Disney’s Hollywood Studios Theme Park continues to transform as they add two new attraction areas to the park. In the not so distant future Pixar’s Toy Story and the mega hit franchise Star Wars will welcoming guests to their respective areas. The new additions however come at the expense of existing attractions and what was once billed as the parks icon the Earful Tower a 163 foot tall water tower that was topped off with Mickey ears.
So why a water tower as an icon anyway? Back in the golden days of the Hollywood studios every studio had one. They would be on the lot usually white in color with the studios logo as big as can be to be seen from miles away if possible. The water towers were a necessity back in those days. Water isn’t always plentiful in California and the infrastructure they enjoy today wasn’t around back then. They also needed to keep that much water around for safety reasons. Studios were made of wood and old cameras and film weren’t as sensitive to light so big hot lights were needed for filming. Towers fed sprinkler systems for fire prevention and for filmmaking when the script required rain. The Earful tower was not a working water tower and could have been placed anywhere in the park and there is the first issue with the tower not becoming the icon it was supposed to be.
The tower was set in the back lot near the production facilities. It has been over a decade since the park was a real working studio but originally that is what it was built for, movie production. The tower wasn’t visible inside the park or even from the front gate. It was not like Spaceship Earth at Epcot or Cinderella Castle in the Magic Kingdom. In fact it was mostly visible from World Drive one of the main highways that run through the property. Its poor placement within the park help seal its fate.
Because of its placement guests only got a quick look at the tower while on the Backlot Tour so unlike Cinderella Castle or Spaceship Earth it never served as a beacon to where people were in the park. Disney photographers weren’t lining people up to have their pictures taken in front of it. There were no wedding proposals made that anyone knows of. People didn’t walk through it and there was no attraction inside of it. So the question is why was it put in a location not visible or accessible inside the park? Well the answer is Universal Studios.
Universal Studios announced that they were moving into Florida and their new working studios and theme park would be ready for the summer of 1990. CEO of Disney, Michael Eisner took this very seriously and announced that they too would be building a new working studio that would be open in 1989. Eisner instructed the imagineers to construct the tower first. Its location was placed near the highway to advertise that not only was a new studio parks coming to Disney but this was the spot where it was being built.
Disney marketing used the tower as the parks icon but it wasn’t working. People were associating the Chinese Theater at the end of Hollywood Boulevard as the parks signature building. The theater also had regular hand print cement ceremonies and it really was what Cinderella Castle was to the Magic Kingdom. Disney marketing started to use the theater more and more in park guides and in advertising. It started to happen so often the owners of the real Chinese theater contacted Disney and told them to slow their roll. They felt Disney was starting to use the theater beyond their agreement and Disney did take note. They stopped the cement ceremonies and other than the logos on the trashcans started to back off using the theater as the parks icon returning to the water tower. The park needed a new icon since the ordinal wasn’t working so in 2001 as part of the 100 Years of Magic campaign the 120 foot Sorcerer Mickey hat was constructed right in front of the theater but I don’t think it was to completely cover the theater like some have suggested. The hat served as the parks icon until it was removed in 2015. The hat never fit the theme of Hollywood but for many that is something they miss.
What will the next park icon be? It looks like the Tower of Terror is going to be new kid on the block. The structure can be seen for around the park and even while inside Epcot. It houses a signature attraction, people photograph it and have their photos taken in front of it. Like other park icons it has a distinctive silhouette.
The water tower never caught on at the Florida park but Disney did learn a lesson from it. Visitors to Walt Disney Studios Park at the Disneyland Resort in Paris will find their version of the Earful Tower visible from the park entrance.
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