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It's one thing for Disney Studio executives to decide to base a motion picture on the " Pirates of the Caribbean " theme park ride. It's quite another to take that bare-bones idea and then turn it something truly special. A series of films that people the world over could then enthusiastically embrace...

Having gone for the gold with its " Pirates of the Caribbean " trilogy, is the Mouse now getting ready to go for the silver ? As in "Hi-yo, Silver ! " It certainly sounded that way late last week. As the Web (Keying off of a story that had originally been posted on Collider back on May 24th) was suddenly...

Look, if you're a regular reader of JHM, I'm just going to assume that you already know what this is a picture of. Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved Yep, that's Johnny Depp. Making his memorable entrance as Captain Jack Sparrow in the very first film of Disney's " Pirates of the...

Christian P. writes in today to say: I'm a huge Pirates of the Caribbean fan and I'm literally counting down the hours now until the third movie opens next week. Do you have any new stories that you can tell about these great great movies that might distract me for a while? Prevent me from spending so...

Judging by many of the comments that have been posted on various Disneyland discussion boards around the Web, " Pirates of the Caribbean " fans are obviously looking forward to lining up along the red carpet on May 19th . Just so that they can then catch a glimpse of Johnny Depp & Co. as they stroll...

Karen M. writes in to ask a special favor: Dear Jim -- I just want to send you a quick e-mail to thank you for writing about Charlie Ridgway 's new book, " Spinning Disney's World ." On your recommendation , I picked up a copy and found that Mr. Ridgway's biography was just as you said it would be: Loaded...

We got any " Get Smart " fans out there? If so, how many of you remember the Cone of Silence ? The weird Plexiglas thingy that Agent 86 would insist on having lowered whenever he had something super-secret to share with the Chief of CONTROL? Which was then supposed to shield the outside world...

First up, Kelly T. writes in to ask: Whatever became of Roger Colton ? I used to really enjoy his "Ruminations" column. But it's been months now since you last published anything from Roger. Is everything okay? Kelly T. Everything's fine. It's just that -- after almost four years of writing for JHM ...

Okay. How many of you remember that story that I told as part of last Friday's "Why For" column ? Where I detailed how -- back in the early 1990s -- Universal Studios swooped in & snagged the theme park rights to Jay Ward 's Rocky & Bullwinkle characters right out from under Mickey's nose? The...

Steve writes in to say that ... An interesting article has popped up about Harry Potter and Universal. You can find it here . Last year, you reported that Disney had signed a Letter of Intent with Rowling . Any word on where that has gone? Oh, no ! Not Harry Potter again ! Sorry. You're going to have...

Are you a fan of Disneyana & America's consumer culture? (Look who I'm talking to. You come to this website, right? So of course you're already into the Mouse. Anyway ... ) Now here's the more important question: Do you live in the LA area? If so ... Well, this would be a really good day to call...

Whatever you're reading, whatever you're doing right now ... Stop it. Drop everything and click on this link ASAP. This, my friend, is the on-line version of the Walt Disney Company's 2006 annual report. And -- as you burrow through all of the various sections of this report -- if you're a hardcore Disney...

This week's "Toon Tuesday" column (I.E. "How will 'Ratatouille' fare in Hollywood's Summer 2007 rat race ?" ) generated an awful lot of controversy. I got phone calls from Burbank, e-mails from Emeryville. With all sorts of folks who are intimately involved with this production chiming in, wishing to...

"Dying is easy. Comedy is hard." These were supposedly the last words of Sir Donald Wolfit , a British actor & director who passed away back in 1968. Though I'm sure that there's a few Imagineers at Walt Disney World right now who - after five weeks of watching their CG performers repeatedly die...

It's Christmas-crunch time, kiddies. You know what I mean. That horrible moment that arrives every holiday season. When you're feeling all smug & self-satisfied because you think that you've completed your Xmas shopping. Only to suddenly sit bolt upright in your chair and say: "Oh, cr*p! I forgot...

Correct me if I'm wrong. But weren't we all laboring under the assumption that -- now that a new management team was in place -- that the Walt Disney Company would stop using Michael Eisner 's old playbook. And yet what did the Mouse do this past Friday afternoon? Waited 'til Wall Street had closed up...

So here I was yesterday, talking about how the Mouse is growing frustrated with the on-line Disneyana community . Reportedly because us dweebs are so quick to condemn anything new that Walt Disney Imagineering proposes for the parks. But now comes word that WDI is actually thinking of using us weenies...

John Lasseter clearly must be a theater fan. After all, week before last, Lasseter was down at Disney World checking out DAK 's " Finding Nemo --The Musical ." Then this past Thursday, John was out in NYC attending the opening night of Disney Theatrical 's newest production, " Mary Poppins ." Which is...

It was 50 years ago tonight that the 1939 version of " The Wizard of Oz " was first shown on television. Copyright 2005 Warner Home Video The first-ever telecast of this Victor Fleming film was a rating smash. Over 44 million people tuned in to catch this broadcast (Which was hosted by the...

Let's cut to the chase, shall we? The Walt Disney biography that all of us dweebs have been waiting for (Some of us, for decades now) ... is finally here . While there may have been other fine books written about the founder of the Walt Disney Company (Bob Thomas' " Walt Disney: An American Original...