Planet Parade

Disney effect to wash over Expo

By Matt Hodges (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-08 07:48

Coming attractions like the USA pavilion's live-action movie experience will redefine the future of Chinese 'edutainment' say creative heads at design firm BRC

The USA pavilion is on track to open in time for the start of the Shanghai Expo so early visitors won't miss out on its main attraction, an emotive cinematic experience right out of Hollywood, officials say.

"We got a delayed start but we are catching up rapidly and we hope to open on May 1," commissioner-general Jose Villareal told a press conference held at a luxury nightclub near the Bund last week.

"Hollywood, California, is ground zero for big-screen entertainment and last week I had the privilege of visiting the studio where (design firm) BRC is producing the show for our pavilion," said Villareal, who was appointed by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"This is our grand feature, the main event, and I don't think, based on what I saw last week, that any of us will be disappointed."

Disney effect to wash over Expo

Hollywood does not have its own floor space at the six-month-long Expo but it seems to have found a Trojan horse by which to join the party in the form of America's national structure and BRC Imagination Arts, which began designing attractions for Disney's Epcot theme park in Florida 28 years ago.

The firm, which is also working on the 2010 Expo's Information and Communications pavilion and a China Aerospace theme park in Hainan province, has designed a four-part story inside the USA pavilion that links with its external architecture to give guests "an emotional souvenir", says company vice president Christian Lachel.

"The architecture and planning actually wrap around the story," he says of the $61-million pavilion, which is shaped like an eagle with wings outstretched in an embracing gesture. "This all boils down to what we call emotional engineering."

Guests will first be treated to a video montage of classic Americana before US citizens and celebrities like Kobe Bryant welcome them in mandarin Chinese - while showcasing the kind of gaffes, humor and humanity that give US television its strong personality.

"The point of the initial 'The Overture' section is that we want to tell everyone, 'Thanks for coming. We're glad you're here,'" says Greg Lombardo, BRC's director of brand experiences.

The same message could read equally well in reverse: the US was among the last of the 185 countries to sign up for the 2010 Expo due to the global credit crisis and a US law mandating that it must rely on the private sector for funding. It has so far raised $50 million, according to its official website.

Whether all of the new construction springing up around the 5.28-sq-km Expo site will be finished on time remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, some of the USA pavilion's video celebrities may join what could be a thick red carpet of international stars lining Shanghai from May to October, including such luminaries as China's Jackie Chan and Yao Ming, Portugal's goal-scoring machine Cristiano Ronaldo and the entire Inter Milan squad.

"Kobe, Magic Johnson and (skateboarding titan) Tony Hawk have all expressed keen interest in participating in the live-video component here in Shanghai," says Lombardo, hinting at the autograph-hunting opportunities that lie in store.

After "Act 1: The Spirit of America" guests will be spirited to "Act 2: The Garden" which tells the story of how a young girl engages her community - a metaphor for the world's community of nations - in turning a derelict wasteland into a flourishing oasis.

This part of the show, which corresponds to the structure's rooftop urban farm feature, uses new technology borrowed from sponsor Microsoft and five jagged, 10-meter-tall "screen towers" that resemble a city skyline to impress tourists as the cinema "slowly comes alive", Lombardo says.

Meanwhile, the use of music instead of dialogue will ensure everyone can enjoy the spectacle at what surveys show to be the second most anticipated pavilion at the 2010 Expo after the China pavilion.

BRC aims to enhance the experience by incorporating 4D elements like wind, rain and lightning at its main 500-seat auditorium, but it rejected going 3D despite the recent success of James Cameron's blockbuster Avatar.

"We thought about that but we decided it would just distract people," said company founder Bob Rogers. "If we went with 3D it would add a lot of expense, meaning we couldn't talk about other areas such as collaboration and friendliness. So now we have two theaters."

The USA pavilion will deploy other forms of cutting-edge communications technology such as tagging, which links cell phones to URLs. Act 3 will divide into five themed areas focusing on opportunities and innovation, with an eye to the future.

No Mickey Mouse operation

BRC has its future mapped out in China after a decade spent working on such projects as the Discovery World Theme Park in Taichung and the redevelopment of the Badaling section of the Great Wall prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

"Most of our projects here have involved working with regional governments trying to promote themselves and compete for the domestic tourism market, which is a very exciting trend happening now in China," says Lachel. "What we do is try to build a multi-sensory experience around the cultural assets they have to offer.

"The China Aerospace theme park in Hainan is particularly exciting because they want to create a compelling attraction to celebrate their space program, and the (4th national) manned space launch center they are building down there," he says.

The theme park is tentatively scheduled to be finished in 2013-2014, putting it in competition with a new Disneyland resort that will open around the same time in Shanghai.

"I don't believe they will be in direct competition. I believe they will help each other as the Chinese start to see location-based entertainment as a good thing," says Rogers, who graduated from the University of Disneyland. He subsequently won one of two Oscar nominations for a live-action short called Ballet Robotique that he created for a pavilion inside the Epcot center in 1982.

"Everybody in this industry owes a huge debt to the Walt Disney Company," he says.

"Every pavilion at this Expo is better today than its equivalent 50 years ago, and that is because of the influence of Disney. When Disneyland first opened in 1955, it completely redefined what was possible at a public attraction site. Before that, museums were really dull. Las Vegas was just a floorshow."

Rogers says his design team, which is based in Hollywood but opened an office in Shanghai last year, is looking forward to being a part of "the largest entertainment attraction on earth" this spring in Shanghai.

"Expo 2010 is going to redefine how China sees itself. It is a platform for China to re-brand China to itself, and for the US to re-brand itself to China," he said. "The Beijing Olympics was essentially a televised event. It was China re-branding itself to the world.

"On the other hand, 90-95 percent of attendance at the Shanghai Expo will be Chinese. They will see the rest of the world united around China, and the respect and recognition that the country has earned.

"The Chinese authorities and people are going to look at scenic areas, corporate visitor centers and museums after this - and they are going to be building a lot of museums, believe me - and they are going to say, 'Wow, the Expo did this, why can't you do this?' Everyone will step up a level.

"But this is China. This is a time of new beginnings, and BRC is really happy to be a part of it."

Disney effect to wash over Expo