Disney Unveils One Hundred Years of Magic

From the early sketches of Micky Mouse to the lightsaber Luke Skywalker: Disney is celebrating its centenary and is celebrating it in style with an exhibition in Philadelphia (USA) intended for all generations who grew up with the charms of his stories.

The Franklin Institute in that city is hosting from this Saturday World premiere of this pattern, the largest that Disney has performed outside of its parks and the event that begins the commemoration of the company’s centennial, which will take place on October 16 of this year.

And it is that although its own Walt Disney Once said that “it all started with a mouse”, the truth is that it began before Mickey Mouse, in October 1923, when the young and visionary creator signed his first contract to produce short animated films, “Alice Comedies”.

Director Disney Archives, Becky Cline, for whom the most difficult thing in designing this exhibition was not so much choosing what was on display as deciding what to leave out among the millions of files, drawings, scores, costumes and devices of all kinds.

“You had to decide which pieces best tell the story” of Disney, Cline told EFE, who points out among the selection two gems on display at the start of the show.

One, a book of illustrated props created for “Sleeping Beauty” that appears at the beginning and end of the film, a gold piece with colored stones that has its own interactive replica on display so visitors can flip through the illustrated story.

The second is a snow globe with a cathedral Saint Paul andn London Mary Poppins, with special effects for the occasion.

Both are in a room full of nostalgia, the first of ten rooms that make up the exhibition, which also contains, for example, the wooden doll that inspired the creation of Pinocchio in 1940.

Some of the exhibits will delight even the most faithful fans of sagas such as Star Wars.

Because next to the robot BB-8 and the soldiers of the empire, you can see the lightsaber he fought with Luke Skywalker, or the gold cubes that Han Solo used to get his flagship ship, the “Millennium Falcon”, in the game against Lando Calrissian.

All Disney and factory followers are at their own risk pixar and marvel find their place in this pattern, which also stops at the music.

Scenes accompanying many of them are projected in a large room songs and melodies The most famous Disney films such as “The Lady and the Tramp”, “The Three Caballeros”, “Fantasia” or “The Little Mermaid” and scores of numerous compositions are on display.

And of course, the art of animation.

The exhibition covers all his stages, from the artisanal beginnings to Disney factory to state-of-the-art technology, and in addition to revealing the mechanics of animation, it shows miniatures or models that have been made of each character, developing all their details before bringing them to life.

But not everything is animated in the history of Disney, many of his films are flesh and blood, as well as stage adaptations. Among them is the Broadway musical “The Lion King”, in which the main costume of Simba, the protagonist, is on display for this occasion.

It is not the only piece of clothing that can be seen. There is also Cruella de Vil’s red dress for the movie “Cruella” (2021), that of Captain Barbossa, played by Geoffrey Rush in “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” or compass which the protagonist of this film, the famous Captain Jack Sparrow, played by Johnny Depp, always carried with him.

During the tour, the visitor discovers the universe Disney or he recalls many pictures from his childhood or youth, or from the childhood and youth of his children or grandchildren. And there are items for all tastes and memories for all generations.

Christoph Scholz, director of Semmel, the company in charge of setting up this exhibition, recounted his first memory of Disney when he was a child living in East Germany, before reunification: The comics his relatives in West Germany hid when they visited.

And Becky Cline, who grew up in the South California, next to Disneyland and company study, he also remembers the first movie he saw in the cinema when he was four years old: “Mary Poppins”.

Because there is a lot of magic and a lot of nostalgia in this exhibition which, after Philadelphia, will go through Chicago and Kansas City and from which another whole will be made, which will open in Munich (Germany) in the spring, to continue later in London.

That’s just for now. Because the company’s idea, Cline said, is for Disney and his century of stories to tour the world with their exhibit over the next five years.