Halloween Screams
| Halloween Screams | |
|---|---|
| Park | Disneyland Park |
| Land / area | Sleeping Beauty Castle, Main Street, U.S.A., Rivers of America and It's a small world |
| Type | Fireworks and projection spectacular |
| Opened | September 25, 2009 |
| Designer | Disney Live Entertainment
|
| Status | Seasonal |
Halloween Screams, in full Halloween Screams – A Villainous Surprise in the Skies, is a Halloween-themed nighttime spectacular at Disneyland Park at the Disneyland Resort in California, presented during Halloween Time. Hosted by Jack Skellington from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, it mixes fireworks, projections and Disney villain music, with Jack's ghost dog Zero flying over Sleeping Beauty Castle. The show first ran from September 25 to November 1, 2009, the length of that year's Halloween Time season.[1][2]
History
Halloween Screams was produced by Disney's live entertainment team under show director Steven Davison, and drew heavily on HalloWishes, the Halloween fireworks show created for Magic Kingdom in Florida. The Anaheim version kept much of that show's music and villain-driven structure but replaced the Ghost Host with Jack Skellington, giving the show a host with a physical presence: Jack appears at the start on a large spherical screen raised beside the castle, a device that became one of the show's signatures.[1]
How guests could see the show changed repeatedly. In its first year it played nightly for all park guests. From 2010 until 2018 it was performed almost exclusively for guests of Mickey's Halloween Party, the separate-ticket evening event, which made it one of the party's main draws.[3] Projection technology moved on around it in the meantime: projectors installed for later spectaculars were folded into the show, and by 2018 its projections had expanded beyond the castle to Main Street, U.S.A. and other viewing areas.[1]
The turning point came in 2019, when the Halloween party moved across the esplanade to Disney California Adventure. Halloween Screams stayed at Disneyland Park and, for the first time in nearly a decade, played for all guests — in a new pattern modelled on Mickey's Mix Magic, running nightly through Halloween Time as a projection and special-effects show, with fireworks added on select nights.[4] It has returned in that form for subsequent Halloween Time seasons, with updates including a refreshed Jack Skellington projection on the sphere in 2022.
Show
Jack Skellington opens the show as its self-styled "Master of Scare-omonies", appearing in a burst of flame and projection above the castle and inviting the crowd to scream along. Zero, his ghost dog, then flies over Sleeping Beauty Castle on the flight path normally used by Tinker Bell, one of the few flying elements in a Disneyland fireworks show not performed by a fairy or a Pixar character.
The body of the show is a tour of Disney villainy set to music largely inherited from HalloWishes. Maleficent, Ursula and Oogie Boogie are among the villains who take over the sky in turn, each with their signature songs and a colour palette to match, while projections of ghosts and ghouls play across the castle, Main Street, It's a small world and the Rivers of America. A "scream-along" sequence, in which Jack urges the whole park to scream at once, is the show's best-known piece of audience participation.
On nights when fireworks are included, the villain sequences are punctuated by large aerial shells; on projection-only nights the same soundtrack and story play out with lighting, lasers, searchlights and low-level effects. Either version is subject to change or cancellation in high winds, when a reduced-effects performance may be substituted.
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Wikipedia, "Halloween Screams" — the show began in 2009 during Disneyland's Halloween Time celebration, ran from September 25 to November 1, 2009, and is hosted by Jack Skellington.
- ↑ WDW News Today archive, Disney press release, September 1, 2009 — Halloween Time would return September 25 to November 1 with the new Halloween Screams fireworks, hosted by Jack Skellington as "Master of Scare-omonies", with Zero appearing.
- ↑ Daps Magic, "Jack Skellington is Back at Disneyland as Halloween Screams Returns", September 2023 — Halloween Screams debuted in 2009 for the public, became part of Mickey's Halloween Party the following year, and returned to the public in 2019 when the party moved to Disney California Adventure as Oogie Boogie Bash.
- ↑ Laughing Place, "'Halloween Screams' to Perform for Disneyland Day Guests this Halloween Time, Only Feature Fireworks on Select Nights", July 9, 2019 — for the first time in nearly a decade all Disneyland guests would be able to see Halloween Screams, with fireworks on select nights.