World of Color - Winter Dreams at Disney California Adventure, 2013

Disney California Adventure's nighttime entertainment World of Color is getting its first full make-over.  World of Color - Winter Dreams is set to debut to the public on Friday, November 15, 2013, but the show had its premiere performance (at least that's what Disney called it) on Thursday, November 14, 2013.  The Disney Parks Blog had conducted a contest about a week prior for a chance to preview the show, and I was lucky enough to get in and to bring one guest.  The day before the show, Disney also announced a special opportunity for annual passholders to attend the preview.  The evening turned out to be the media event for the show as well.

There was a set registration time, and with work and traffic and such, we literally made it to registration with seconds to spare.  As soon as we turned in our completed likeness waivers and received our wristbands, they closed the ticket booth window.  We rushed through the gates and to the designated meeting place, walking past long lines of annual passholders along the way as they waited to be let into the show as well.  We were let into the viewing area and then the annual passholder line was let in after us.

The wristbands were much different than for other events.

We were pleasantly surprised to discover that we were all being given a pair of the Glow with the Show ears.  We'd previously received a pair when they'd debuted them with World of Color but the batteries had run out on them, and we hadn't replaced the batteries yet.  As we headed to a viewing section (not too close because we didn't want to get too wet), we noticed they were handing out programs so picked up one of those.  We were thrilled to discover that the program was like a Playbill that you get when you attend a live play or musical.

A lovely CM was kind enough to hold the program for me to photograph.

We found a spot in the upper section, dead center looking at Mickey's fun wheel, and there was only one sparse row of people in front of us.  I positioned myself so that I was looking through the space between two not-very-tall people, so I had a pretty good view.  As annual passholders were let into the viewing area, our section started to fill up.

Waiting for World of Color - Winter Dreams with a sea of Glow with the Show ears in front of us.

After about a half-hour wait, it was showtime!  Steve Davison, Disney entertainment guru extraordinaire, did an introduction for the new show and was joined by none other than Josh Gad himself, who voices the character of Olaf in the upcoming Disney animated film "Frozen".  Olaf is the main character who takes the audience on the journey through World of Color - Winter Dreams.

No spoilers for the show itself (I'm sure you can find pictures and videos galore on the internet if you're so inclined).  I enjoyed the show, and there was a lot of different things to see, and I know I missed some of them with just the one viewing so far.  Lots of nifty new effects - the technology and technique has definitely been upgraded, and it was fun to see how the Glow with the Show ears are utilized in this new production.


Below is the full program that was given to us for the evening's performance.  Click on the image to get a larger version of each picture.

Enjoy the show!