The Disney Parks Live-Entertainment Bracket -- Round One, Day Six

Happy holidays to all, and to all, happy voting (also).

I’ve been rewatching Frasier lately. (I recently wrapped up a full-on series binge of Cheers, and it felt natural to continue the story.) I’m midway through the second season all over again, and on Thursday night, I rewatched “The Show Where Sam Shows Up”. (You get three guesses what the episode’s about, and the first two don’t count.)

If you haven’t seen the episode, a brief recap: Frasier is visited by his old friend Sam Malone, who gradually reveals that he’s traveled across the country because he has cold feet. He’s supposed to be married to a beautiful young woman played by a pre-The Naked Truth Tea Leoni. (I’m sure you all remember the 90s sitcom The Naked Truth.) Frasier is surprised to hear Sam was set to be married, but doubly shocked to realize he had slept with Leoni’s character not three months earlier.

Though things seem smoothed over enough, by the episode’s end, Frasier and Sam are equally horrified to learn that Sam’s fiancee has also slept with two of the famous barflies from Cheers: the short and dumpy Paul and everyone’s favorite mailman, Cliff Clavin. It’s the latter revelation that sinks both men, because…well, Cliff’s kind of the biggest loser, no?

Anyway, as you may know if you’ve seen Frasier, each episode ends with the silent end-credits gag, over which you hear “Tossed Salads and Scrambled Eggs", the show’s theme song performed by Kelsey Grammer himself. In this episode, the end-credits gag is a shot of Frasier driving home from his adventures with Sam, as we see him (but don’t hear him, of course) say the word, “Cliff” in varying levels of shock, horror, and confusion.

As I type these words, we are two hours removed from this news.

Texas Rangers @Rangers

OFFICIAL: We've signed RHP Jacob deGrom to a 5-year contract.

For the last two hours, I have been Frasier Crane driving home, shouting the word “Cliff” in confusion and horror. Just replace “Cliff” with “…THE RANGERS?!?”

Anyway. Let’s move on. To the brackets!

(2) SpectroMagic vs. (15) British Revolution: This one’s not challenging for me at all. SpectroMagic is a riff on the Main Street Electrical Parade that I remember quite well — my wife and I caught it during our honeymoon to Walt Disney World (yes, of course), and I know she at least prefers it to the Real McCoy. (I wouldn’t go quite so far, but in this matchup, the choice is clear.)

(7) World of Color Season of Light vs. (10) Disneyland Forever: So, as you may recall, I am only a couple weeks removed from my most recent trip to Disneyland. The holiday season is my favorite time of year, and Disneyland does an excellent job (generally) of celebrating it in a very secular fashion. (I am a very secular person.) With this in mind, my family and I made sure to see World of Color Season of Light, the holiday-specific nighttime spectacular at Disney California Adventure. We had a great location, got to see the show in full, and…uh…I will be leaning towards Disneyland Forever for this one.

Why’s that? Well, while I like the concept of World of Color Season of Light — a fountain-driven nighttime show that celebrates the holidays and pays homage to various Disney characters — the execution is baffling. Here’s one example: unsurprisingly, part of Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker Suite” is used as part of the show’s soundtrack. And if you are reading this newsletter, you are no doubt already aware that Fantasia utilizes the “Nutcracker Suite” in one lengthy section. So it’s equally unsurprising that Season of Light plays a clip of Fantasia while playing this piece of music. A clip of the “Dance of the Hours” section of the film. You know, the part with the dancing hippos and ostriches.

Yes, that’s right. The section of World of Color Season of Light that plays the “Nutcracker Suite”…does not include footage of a Disney film set to the “Nutcracker Suite”. So again: I vote for Disneyland Forever.

(3) Festival of the Lion King vs. (14) Storytelling at Royal Theatre: Seeding aside, this is a fun match between two very different approaches to live performances centered around a retelling of beloved animated films. On one side, we have an ostentatious and sumptuous redo of one of Disney’s biggest animated stories. On the other, we have a deliberately lo-fi take on films like Tangled and Beauty and the Beast.

I’m leaning towards Festival of the Lion King, but I will admit that Storytelling at Royal Theatre in the outskirts of Fantasyland at Disneyland is a lot of fun, and could well be a dark horse here. Who are you voting for?

(6) Dapper Dans (Disney World) vs. (11) Citizens of Hollywood: Here, we have two fine sets of performing groups you can find at the Walt Disney World Resort. I’ve had my selections already among the various citizens of the World and the ‘land (as it were), so I will lean with the colorful quartet above (even though there are a lot of different Dapper Dans even within the current set of them). I am, as ever, a Dapper Dan man.