teasers for the future however, and no Q&A.

As was said before, it was truly geared to Disney lovers and geeks. Much of his talk would have gone right over the heads of many park goers. All nuances were well received by the audience at hand.

 

[Fantasyland-er]

All great points listed already. Concept art was unbelievable and nice mix of anectdotes. No teasers for the future however, and no Q&A.

As was said before, it was truly geared to Disney lovers and geeks. Much of his talk would have gone right over the heads of many park goers. All nuances were well received by the audience at hand.

Really no Q&A that stinks... so it was just a presentation and thats it... I wish I could have been there... he seems like such and interesting guy.

 

[ChrisFL]

Marty explained that Walt had a theory about "the weinie" (his word, not mine). It's a visual element that draws people to a part of the park. AA is the weinie that draws people to the back of the park. If they put AA in the front, there was no draw to the back. So they moved it there. Neat stuff.

Yes, the Castle, The MGM Hat, The Tree of Life are all wienies (or is it weenies?), a term Walt used.

 

[ClemsonTigger]

Really no Q&A that stinks... so it was just a presentation and thats it... I wish I could have been there... he seems like such and interesting guy.

Not surprising though....bad enough he had to give three presentations to CM's and Disney/Epcot geeks. If he did open up the floor for questions, it would have been worse than starting a Gay Day thread here....
The whole audience would have their hands up at once....have to laugh picturing it though!

 

[loweyan]

Marty Talk

Marty started his talk off with telling us how he had started as a contractor hired to create a newspaper concept for Main Street U.S.A. in Disneyland. And it was through this concept proposal that he came to the attention of Walt Disney. After graduating from college he returned to work for Disney mostly as a writer and concept designer.

From there he ranged in topics but mostly tried to talk about the process leading up to and including the creation of WDW and Epcot.

Some of the highlights for me were some of the excerpts from his personal collection of memos and such. I guess since I'm a technical director for a theater and do a lot of what we call "lipstick and napkin" sketches on random pieces of paper, it was so cool to see some of these done by the imagineers and Walt.

One of these was the original sketch that was done to show how Spaceship Earth could be a suspended Ball instead of one resting on the ground. The original engineers were not able to conceive a way to do it until one of the original Epcot team (his name escapes me) showed a sketch showing the creation of a large plate supported by the ground supports. The ride would be built off of this plate as a base, as well as the ball above it. Below it however the lower 1/3rd (approximately) would be suspended from the plate allowing the Spaceship Earth we know today.

The second was the true scrap / pen and pencil drawing done by Walt that would eventually become the full size picture which featured the grounds of WDW and was used as the backdrop for the Epcot film which featured Walt Disney in his last filmed appearance before his death.

Marty additionally showed us the two separate endings for the film, one directed towards Florida residents and lawmakers (to encourage them to create the autonomous Reedy Creek improvement district) and the other towards major corporations (to encourage them to support the project from a manufacturing and technological aspect).

After that, as was mentioned above he showed us some "thin Marty" pictures of the construction of the magic kingdom as well as Epcot and talked about the Reedy Creek district.

Eventually he moved into showing us some of the concept sketches for various current or planned attractions including the Space pavilion, original spaceship earth (dome/ball type) and the various countries.

The Countries he talked about were Costa Rica, Isreal, Iran, Africa, and Denmark.

Costa Rica was a beautiful greenhouse looking building (almost something like the crystal palace from MK but with all gold window trim and walls).

Isreal was planned to be a market place with cool alley like shops which had a Roman style ampetheater in the rear (away from the lake side).

Iran was a Persian / Mesopotamian style entryway with Bablyonian style guardians on each side of the main stairs. Above it was a large black stylized banner with "Persia" emblazoned on it. This pavillion was pitched to the Shah of Iran who liked the idea and wanted to move forward. Nine days later he was deposed from office in the revolution.

Africa had a few possibilities, ranging from a native villiage up to a very cool museum style pavillion. He then told us about the Disney-Tishman collection, which is a collection of 525 art pieces of African Art that was donate/purchased by Disney from the Tishman family. It contains over 100 master work level pieces and is considered one of the most important African Art collections in the world. One of the ideas for the pavillion was to be a museum structure to house this collection. Eventually the pavillion was scraped and the art collection was donated to the Smithonian. Here's an article on it: http://usinfo.state.gov/scv/Archive/2005/Oct/03-896744.html

Denmark apparantly had a few various plans, some of which included a maze and water rides. It seemed like it was one of the ones closest to be produced.

He then talked about the Original idea and location of the American Adventure. It was supposed to be at the entrance to the world showcase lagoon and looked like a very modern structure that allowed people to pass under it and then would go upstairs into the show. But they later scrapped this idea due to the choke point it would create into the showcase and then it was moved to the opposite side.

Later on he talked about the Story Telling songs that were apart of Epcot, such as Listen to the Land, One little Spark, and universe of energy. Then he played a meldly of all the original music created for the pavillions and countries.

When I get a chance, I will try to recall some more

Keep on Dreaming!
Marcus