John Hench Quotes

When you go to the park, there is no horizon – just Disneyland.

What happen to the pirates we are supposed to see? Then we go down the chutes, and it’s where the pirates were. But they’re all gone. There is nothing but skeletons down here!

Well, it was never supposed to be like that. Walt died before we had finished. The original idea of Walt’s was that you came down there, into the caves, and there were no pirates. But they had been there just seconds before! There was a hot meal on the table, steaming.

We’ve achieved this feeling, for instance, with the colors. The colors in the park are harmonious with each other, not like in big cities where they don’t.

We finally found out the technique of separating and getting information about where every train would be at any moment. Of course, I went over budget many times, because – as you go along – some things improved, and you get better ideas.

We don’t have too much ritual in our life anymore. And these life symbols which people rely on to keep their feeling of well being, that life is not too bad after all are required more and more.

Walt’s idea was that – as soon as the people who were dining got through their main course. They were supposed to all be seated, served at the same time, when they got into the dessert.

Walt understood all of those things, and even common things about people. For instance: Usually you get your idea of what kind of day it is by looking at the horizon, because the horizon is your eye level. So what Walt did is to eliminate the horizon.

Walt put everything he knew about communication with images into the park, so it was very familiar.

Walt had a marvelous intuition. And because he understood people very well, liked them and had great respect for people, there was nothing cynical about Walt.

This music that was supposed to only come from tapes like in any restaurant. Something would happened. One bird will start to do a little jazz thing, and another bird will start to answer.

There were no jewelry hidden. Walt wanted this atmosphere: They were supposed to live here, they’ve been outside somewhere, but they could come back at any minute and catch us.

Then, you were supposed to discover the city, where they were. But because somebody like skeletons. And that they discovered that they were at a cheap price, we used too many skeletons all over the place, and the public got the wrong message.

The show is being changed right now, by the way. Jeff Burke is doing it for the Magic Kingdom. And I think it will be better, with new birds, master of ceremonies, etc.

The park achieved a kind of reality. Like these virtual reality games the children are playing with. I told them we were doing this 40 years ago! Disneyland is virtual reality.

The colors I choose there was to paint the first hotel, the Disneyland Hotel. Because of the cloudy sky we had in Paris, it had to be a particular kind of color who will fight those grey days. And also something you can see when you’re driving up ‘There it is! We’re arriving!’

Of course, it gave the studio an enormous power, because I don’t know any other place who had that skill with images to communicate with. And the need of these kinds of images are even greater now than they ever were because we are losing our life symbols.

Nobody now is going from department to another department. Only Walt did that. I was very fond of him, really.

Mickey is one of the prime examples: Mickey has never been suspected of being an American export. It was deja vu. They gave him a local name and he’s been accepted everywhere he goes.

It was supposed to be in the second street project for Main Street. But who knows? Maybe it will be built one of these days. We never throw away any idea.