A Visit to the Walt Disney Studios - Part 2

In our previous installment, we caught a glimpse of the Roy E. Disney Animation Building, entered through security, saw the famous signpost at Pluto's Corner, entered the original Animation building and passed by Walt Disney's office. Now let's continue our tour with the soundstages...

Now named in honour of the late Annette Funicello, when we visited, Stage 1 was still known as the Fantasia Stage. Originally built in 1940 to film the live action sequences of Fantasia starring Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra, the stage would go on to be used by the Mickey Mouse Club. 

Stage 2 is named for Julie Andrews, as it was the stage to house filming for Mary Poppins and The Princess Diaries. During the construction of Disneyland, Stage 2 was also home to WED Enterprises, in which they built components to many attractions including the whole Mark Twain Riverboat. Thanks to a break in scheduling, we were allowed to enter this soundstage and peruse the sets being used for a new television pilot.  

From the soundstages we migrated over to the Frank G. Wells Building, home of the Disney Archives. Unfortunately they weren't open on the day we were on the lot (I realized in retrospect that they were probably busy setting up the Treasures of the Walt Disney Archives exhibit that was soon to debut at the Reagan Library). We did, however, get to see one of the multi-plane cameras in the lobby.

Then it was over to hors d'oeuvres in the Disney Legends Plaza adjacent to the Team Disney - Michael D. Eisner Building. Opposite the building is a ground-level casting of the Partners statue. Here in the Michael Graves-designed part of the studio, the homey comfort of the 1940 studio campus is long gone... We are well within the social space of the multinational, multibillionaire Walt Disney Company.

Walt's looking a little lonely though...

A cast of the bronze of Roy O. Disney with Minnie Mouse can also be found in the plaza.

The Disney Legends Plaza is also a good place to hunt for your favourite Disney personalities.

Ward Kimball, my favourite of the Nine Old Men...

 Meanwhile, Ashley puts herself in the hands of Julie Andrews...

One last stop before we must ride off into the golden sunset that is setting over the studios...

Our Adventures by Disney guides also gave us a good game to go home with: identifying how many Disney movies used the studio buildings as the set for a college campus. They gave us one to start by showing us Now You See Him, Now You Don't on the bus ride back to the Disneyland Resort.