Why Clint Eastwood was a last minute addition to Disney-MGM’s “Great Movie Ride”

Jim Hill

13 years ago

Greetings from the woods of Northern Georgia.

Nancy and I are still down in this neck-of-the-woods. Her Dad’s funeral was on Monday, so we’re still in the process of dealing with a lot of family obligations. And given that my laptop went belly-up on Super Bowl Sunday … Well, filing new stories for this site has become even more challenging.

Which is why — until Nancy can get the chance to properly format the Samsung Notebook that we purchased yesterday — I thought that I might reach back into JHM’s archives and resurrect a Why For column from February of 2005 that (given that Clint Eastwood is back in the news, thanks to his somewhat controversial “It’s Halftime in America” commercial) is somewhat newsworthy. So here goes:

Jim —

I really enjoyed Thursday’s story about how the Disney-MGM Studio theme park may be forced to change its
name this summer. I was wondering: Will the expiration of Disney’s
agreement with MGM/UA also result in “The Great Movie Ride” being
shut down too?

Rich G.

Dear Rich G.

Actually, no. Don’t worry about it. The rights to use
the various movie scenes and characters that you see in “The Great Movie
Ride” were actually acquired under a separate series of agreements that
involved a number of different movie studios. Not just MGM/UA.

Take — for example — the “Alien” sequence in TGMR.
Disney got the rights to use those characters and that oh-so-spooky
setting by cutting a deal with 20th Century Fox, the studio that
actually produced this Ridley Scott film back in 1979. The “Raiders of the Lost Ark” Well of Souls scene? The Imagineers actually had to
approach two different companies — Paramount Pictures and Lucasfilm
Ltd.— in order to get permission to make AA versions of Indy &
Sallah.

That process sounds kind of involved, don’t you think? Wait. It gets worse.

In addition to getting permission from the individual
studios in order to recreate a character and/or a setting from a
particular motion picture, WDI often times had to also persuade the
surviving members of a performer’s family to sign off on the likeness
of that AA figure as well. Otherwise Disney’s lawyers wouldn’t allow the
Imagineers to install the robotic version of that star in “The Great
Movie Ride.”

This is what actually happened with the Lee Marvin Audio
Animatronic that was supposed to be installed in the Western sequence
of that Disney-MGM ride. Directly across from the John Wayne figure.

“Wait a minute, Jim,” you sputter. “You’re telling me
that there was supposed to be a Lee Marvin AA figure in the ‘Great Movie
Ride’? How did that deal fall through? What exactly happened here?”

Well, to put it bluntly, Lee Marvin’s kids refused to sign WDI’s release
form. They were deeply offended that — out of all the roles their Dad
had played over the course of his 35-year-long career — Disney had
chosen to make a robotic version of Kid Shelleen (AKA The drunken
gunslinger that Marvin had played in the 1965 comic western, “Cat Ballou“).

Now it didn’t seem to matter to Marvin’s children that
their father had actually won an Academy Award for playing Kid
Shelleen. Or that many people had thought that Lee’s performance in “Cat
Ballou” was the very best thing that the late actor (Marvin died of a
heart attack in August of 1987) had ever done.

Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Frank Wells, Michael Eisner, Goofy and Donald
Duck. Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved

All they knew was that everyone who ever rode
Disney-MGM’s “Great Movie Ride” was going to see — for years &
years yet to come — was a robotic version of their dad, drunk. This
was a concept that Lee Marvin’s kids just couldn’t live with. Which is
why they flat-out refused to sign WDI’s release form.

This — as you might understand — left the Imagineers
who actually were in charge of completing this attraction in a bit of a
lurch. These guys knew that they needed two well-known film legends in
order to properly fill out the performance space that had been built
into the Western section of “The Great Movie Ride.” And now that the Kid
Shalleen AA figure had to be pulled out of TGMR … Well, that left one
hell of a big hole.

Luckily, Frank Wells was able to come to WDI’s rescue.
He told the Imagineers: “Look, I’m personal friends with Clint Eastwood.
I was his attorney for a while. And — back when I was in charge of
Warners — I actually greenlit a number of Eastwood’s pictures. Which is
why I’m sure that he’d get a real kick out of seeing himself inside the
‘Great Movie Ride.’ So why don’t you work up an Audio Animatronic
version of him? And I’ll then get Clint to sign your release form.”

This WDI did almost immediately. They fabricated that AA
figure in record time. Of course, given the limited amount of time that
the Imagineers were working with here … Well, I guess you can
understand now why the GMR’s “Man with No Name” robot has such limited
movement.

Anyway … WDI quickly produces an Audio Animatronic
Clint Eastwood. The figure’s then sent east and quickly installed in
“The Great Movie Ride.” But — because Disney’s lawyers insisted that
the public wasn’t actually allowed to see this particular AA figure ’til
after Eastwood officially signs that release form … During the “Great
Movie Ride” ‘s entire test-and-adjust period, the “Man with No Name”
stood stoically in that doorway with a paper bag over his head.

Meanwhile, the Imagineers keep calling Frank Wells’
office, asking the Disney Company’s president: “Did you get Clint to
sign that release form yet.” But Wells is busy running the Mouse House.
And Eastwood was working on “Pink Cadillac.” So neither of
these guys really has a hole in their schedule. And meanwhile the date
of Disney-MGM’s grand opening keeps getting closer and closer and closer
…

Finally in April of 1989 (Less than 10 days before the
studio theme park was due to open to the public ), Wells persuades Clint
to get on a plane with him. So that the two of them can then fly on down
to Florida and go check out Disney’s newest theme park.

Mind you, Eastwood really isn’t a theme park kind of
guy. More importantly, he’s not all that crazy about planes. So it takes
an awful lot of weedling on Wells’ part to finally get Clint on
Mickey’s corporate jet. But eventually Eastwood does agree to go to
Orlando.

So Clint & Frank finally arrive at Disney-MGM and
begin touring the theme park. And this whole time, the Imagineers
assigned to the GMR are sweating bullets. They keep thinking about what
could to happen if Wells is wrong. What if Eastwood absolutely hates the “Man with No Name” AA figure? What will they do then?

Finally, the two old friends get on board the “Great
Movie Ride.” They’ve got an entire theater car all to themselves. And —
as it quietly slides out of the attraction’s load area — a very
nervous lead picks up his walkie-talkie and says: “They’re on their way.
You can remove the paper bag now.”

And that’s literally what happens. Just seconds before
the theater car that’s carrying Clint and Frank rolls into the “Great
Movie Ride” ‘s Western section, an Imagineer sprints on stage and rips
the paper bag right off of the “Man with No Name” ‘s head. Then — bag
in hand — he slips back into the shadows, holds his breath and watches
what happens next.

The doors leading from the attraction’s gangland
shooting sequence now swings open. The theater car slides into the next
room. Eastwood spies the “Man with No Name” AA figure leaning against
that building. A big, very un-Dirty-Harry-like smile spreads across his
face. He turns to Wells and says: “Hey, that’s me!”

Right across from the Clint Eastwood AA figure is one of John
Wayne, recreating this Hollywood icon’s classic role in John
Ford’s “The Searchers.” Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc.
All rights reserved

Frank turns to Clint and says: “You like?” Eastwood says: “Yeah. Sure.” Wells then whips out WDI’s release form and says: “Okay. Then sign this, please.”

And literally — right in the middle of the action
portion of the GMR’s Western sequence (I.E. After the robber has tossed
the dynamite into bank. Which is why all those flames are belching out
of the windows) — Clint initials and then signs that release form.
Thinking that his old pal, Frank, had gone to such elaborate lengths to
try & amuse and surprise him.

To my knowledge, Eastwood has never learned about all
the problems that the Imagineers were having with Lee Marvin’s kids. Or
that his “Man with No Name” AA figure was really just a last minute
substitute for the Kid Shalleen Audio Animatronic that the Imagineers
had originally planned on installing in this attraction.

Which is why I’m kind of hoping that this story never
gets back to Clint. I’d hate to think that — by posting this tale on
JHM (Which was told to me by the very same Imagineer who reportedly
raced on stage and ripped that paper bag off of the robotic Eastwood’s
head) — that this will somehow undermine what must be a pretty fond
memory of the late Frank Wells.