John Hench

“Of course, it gave the studio an enormous power, because I don't know any other place who had that skill with images to communicate with. And the need of these kinds of images are even greater now than they ever were because we are losing our life symbols.”

“Walt's idea was that - as soon as the people who were dining got through their main course. They were supposed to all be seated, served at the same time, when they got into the dessert.”

“We finally found out the technique of separating and getting information about where every train would be at any moment. Of course, I went over budget many times, because - as you go along - some things improved, and you get better ideas.”

“I always admired Walt's optimism. He seemed to know the direction he was going to. When I was at the studio, I remember he kept driving all of us back down to a more fundamental level all the time.”

“I don't think that was too successful. Because I always thought that the two of them should have been more separate. Also I had planned the monorail station to be in the center. So that one day you would have go to World Showcase and then the other day to Future World.”

“Even in China. Children there, next to the Great Wall, who had never seen Mickey Mouse responded. So the studio did have that skill to communicate with images.”

“It was supposed to be in the second street project for Main Street. But who knows? Maybe it will be built one of these days. We never throw away any idea.”

“When you go to the park, there is no horizon - just Disneyland.”

“We don't have too much ritual in our life anymore. And these life symbols which people rely on to keep their feeling of well being, that life is not too bad after all are required more and more.”

“I suppose that every time there is difficulty. I remember about Space Mountain: It took us ten years before we found the technology that would allow such a ride. And during these ten years, I had a model that I kept, waiting for the technology we needed.”

“I thought that it would be easier to learn that if I worked in motion pictures. So I went to work with one motion picture producer who was developing a color system. This didn't do to me much good. All I did was pick filters for the camera.”

“Nobody now is going from department to another department. Only Walt did that. I was very fond of him, really.”

“The park achieved a kind of reality. Like these virtual reality games the children are playing with. I told them we were doing this 40 years ago! Disneyland is virtual reality.”

“Well, it was never supposed to be like that. Walt died before we had finished. The original idea of Walt's was that you came down there, into the caves, and there were no pirates. But they had been there just seconds before! There was a hot meal on the table, steaming.”

“Color is a very critical thing. I've found that architects don't like colors. Engineers too. And so somebody has to stand in. Because this is the finish of it. It is the emotional part of a structure.”

“This music that was supposed to only come from tapes like in any restaurant. Something would happened. One bird will start to do a little jazz thing, and another bird will start to answer.”

“The colors I choose there was to paint the first hotel, the Disneyland Hotel. Because of the cloudy sky we had in Paris, it had to be a particular kind of color who will fight those grey days. And also something you can see when you're driving up 'There it is! We're arriving!'”

“I did what we call dry for wet effects, some of the miniatures work and two animation sequences.”

“Big cities are chaotic. And chaos for humans - who have experience from their ancestors - is the last step before conflict. So, in the park, every kind of visual contradiction has been eliminated.”

“I suppose that I was a kind of consultant for taste. Is it good taste? Or bad taste? I had an attention to detail, to what would tell best the story. Because many people get excited about the work and drift off from the story.”