Who doesn’t dream of dancing and celebrating alongside the Disney Characters? In 2009, Mickey’s Magical Party makes it happen! In a brand new, 360-degree spectacle at the heart of Disneyland Park, guests can laugh, dance and sing along with their favourite stars and memorable songs.

A show full of heart and bursting with energy, it was show director Christophe Leclercq who was tasked with bringing this centrepiece event to life. So, It’s Interview Time… with our host Jérémie Noyer!

How did you conceive It’s Party Time… with Mickey and Friends?

We knew we needed an overture, a prologue, interactive moments and a finale with a play-off. From this, we looked to how to give life and energy to that structure. Considering the number of dancers we have, we thought it would be great if they’d arrive on stage first. However, we later changed this, and it’s now the hosts who arrive first and introduce the dancers.

After that, we needed a magical moment for Mickey to appear. We chose to wait a little before having him magically appear on stage, so that we could warm the audience up to welcome him in the most exciting way. That’s our overture.

Now, once our star, Mickey, the dancers and the hosts were gathered on stage, we were ready for the prologue, an introductory production number. That was the time to invite the other Disney Characters to come along. To do that, we drew our inspiration from the logo of Mickey’s Magical Party, which features Mickey, Pluto, Goofy and Donald. For that reason, we thought it would be best if these Characters were the first to join Mickey.

From here, we had four Disney Characters, each on one of the four satellites of the stage, with dancers and one host: now everything was set to invite the rest of the cast, that is Mickey’s other friends: Baloo, Tigger, Timon and Peter Pan & Wendy. For this, we use the lift incorporated within this magical stage, to allow the Characters to arrive completely by surprise.

So, briefly, we started with a classical structure that we plussed along the way to fit the story we wanted to tell.

How did you choose which of Mickey’s friends would participate to the show?

We made the decision rather soon to ask Goofy, Donald and Pluto to take part, to echo the Mickey’s Magical Party logo already designed. Then, the choice of the other Characters was mainly motivated by the music. We needed each Character to be interesting musically.

For instance, children love Baloo, who is inseparable from his song, The Bare Necessities. The same goes for Timon and Hakuna Matata, which is an instant winner. With Tigger, we have “bouncing” songs, perfect to bring energy and fun to the show, whereas Winnie the Pooh’s songs would be too soft.

Finally, I hesitated a lot between Alice and Peter Pan. Actually, in the park, Princesses are very much present, much to the delight of little girls. So instead, I turned to a Character that boys could identify with – Peter Pan – and, in associating him with Wendy, little girls wouldn’t be forgotten either. I also loved the idea that both Characters can fly and I represented that in the choreography.

As you described, the soundtrack of It’s Party Time… with Mickey and Friends strongly follows the energy and storyline of the show. How did you find collaborating with Musical Director Vasile Sirli?

The challenge was that both the writing of the show script and the writing of the score had to be done in parallel. We had long talks, long meetings, listening to demos, in order to find a satisfying way to tell our story. We needed it to be very energetic all the way through.

It was the music, thanks to Vasile’s demos, which helped us to choose the appearance order of the different Characters. At the beginning, we were set on starting with Peter Pan and finishing with Timon. But it was musically more interesting to start with Baloo and Tigger and to finish with Peter Pan. This also fit much better the musical cue that would follow, for the finale.

How did you come to create and use the Mickey’s Magical Party Time song by Scott Erickson, which can be heard several times during the show?

The first time I heard it, it was at the demo stage and I said: “That’s what I want! That’s what I need for the show!” From this, the decision was made to hire Scott on the project and have him write the lyrics and transform his demo into a fully-produced original song.

The final product is the result of an intense collaboration between Scott, Vasile and Creative Director Kat de Blois.

For the first time, you looked to a writer to help you on the show script.

Absolutely. I worked with Paul Scherer, who is a British actor, singer and scriptwriter. He helped me a lot through both the exchanging of ideas and the writing – and re-writing – of the script each time a new idea would come up.

It’s always very difficult to put on paper an idea you have in your head and in your heart, and he helped me clarify some of the ideas which came out of my imagination. He brought a more dramatic, theatrical approach to the script, as I’m rather “concert” oriented, driven by the music. It was a superb collaboration!

Can you tell me about that amazing stage built in front of Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant?

It was designed before the creation of the production itself and my job was therefore to create a show for it. What was very important to me was to have the two lifts. They were merely suggested at the beginning, but I insisted a lot for them to become a reality.

Mickey’s lift was crucial because it is the one that brings the magic on stage, allowing Mickey to appear. As for the second one, which lifts the podiums on stage, it was also necessary since the whole show script was conceived around it.

How did the stage influence the way you directed the show?

The challenge was to create a show visible through 360 degrees. When you’re in a theatre, there’s always a backdrop and the side wings to get in and out. Here, we had a great backdrop – the castle – but no wings. From the moment the artists arrive on stage, they stay there. I therefore had to keep them active so that the visual is always interesting. And, since they have no focus – which means they don’t have one audience directly in front of them like in a traditional theatre like The Chaparral Theater or Videopolis – we had to imagine our choreographies “in circle”.

We don’t have one but four main focuses: Main Street, the Castle, Discoveryland and Adventureland/Frontierland. Knowing that, between the satellites, there are even more focuses. It’s 360 degrees, all around! You have to always keep in mind that the Disney Characters, the dancers and the hosts must dance for everybody. Wherever you are in the audience, you always see artists facing you. The whole choreography and the staging were conditioned by that really gigantic and wide stage.

Because the idea was always to have a big central stage, with machinery, bridges and satellites allowing the Disney Characters, dancers and hosts to get closer to the audience, that demanded a lot of thinking and a lot of work in the staging.

We ended up with up to 36 different versions of the script. With 33 artists on stage, if you have someone move, you’ve got to move everybody else to keep the balance. Hence the whole staging is based on lines, crossing lines and English chains. That’s very complex!

How did you visualize those moves, when you were initially planning the show?

Everything was drawn by hand on boards representing a bird-eye view of the stage. With Choreographer and Junior Show Director Françoise Baffioni, we drew crosses and circles for the dancers, and wrote names for the Characters.

According to the musical structure, we drew a board for each important moment of the soundtrack. And, since we wanted everything to move all the time, using the whole scenic space, we drew all the movements by hand on dozens of boards.

Where did you find the space for rehearsals?

We rehearsed at Disney Village, in the Dome. We had some marquees on the ground identical to the actual stage so that we could avoid surprises when we would transpose our work into the park. That proved really helpful since, for our first rehearsal in the park, almost everything worked and we had to make just very few adjustments.

You said how inspirational the logo of Mickey’s Magical Party was for you in the choice of the Characters. Are there any other elements of the decoration of the park that inspired you?

At one moment, in the Prologue, there is a ballet with ribbons. That idea was inspired by an original concept for the decoration of the lampposts in Main Street USA, which was later abandoned. You can still find that general idea nevertheless on other decorations like the ones on the castle.

It’s Party Time… with Mickey and Friends is based on an alternation of production numbers and interactive moments. How did you find the right balance between these?

Interactivity is a crucial feature in the concept of Mickey’s Magical Party. Yet, at the same time, we have an impressive cast of dancers on stage. So, with Françoise, we said that we had to give the dancers some true work to do, interesting things to perform. That’s the reason why you have both complex ballets and more simple moves for the audience to dance along to.

Though we know the European audience is more reluctant to dance that the American audience, there are always groups of people who join the party and dance. But, at the same time, I made the show as visually interesting as possible so that people who don’t want to dance can enjoy it because of the Characters, of the beautiful costumes, the music, the choreographies, the dancers and the hosts.

What is your best memory of the production process?

The day the cast arrived in the studio for the presentation of the concept through boards and demos (since the soundtrack wasn’t ready yet). Meeting all these artists we had auditioned all over the world was really something. Imagine it, we have dancers from seven different countries: France, England, USA, Italy, Spain, Poland and Greece.

At the beginning, in our casting office, we just had photos of the dancers and the MCs, and this day everybody was finally here, it was big! There were 90 people in the studio, and they all liked the concept. After that, rehearsals went smoothly, without any stress. Everything was so well-prepared that despite the amount of people to manage, it was a pleasure!

Another memory was the day the stage was completed. It was Saturday morning. I had the day off and I received a photo of the stage on my Blackberry from the Production Manager. I immediately took my car and got to the park because I wanted to see the completed stage with the castle behind so much.

I had followed the whole building process, but from behind the construction walls. Now, I could see the whole place opened out, with all the flowers planted by our Landscaping department. That was a very moving moment – and a scary one, too, because it was huge and I could see the amount of work which still waited!

Just like Candleabration became the Enchanted Candleabration for Christmas, do you think the show will be adapted to the different seasons of the park?

Nothing’s set yet. But I’ve already decided that Mickey should wish a merry Christmas and a happy new year during the Christmas season. That said, I can imagine an enchanting finale with the whole cast for the illumination of the Crystal Castle, taking advantage of all these brilliant artists to create a brand new spectacle for Christmas!