The Lowdown on the Plus-up - A Theme Park Podcast

Send us Fan Mail In part two of Transylvanian Tumbleweeds we explore the legacy of Dracula-themed attractions, particularly focusing on the Castle Dracula experience at Universal Studios. We discuss the concept of the "JayBang" introduced by Jay Stein and the challenges faced as audience tastes shifted, leading to innovative adaptations in modern amusement parks. • Exploration of Univers...

Send us Fan Mail In part one of our exploration of the Transylvanian tyrant turned tourist trap, we break down some of Dracula's origins. Don't worry, this is not going to be that same old "Dracula is based on Vlad the Impaler" lecture that you've already heard. It's much stranger than that. And much more wonderful. Then we start to place the good Count into some of h...

Send us Fan Mail Ken Bruce spent 16 years researching and writing about the most important piece of theme park pop art ever made: Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room. The resulting book not only tells the history of that attraction, but serves to show how its story is the story of how we see the modern theme park as a whole. Ken was kind enough to spend some time talking with us about his book...

Send us Fan Mail An opening day attraction in both Disneyland and Walt Disney World, Mr. Toad is surprising fan favorite given that it plays like an outtake of a film that not that many people have seen and ends in punishment. We love it. Join us for an exploration of the ride that started Claude Coats' theme park career: Mr. Toad's Wild Ride! Thanks for listening! We'd love it if y...

Send us Fan Mail It's one of the quirkiest theme park attractions of all time. Disneyland, for the first time ever, took on pure science fiction and hit it out of the park. It was like riding through an episode of "Outer Limits" or "Twilight Zone" (and was notably influenced by "Twilight Zone" writer Richard Matheson) and was unique in its effective simplicity an...

Send us Fan Mail Another amuse-bouche one between the big shows. Let us know if you like these. And review us on your podcast platform of choice, please.  We'd really appreciate it. Thanks for listening! We'd love it if you would give us a review on your podcast platform of choice: iTunes, Spotify, etc... They're really helpful. And get in touch and let us know about YOUR Plus-Ups f...

Send us Fan Mail It was a small park in rural San Jose with off-the-shelf rides and entertainment liberally lifted from Disneyland; so why is it so beloved? Is there another regional theme park in the country that has yearly reunions four DECADES after it closed? What was the magic behind Frontier Village? Playland at the Beach, The San Francisco Opera, Fantasia, Puppetoons and two very interestin...

Send us Fan Mail It exists in a nexus between three time periods: the future, the retro-future and the nostalgic past. The Main Street Electrical Parade is the most famous Disney parks parade for a good reason, it somehow synthesizes everything that is contained in Walt's original park - fantasy, history, progress - in a joyous and timeless spectacle. And Walt Disney was long gone before it w...

Send us Fan Mail If you take a left turn around 1929, you end up here: where the jazz band triumphed over the orchestra, where sexy usurped formal, where a very different theme park empire began, and died. Welcome to Fleischer Land.  Keep an eye out for hidden Bettys! Thanks for listening! We'd love it if you would give us a review on your podcast platform of choice: iTunes, Spotify, etc... T...

Send us Fan Mail When we pick up a fake gun and shoot it at a fantastical electric target, what are we trying to become? What do we think Frontierland is? Who is Paul MacGlashan and how did the guy that designed Disney's shooting galleries help win WWII?  And, most importantly, How did Kelly and Pete find themselves so mired in the kind of Disney current affair news that they usually avoid li...

Send us Fan Mail Fire up your Flux Capacitors, people, because we're heading back, back, back in time! We're traveling to the early-20th Century to visit some houses that ought not spin the way they do, the '60s to visit that same Not-Really-A-World's-Fair that we keep yammering on about and, of course, the '80s - where Huey Lewis lives. It's the ride that saved Unive...

Send us Fan Mail We go out on a limb this episode by philosophizing about the uses and abuses of guest interactivity within theme parks and other forms of live entertainment. We get real philosophical and voices get kind of contemplatively husky (or Kelly is still getting over a cold). Along the way we visit Knotts Berry Farm, the Galactic Starcruiser, Evermore, live murder mysteries and Renaissan...

Send us Fan Mail A puzzling anomaly today - we dive for hours on packed highways to a place where we pay money to simulate driving on packed highways - the Richfield Autopia attraction was once a vision of an America poised on the brink of progress and possibility. Kelly and Pete go on a pilgrimage to Disneyland to consider its history in person and meet legendary Imagineer Bob Gurr along the way!...

Send us Fan Mail It's been in the parks so long that it seems simply part of Disneyland's fabric, which it is. The Jungle Cruise is almost synonymous with the idea of "theme park." But it struggled with its identity for a very long time before becoming that attraction that we all know and love today. And some of the most fundamental players in its development have been obscured...

Send us Fan Mail After Sleeping Beauty Castle, there may be no more important icon of the first few decades of Disneyland than The Golden Horseshoe Saloon. Wally Boag, Betty Taylor and Fulton Burley held court, every day, in Frontierland's grandest meetin' place, for thirty years. But what exactly was it? Join us. Come visit our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/151109419...

Send us Fan Mail Once the most modern of resorts, the story of The Disneyland Hotel goes from the Governor's mansion in 1930s Texas to an engineering miracle in 1815 Cairo... At least that's how we tell it. Trust us, this is a strange ride. Thanks for listening! We'd love it if you would give us a review on your podcast platform of choice: iTunes, Spotify, etc... They're really...

Send us Fan Mail The icon of all theme park icons, Sleeping Beauty Castle. While it's the smallest of the Disney parks' castles, it has the richest, and strangest, history. Watch out, in this episode you will learn how something you probably thought was true about the Haunted Mansion is not, but is, instead, true for the Castle. Come on into this dark, cramped, stairway; there's som...

Send us Fan Mail We're chaining ourselves to Honest Abe and discussing why YOU should make a point of visiting him every time you go to Disneyland. Walt would want you to. Thanks for listening! We'd love it if you would give us a review on your podcast platform of choice: iTunes, Spotify, etc... They're really helpful. And get in touch and let us know about YOUR Plus-Ups for the att...