MousePlanet

General Trip Planning Help
Brian Bennett

Disneyland Sleeping Beauty Castle photo by Claude Cartee

Hi, My family and I have been planning to pay a visit to the Disneyland Resort in California for the first time in 7 years. I'm really excited and I have been searching the internet like crazy to get as much detailed info and pics on Disneyland as I could, to make our trip as enjoyable and relaxing as it can be.

I'm emailing you not to tell you my life story, but to tell you that I LOVE YOUR SITE! Your site as awesome information compared to all the other sites I have visited. Have a nice day:)

- Brandon

I just wanted to say what a great site. I am an avid Disneyland fan I stopped counting how many times I've been, but it's over 50 but still found new information in particular, the special viewing for a price of Fantasmic. I found your site more useful than the official Disney site. Keep up the good work.

- Susan

Hi Brandon and Susan,

We appreciate your kind words very much! We hope you'll find MousePlanet to continue to be valuable as you plan your visits to the parks!

- Brian

Brian, I am taking two young women (high schoolers) to Disneyland this summer. I know summer is the worst time to go, but we have no choice.

We will be spending the night so when would be the least busy time to go and what days are the slowest.

-Sue

Sue,

Without doubt, Sundays are the slowest day of the weekend year round. Mondays and Tuesdays are then slower, (usually with fewer entertainment options) but then things accelerate to the weekend when Friday and Saturdays cap off the week with the busiest crowds (a lot of locals join the masses on the weekend).

- Brian

I want to know the scheduled conventions and dates of those that are significant enough to affect the accommodation rates ... jumping them up in off season. As part of the reason to go in off season is to also have lowest rates for our stay and ca rentals too. Thanks ...

-Sue

Sue,

The Anaheim / Orange County Visitor and Convention Bureau keeps a list of conventions at this link . This should give you a pretty good idea of what to expect.

- Brian

Do you think a family with 4 children who are 17, 14, 12, & 10 could see everything at Disneyland and California Adventure in 3 days?

Also, we thought we would go to Goofy's Kitchen for lunch. Do you know if certain days are better than others to go?

-Greg

P.S. We will be traveling in the middle of July.

Greg,

You'll be able to do it in three days with kids of that age. A multiple day ticket now finally allows you to park hop - so you can visit both parks with little or no trouble. (Just remember to get your hand stamped, and keep your ticket on hand, as you jump between the two to make your entry speedier.) You'll probably spend most of your time at Disneyland - California Adventure will be a much quicker visit.
I don't think any days would be better than any other in mid- July for Goofy's Kitchen. During off peak times, weekdays would be less busy, but during high season, I don't think you'll see a difference.

The key is to get reservations! I'd suggest that you look over Kevin Yee's Disneyland Restaurant Review

- Brian

The Reporter's Notebook
Alex Stroup
Go to column

The Lion King storybook is available through Amazon

What you failed to point out in your article, and would only be found by people who read the full story is that the school asked for permission and was denied. And they went ahead and did it anyway.

"Last year we put on some songs from Cats but this time it was the pupils themselves who wanted to do The Lion King. Mr Eadie said the school had contacted Disney to make sure there would be no problem with them staging the play and were refused permission. The children are allowed to perform the songs from the show written by Elton John and Tim Rice but are not allowed to re-enact the plot of The Lion King on stage. Mr Eadie said Disney had not asked for payment from the school or threatened it with any legal action, but it has made its position clear on the matter."

So the true lesson which these students should learn is:

If you are told not to do something, and you do it anyway, you will get in trouble.

It is a shame that the students, are suffering, because the teachers, chose not to follow the rules. Disney is coming out as the villain of the story. When in reality, the villain in the story, are the teachers who let them work so hard on something, they knew what they were doing was wrong.

-Brad

Unfortunately, I do not feel the same pain as most do to Disney stopping the play from occurring. I think that if they wanted to do the play, they should have looked into the pro forma request before anybody even sewed a costume. Copyrights are copyrights, and if they wanted permission to do the play, they should have called BEFORE any of the rehearsals had taken place. It would have been just as illegal to have done an Andrew Lloyd Weber play or Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat without permission or buying the rights.

When I was in high school, all these students wanted to do Grease because it was so popular and everyone loved the musical in our theater department. The unfortunate reason we couldn't put on our beloved play: rights. They cost too much.

Disney has every reason to protect their characters and intellectual properties. I am an amateur cartoonist, and if anyone ever stole my cartoons and / or "performed" them for the public without my permission, I too would have been furious.

The school could have gotten away with doing the play, too, had they not called for a pro forma request AFTER EIGHT MONTHS of rehearsals. It would have been illegal, true, but who knows how many plays or musical revues schools have done around our own country without permission. The simple fact is that you cannot keep track of every single copyright violation.

The fact is that copyright laws do protect, and it is unfortunate that if you want to use music or stories or any intellectual property to entertain people in your area, you need to buy rights. As much as I hate it and have disobeyed it myself, it is something you can't get away from. Next time you hear music played on the radio or in a movie you see, think about the royalties involved first, before saying "Hey, we can do that!" That, is my two cents.

-Bryan

I'm not one to defend modern day corporations, quite literally the most fascist entities that ever existed, but Disney has no choice but to play "bad cop" in these instances.
Copyright cases are decided upon not only who owns the copyright, but also the copyright owners' vigilance in protection of the copyrights. Quite literally allowing one of these small time innocent "thefts" gives the big time copyright thieves ammunition in the courts (as hard as it may be to believe, as far as copyright protection goes the courts do not distinguish between a couple of paintings of Mickey on a nursery school wall and a widespread distribution of bootleg Mickey cartoons -- if you allow one, you've set a precedent for others to use your copyrighted materials without first obtaining permission).

-Leonard

Thank your for your comments Brad, Bryan, and Leonard.

You are correct, Brad, in that the teacher deserves much blame here for allowing the students to proceed without first obtaining permission. But I am still going to have keep Disney on the hook as one of the villains in this story (but they get to wear the white hat after all, more in a bit).

Bryan and Leonard both argue the issue from a strictly legal point of view. One with which I agree completely. One must be bone- crushingly strict in protecting copyrighted materials or else risk losing all control.

But read what I was saying, I am not at all advocating that Disney should ignore even the slightest infringements but rather that in these situations, they should be looser in granting permission. The school teacher, however belatedly, did request permission. Saying yes would not have, in any way, diminished Disney's control over The Lion King . In fact, it would have been an explicit affirmation of Disney's control.

Take the example of Disney forcing a daycare center to paint over a mural featuring Disney characters. Copyright infringement? Absolutely. Was Disney acting completely within their rights? Yes, they were. Did Disney pull a boner in allowing their lawyers to override their PR sense? Completely. If I were Disney, I would have sent that daycare center a cease and desist notice. Then the next day I would have had a Disney artist and a crew of painters in that center offering to paint a brand new, Disney-approved mural.

Control was maintained and and the local newspaper will write a positive article. When all the other daycare centers do the same thing, Disney can rightfully point to their opportunistic behavior and make them stop. This production of the The Lion King was not just an opportunity to enforce control over property, but also an opportunity to create a warm and fuzzy moment. Disney almost missed that chance.

Almost? Yes, after reconsidering (and, no doubt, after noting much negative publicity), Disney changed their position and has decided to allow the show to go on. A win-win possibility turned into a lose-lose actuality turned into a win-blah correction.

- Alex