An Over Coffee® special-edition podcast
ScareLA™ 2018, Los Angeles’ first Halloween convention, celebrated its sixth anniversary during the weekend of August 25th.
And we had the opportunity to speak with three iconic creators about their work on the Disney Haunted Mansion and Universal Studios’ “Halloween Horror Nights”.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
Iconic Disney Imagineer Bob Gurr was onsite at the “Haunted Orange County™” booth.
Walt Disney himself hired Bob, who is one of the two remaining original Imagineers. Working with Walt to design Disneyland, Bob created the vehicles–and of course, besides his designs for the miniature cars in Autopia and the Monorail, he designed the Doom Buggies for the Haunted Mansion.
Bob, who was named a Disney Legend in 2004, also developed the first realistic humanoid animatronic in the 1960s, for the New York World’s Fair: Abraham Lincoln, for “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln”.
After taking early retirement, he would go on to create animatronics for Steven Spielberg, as well as designing effects for Michael Jackson’s Victory tour, among innumerable other projects.
Named a Disney Legend in 2004, Bob still does consulting work for Disney today. In addition, his website says he’s in the middle of another exciting independent project!
A ScareLA™ favorite
Meanwhile, a capacity-crowd-popular event at every ScareLA™ is Universal Studios’ “Halloween Horror Nights” reveal.
Every year, Universal Art Director Chris Williams and Creative Director John Murdy share a preview of Universal’s new Halloween mazes, as they talk about their experiences creating them.
For 2018, Chris and John will scare the daylights out of you with a maze they’ve wanted to create for a long time.
The “Universal Monsters” maze features classic monsters from some of Universal’s scariest horror films, over the decades. And now, they’ve all been brought together to terrify Halloween 2018 maze attendees. In addition, there’s an original soundtrack, created by Slash, former lead guitarist of Guns and Roses. (And it’s going to be a screamingly good time!)
Bob, Chris and John talked about their experiences, behind the scenes, creating the attractions that will draw you in, show you a good time and very possibly (in Chris and John’s case) evoke some “monstrous” Halloween chills.