The Future World of Universal’s Playground
In the beginning. . . .
There was a hill and a movie studio. There followed a studio tour, then a luxury hotel, an outdoor amphitheater that became an enclosed amphitheater, two restaurants, a couple of high-rise office buildings, another restaurant, another luxury hotel and an 18-screen movie complex.
And then . . . MCA created Earth.
In fact, MCA has created 4 1/2 acres of earth on top of a massive (2,850-car, seven-story) $58-million parking structure. It was designed specifically to butt up to and double the size of the Universal Studios Tour’s Entertainment Center.
The structure really is a marvel in itself, the way it has been sculpted into Laramie Canyon, a rugged hillside named for its use in the 1950s TV Western, “Laramie.”
And on top of the new land: a $20-million “back lot” filled with replicas of movie sets and facades--and shops and restaurants--ranging from Irma la Douce’s spicy France and Sherlock Holmes’ turn-of-the-century England to 1950s America complete with a working malt shop straight out of “American Graffiti.”
It’s part of a three-year, $142-million expansion of the Universal City theme park that MCA, Universal’s corporate parent, hopes will find it more gold in the hill.
Speaking of gold, “I have never seen the numbers of what this property (the hill) is worth,” insists Jay Stein, president of MCA Recreation Services and a chief architect of the hill’s development since the 1960s, “but I have read several estimates in the billions.”
The first stage is the June 1 opening of “The Star Trek Adventure,” which replaces the Screen Test Theater. It beams audience members aboard the Starship Enterprise and into a seven-minute film made possible through use of a “real-time look-ahead auto assembly edit system.” The device intercuts footage shot during the demonstration with action from Capt. Kirk and Mr. Spock (via scenes from the film series) and instantly plays it back as a mini-movie at the end of the half-hour. (Videocassette copies will be instantly available, too, at a charge of about $30.)
“It certainly is bringing us up to the state of the art,” says Jon Pugh, a veteran of Knott’s Berry Farm expansion who was called in to oversee construction and design on the tour project.
And there’s more:
* This fall the tour will open “Earthquake: The Big One,” designed to offer a closer look at movie-making’s mechanical effects. After the tram rumbles into a train station soundstage (as it has been rumbling into King Kong’s realm), visitors will get caught in an 8.8 tremor--the tram rolls, concrete slabs fall, the station begins to crumble, electrical systems short-circuit and burst into flame and buildings are flooded with a wall of water 10 times the volume of the tour’s current flash-flood tram stop.
* Next year: “Back to the Future,” which will take visitors back in history through time travel in the spirit of the studios’ hit movie with Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd.
* And the next year--the long-awaited attraction built around “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial,” which will re-create the critter’s celluloid adventures on Earth and back home. Steven Spielberg, who made the film for Universal, is involved in conceiving the project. Tour officials won’t discuss details.
Technological developments and flashy additions, reps insist, have kept the 24-year-old tourist attraction competitive during this decade. The 1983 debut of “The Adventures of Conan” gave it a new life, they say, and when a 30-foot mechanical Kong roared along in 1986, attendance hit a record 4 million. Last year’s continued increase, they say, can be attributed to the opening of “Miami Vice Action Spectacular.”
According to the trade magazine Amusement Business, the tour ranks fourth in U.S. theme park attendance, with 4.2 million paying patrons (at $16.95 an adult ticket) last year. Biggest sellers were Disney World/Epcot Center ($28 per adult admission) with 21.3 million, Disneyland ($21.50) at 13.5 million and Sea World of Florida ($23.30) with 4.8 million visitors.
The tour’s current technological revolution ironically has hinged on one thing that Universal used to have in abundance.
“The bottleneck always has been parking,” said Stein. “We have always believed the attendance (potential) was there, but we lacked the ability to accommodate the autos and buses. Now we’ll be able to handle them.”
The additional 2,850 parking spots doubles the tour’s current parking capacity.
In the past, Universal typically took on one project at a time as part of renovation and expansion efforts, Stein said, “but we decided we would best meet competitive conditions and reach attendance goals” by making the more ambitious commitment.
“The parking structure now gives us the ability to handle 5 1/2 million people (a year),” he said, “and we think we’re going to be able to attain that relatively soon--certainly by the time we complete the three-year expansion.”
With the new “Star Trek,” based on the popular Paramount TV and film series (and using clips of a lot of the familiar faces), the tour hopes both to catch up with technology in its look at the state of the film-making art and to keep that parking structure filled.
Universal entrusted that task to Phil Hettema, who devised the “Miami Vice” spectacle and was an integral part of the 1984 Olympics Opening Ceremony and Liberty Weekend, both with producer David Wolper.
“It’s been a blast because it (the show) combines so many different things,” Hettema said with the enthusiasm of a kid. “We’ve worked with (creator) Gene Roddenberry and the ‘Star Trek’ people and on special effects and sound effects--it’s been like producing a movie and theater and a Broadway show at the same time.”
His “Star Trek” experience: “We will select 29 members from the audience and put them in costumes and they’ll interact with our characters. We’ll shoot video of the whole thing and cut in the film clips, and that becomes our production.”
Volunteers will be selected, then rehearsed and outfitted in costumes that were created by Robert Fletcher to match those he came up with for the Paramount films. Among the new designs: an alien whose flowing robes are topped by a headpiece that displays an oversized brain when lighted, and a new “puppy lizard” character, a Klingon pet described as a “a cute dragon/dog, bigger than a St. Bernard, that has scales and hair and sharp teeth.” It’s to be played by a child, a tour spokesman said--and added quickly, “but it won’t be scary.”
Such novelty features aside, “Star Trek” really is a complex undertaking on several levels.
The staging, made possible by use of a revolving stage, features replicas of the Starship Enterprise bridge, transporter room and engine room and the Klingon Bird of Prey bridge. It boasts live special effects from Industrial Light & Magic, George Lucas’ company, including a laser-generated star field and visitors “atomizing” and disappearing from the stage and reappearing--in the mini-movie--on an alien planet.
The editing device that puts it all together--which combines three recently developed techniques now used by movie makers--was designed specifically for this project.
“Our video edit system is the only one like it in the world,” Hettema says. “It enables us to shoot this entire story out of sequence and instantly play it back edited into the correct sequence combined with stock footage and special effects footage we created, plus sound effects and scoring.”
Universal wouldn’t discuss the cost of that specific project, but a spokesperson did say that the “Star Trek” and “Earthquake” shows combined amount to nearly $20 million.
“Research shows people want to get off the tram and wander through back-lot sets, and they never were able to do that,” said Stein, “and now they can.”
While designed and constructed for possible use in film and TV production, the huge deck also was designed and constructed to provide some return on the investment. It opens mid-June and features:
* Paris, represented by Moulin Rouge Street and the “Irma La Douce” courtyard where Shirley MacLaine initiated Jack Lemmon into the joys of making a dishonest dollar. It includes facades of Cafe Moustache and Hotel Casanova as well as a sit-down restaurant, tentatively called the Moulin Rouge Cafe, plus La Crepe, where those little French pancakes will be sold, and a fresh-fruit cart straight from the back streets of Paris.
* London, with Sherlock’s Baker Street--based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s original descriptions rather than film depictions of the famed sleuth’s environment. It will come complete with facades of Holmes’ apartment building, the Strand Hotel and Alpha Inn.
* America in the 1950s and 1960s. It will be recalled through replicas of the Palace Theatre and Faber College, where John Belushi inspired his food fights in “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” plus an open-for-business “American Graffiti” diner/malt shop, where food fights will not be tolerated.
* A new 2,500-seat amphitheater--half the size of the original outdoor Universal Amphitheatre--also opening in mid-June. To be used for such smaller events as its Soap Opera Festival, Asian Festival and several Hispanic events that, in the past, have been sandwiched between regularly scheduled shows in existing arenas.
* Such boutiques as Movie Memo, featuring merchandise from films and TV shows, and California Apparel for visitors trying to capture the Hollywood look (plus a “Star Trek” shop and “Animal House” stuffed animal shop, not located on the new deck). More will open in later expansions.
“No question about it, the sets will have places for you to spend money, but that is a given in our business,” Stein said. “To just have sets up there would not be prudent, so we’re including indigenous shopping and thematic food and restaurants and stores.
“But these truly are movie sets,” he added, “just practical movie sets.”
“The first phase is the movie-set streets and the upcoming attractions,” said Pugh, “but we’re doing strategic planning (for future years). I’ve got consultants right now involved in the whole strategy for further expansion of the tour.”
