Theme park parades: Brighter, bigger, in demand

[Disney4me]

Walt Disney World is introducing a fresh parade, a staple of the theme park experience for decades, but one that’s evolving with technology and modern audiences.

Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away officially debuts at Magic Kingdom on Sunday night.

Theme-park parades serve as a come-together moment for visitors, encouraging them to spend more time – and more money – in the parks. But today’s parade-goers want to see a show.

“Expectations have changed because now these parades are not just parades. They are immersive theatrical events. They have advanced lighting, audio, scenic, character design, choreography that are the level of Broadway or higher,” said Ryan Stana, chief executive officer of RWS Global, a company that designs experiences for the attractions, leisure and sports industries.

“The bar has been raised for everyone to deliver more — and more interesting,” Stana said.

Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away parade kicks off at Magic Kingdom with the Blue Fairy, and her powers affect the floats that follow. (Courtesy Walt Disney Co.)

Disney Starlight has been more than two years in the making, said Katie Marks, producer with Disney Live Entertainment.

“The last time that we built one that was specific for the Magic Kingdom was SpectroMagic, which was back in the early ‘90s,” she said. “So we knew that we had a lot of opportunity there to really take a look at what is out there in the market today.”

Most evident: the lighting that runs the length of the parade.

“One of the great features of this parade is that we’re really able to control every single pixel that you see on every single float, which is a real milestone for us,” Marks said.

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The new parade is fronted by the Blue Fairy, whose light is seen throughout, all the way back to the final float, a train (a character whimsically named Whimsy) pulling Mickey Mouse with Minnie Mouse and friends. Sprinkled among the lighting effects are other characters such as Elsa, Moana, Miguel, the Madrigal family and assorted Disney princesses and princes.

Like many park parades, the Starlight processional will be a hot spot for character spotting.

New starry costumes have been whipped up for Mickey, Minnie and Goofy as the new Magic Kingdom parade approaches. (Olga Thompson/Walt Disney Co.)

The new parade’s lighting effects also extend to on-ground performers. The “twinkle level” of their costumes can be adjusted, Disney says.

“Another thing that we looked at from a technology standpoint … is video incorporated into some of these floats,” Marks said.

“There’s a lot of really great video technology that you will see in this parade, with some product that is relatively new, some video screens that allow us to create shapes that we may not have been able to create in the past,” she said.

Bringing up the rear: on-screen Jiminy Cricket, a character who waved goodbye to spectators at the end of SpectroMagic.

Starlight’s music is billed as an all-new score that incorporates classic Disney melodies.

“We wanted it to be big and grand and gorgeous, but also funny, sweet and thrilling. Classic stories and new stories, iconic moments that I hope will really resonate with our guests,” Tara Anderson, show director with Disney Live Entertainment, said in an episode of “We Call It Imagineering,” a YouTube series.

“Starlight is not just nostalgic, it’s historic because it really reawakens the traditions that are the touchstones for generations of guests,” Stana said.

“Disney knows how to make us feel like kids again, and that’s what a parade like this is built for,” he said.

Characters from the "Encanto" film get the float treatment in Disney Starlight parade. (Courtesy Walt Disney Co.)

Magic Kingdom hasn’t had a regularly scheduled nighttime parade since 2016, when the run of the Main Street Electrical Parade ended. But this style of entertainment has continued in multiple Orlando parks.

Disney’s Festival of Fantasy parade will still run in its customary midafternoon slot at Magic Kingdom. SeaWorld Orlando currently stages two daily character-heavy parades, Sesame Street Party Parade plus Shamu and Crew. Universal Studios Florida introduced Mega Movie Parade last summer.

There are also seasonal parades for holiday events, including Halloween, Christmas and Mardi Gras.

“There are guests that come for the rides, and they’ll often leave talking about those rides. But also they talk about the fact they got to see their favorite character dancing in front of them in a parade with music soaring,” said Michael Aiello, senior director of entertainment creative development at Universal Destinations & Experiences.

“It presents kind of this almost cinematic and emotional experience,” he said.

A "Jurassic World" float topped by a T. Rex figure rolls through the streets of Universal Studios Florida theme park during the Mega Movie Parade last year. (Dewayne Bevil/Orlando Sentinel)

Mega Movie features units inspired by films in the Universal family such as “Back to the Future,” “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial” and “Ghostbusters.” Each section has related characters and actors, including walk-along ghostbusters, performers on faux hoverboards and the mayor of Amity Island, a nod to “Jaws.”

The parade ends with a “Jurassic World” float topped by an in-motion T. Rex figure. The big guy is a hybrid of puppetry and animatronic, Aiello said.

“How are we blending the ways we can tell our story?” he said. “Technically, it’s that technology blended with the old tried and true, the old smoke and mirrors, because that T. Rex — although massively technical — there’s someone inside that, puppeteering it, which I think is so cool … and not many people even realize.”

Mega Movie replaced Universal’s Superstar Parade, which concentrated on animated films but ended in 2022.

“For Mega Movie, we wanted to widen the net. We wanted to make sure we were featuring components that everyone in the family could be excited to see. It’s why we’ve got nostalgia mixed with contemporary,” Aiello said.

The parades are major people-pleasers, said Ryan Miziker, chief creative officer at California-based Miziker Entertainment Inc., which produces shows and parades on a global scale.

“There’s two sides of the parade route, so that’s 2 miles of front-row seats that people have, and that’s really unusual. Everyone has the possibility of having a front-row seat,” Miziker said.

The events fall into the parks’ memory-making strategies, he said.

“What Disney does is that they rely on having a big kind of emotional impact, so that the things that you do during the course of your stay, you remember, and you enjoy experiencing them,” he said.

“To be able to process 10,000 people … that’s a huge benefit,” Miziker said. “It really sort of allows parks to justify the cost of the parade because they know that a lot of people are going to see them and remember them.”

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Synchronized sound coordinated via wireless network zones, projection mapping and massive LED projects are among the worldwide global trends, Miziker said.

And then there are drones.

“We have heard pitches for drones for years now with parades,” Miziker said. Drone use is challenging because of restrictions about flying over audiences, he said.

“However, we’re working on a project right now that utilizes drones in a way that hasn’t been seen before that I think will be a huge innovation and something that’s going to be really cool to be seen,” he said.

“We approach this creative challenge, bringing as much innovation and technology and surprise elements as possible, because, you know, the demand is there,” Miziker said.

Email me at dbevil@orlandosentinel.com. BlueSky: @themeparksdb. Threads account: @dbevil. X account: @themeparks. Subscribe to the Theme Park Rangers newsletter at orlandosentinel.com/newsletters.

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