Extinct Attractions – An American Tail Theatre and Fievel’s Playland

Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, we’ll be traveling back to the early 1990s when Don Bluth Animation was giving Disney Animation a run for its money as the most popular animation studio in the business.

Universal CItyWalk in Orlando is reopening today as the first stage in the reopening of entertainment resorts in the Orlando area. Who knows when theme parks will reopen, but it’s promising to see areas like CityWalk and Disney Springs reopening, especially in a smart way where each individual restaurant can decide for itself whether to reopen. This phased reopening should help restrict the number of people coming through at the beginning, making it safer for all the workers and patrons.

Though it will be awhile until these theme parks will have international guests coming through, today seemed like as good a day as any to look at an attraction based all around immigration and new people coming to the U.S.

Via Rotten Tomatoes

An American Tail debuted in 1986 and went on to become the ninth highest grossing film of the year worldwide, as well as the highest-grossing animated film of the year by a longshot. At this point in time, Don Bluth’s animation studio overtook Disney Animation as the most successful animation studio throughout most of the 1980s. With a second film in development, Universal began to look for ways to involve the property in its theme parks, with An American Tail Theatre opening along with all of Universal Studios Florida on June 7, 1990.

Via YouTube

The theater called the San Francisco area of the park home, sitting in the spot where Fast & Furious Supercharged is today. There, guests got the chance to see some of their favorite characters from the film go on a quest across the country in an effort to find a spot with no cats.

I’m going to be honest, I didn’t understand this show at all. There wasn’t much of a story, with the show feeling more like a live entertainment offering than a theme park show. Pretty much all that happened was that mice would dance to popular music from the day, then cats would come up and dance to a different song while one of them “rapped.” Then, there would be a “scene change” where the background curtain was simply raised to reveal another city name.

As a whole, its production value was so far below what one would expect from a show at Universal park, that it was hard to believe they had even included it there. It reminded a lot of Extreme Ghostbusters: The Great Fright Way, with one major exception. Ghostbusters was billed as live entertainment, whereas American Tail was billed as a stage show, which was simply wrong. In fact, American Tail even reminded me of 2019’s Cats, if that helps bring any type of comparison to your mind.

Why did they use pop songs instead of songs from the movie? Why are they traveling around the country? Why are the cats not able to see the mice even though they are on stage together? So many questions and no many answers.

Via Orlando Informer

On July 5, 1992, Universal Studios Florida completed Fievel’s Playland, a kid’s area with larger than life props designed to make children feel like they were mice in the film. Along with the play area, there was supposed to be a replacement to that original “stage show” that closed in 1992 so Beetlejuice's Rock and Roll Graveyard Revue could have the stage. However, I couldn’t find evidence that this new show, Fievel Goes West, actually made its way into Universal Studios Florida other than a mention in the New York Times, so if anyone out there can shed light on what happened here, be sure to let me know.

Via American Tail Wiki

Luckily, An American Tail Theatre got a chance at redemption across the country at Universal Studios Hollywood. The attraction had also debuted there in 1990 along with an adjoining Fievel’s Playland, though I’m not sure if the original show was the same as the one in Florida or the version that was there from at least 1992 on. The new version combined elements from the original movie and its sequel which was not released until 1991, so that’s what leads me to believe there might have been a reimagining at some point.

Full disclosure, I have never seen An American Tail, but this version of the show gave me a much better understanding of what was going on because it actually had a story. Sure, they consolidated two feature-length films into a twelve minute stage show, but they used songs from the movie to still give me a good idea of what was happening. The songs were especially useful in setting up the tone of embracing your culture while also paying respect to other world cultures.

Via The Studio Tour

The coolest part of the show, though, was Tiger, Fievel’s cat friend, who was a giant puppet controlled by three different people. His size led to an amazing effect because he really was so much larger than these mice portrayed by humans that it just all made sense. Tiger definitely helped set this show apart and gave it the gravitas to feel like a proper theme park show.

As a whole, this new version of the show was just so much better than the original version and actually made me want to go out and watch An American Tail, so if you are only going to relive one, I definitely recommend the latter version.

Via The Studio Tour

Eventually, it was time for An American Tail Theatre and Fievel’s Playland to close their doors in Hollywood in 1997, with T2-3D: Battle Across Time taking over. If you still want to visit Fievel’s Playland, you can visit Universal Studios Florida, where it stands today 28 years later. It’ll be really interesting to see how much longer it sticks around.

With that, we are done for today, and I have a little announcement to make. For the foreseeable future, I will be writing a post every two weeks because I am running a bit low on attractions, having done this for over four years now, and want to space out the ones I have left as much as I can. With that in mind, here’s your clues for my next post.

Via Tumblr

Thanks for reading and have a magical day!