It’s Baseball in the U.S.A.
Not long after I started in Characters, began a period we like to call “the Golden Age of Characters.” We had some of the best show directors, choreographers, and technical staff Walt Disney World has ever had. Shows were well thought out and brilliantly produced. And during that Golden Age, we Characters were crisscrossing the United States on a new target market tours every three months.
During the spring of some year, rumor had it that the next new show to be produced would take place in Major League Baseball stadiums. The Character Department was all abuzz because Judy Lawrence was directing the show. She was originally from California and always came up with fresh and inventive shows that really showcased the Characters.
At the time I auditioned, I didn’t know the details of the show. Rumor had it that the show would be performed in Major League Baseball stadiums. All I thought was, “ … another show on the road! Overtime! Travel! Wee!” It wasn’t until after I made the cast, that I discovered that the show’s story line included Donald Duck hitting a home run and then running the bases.
When I heard that I laughed hysterically out of terror.
The show was a balls-out pre-game spectacle that covered every inch of a pre-game Major League Baseball playing field—even the hallowed pitcher’s mound. I don’t know how Disney sold Major League Baseball on the idea, but after many talks the show finally got approved.
The “Disney World Series” debuted in the middle of July in Atlanta and raised the level of torture I experienced in a Donald Duck costume to an all-time high.
Twenty-four perky dancers sang, cartwheeled, back-flipped, and aerialed their way through the opening number, all the while singing the joys of the Disney World Series and baseball. Minnie Mouse and over a hundred cheerleaders took to the field to rev up the crowd with a saucy rendition of Bonnie Tyler’s “I Need A Hero;” followed by Goofy leading Pluto and a flood of what looked like a million T-ballers in the standard “You Gotta Be a Baseball Hero.”
After the T-ballers finished their number, the stage—or rather the field—was set with Goofy at the pitcher’s mound, Pluto at home plate as the catcher, Chip and Dale in left and right field respectively, and Donald Duck (yours truly) up at bat. Goofy got two very real strikes using an imaginary ball off a frustrated Donald Duck amidst Chip and Dale’s taunts and jeers.
On Goofy’s third pitch, the crack of the bat echoed through the ballpark as Donald “hit the ball” out of the park. The audience had to just go with it, as I was using an oversized, bright red, hollow plastic bat. I have to admit that the sight of all those T-ballers running outfield after an imaginary ball while the announcer hollered “it’s outta here!” was hysterical. What was not hysterical was my trip around the bases in the sweltering Atlanta heat.
I was the most non-athletic Character performer who ever lived. Yet there I was with my nineteen-inch inseam running from home plate to first base, then on to second base—where we had to do four-counts-of-eight worth (that’s dancer-speak for “too damn long”) of calisthenics—then chugging on to third base.
In the planning meetings for the show, somebody forgot to tell Judy (the show’s director) that Little People don’t run.
By the time I reached third base in my webbed feet, every fiber of my being told me I was going to die of a heart attack, heat stroke, or a combination of the two, and meet my Maker in a Donald Duck costume. Death was a welcomed option to finishing the show.
Mercifully, Judy had written into the show that Pluto and Goofy carried Donald on their shoulders from third base to home plate for the money shot. And you’d better believe my body went completely limp on that ride to the Promised Land. I knew Goofy and Pluto (who were very good friends of mine as were all the other Characters in the cast) were just as exhausted as I was, if not more, as they had completed their number out on the field long before mine. But they had bigger lungs and longer legs and could’ve walked the bases in a quarter of the time it took me to run it.
Once we reached home plate, we struck our final pose, every single one of us gasping for air inside our costumes.
But wait! There was more. Considerably more. A finale to honor America. Of course, it was only fitting that America’s most beloved duck should drop dead amidst a celebration of America’s favorite pastime and apple pie. I ached for someone to put me out of my misery, to put bullet in Donald’s head.
From deep in the outfield, Mickey and a cavalcade of lesser-known Characters marched ahead of a massive conglomerate of local high school bands. From our pose at home plate we had to return to the pitcher’s mound and perform still more choreography, during the detonation of yet more daytime fireworks, and additional release of more doves and balloons than Uncle Sam could shake a stick at. And, of course, we had to hold that final pose for the cameras, again.
To the rest of the world, that damned happily smiling Donald Duck head made it all look effortless. Inside that fishbowl of death that rested on my head, I knew each breath of searing carbon dioxide I sucked deep into my lungs would be my last. I prayed to God in Heaven that I would not pass out. I thank God that I never did. No matter how easy it would’ve been to let go and lapse into unconsciousness, I couldn’t let myself go there. It would have spoiled the show. People were depending on me. Kids were depending on me. Hell, I was depending on me. I had a reputation to maintain.
Plus, with the media there, Donald Duck passing out would’ve been captured on film for all eternity. The public wouldn’t have known who the poor schmuck was that passed out in the duck costume, but I would have known, as would the show director, and everyone in the Character Department. I would have never been cast in another Disney show. And the greatest motivator of all?
Ridicule.
If I had passed out I would have never heard the end of it.
At a house party, “ . . . remember the time when you passed out on the baseball tour?”
At some reunion decades later, “That was so funny when you passed out on the baseball tour!”
At my funeral: “Yeah, that would’ve been a great show. Too bad he had to go and ruin it by passing out.”
No, passing out was not an option.
To tell the truth, the applause made the effort that much more worth it. It’s hard to explain to people who’ve never performed what it’s like to be on the receiving end of applause. Everyone knows what it was like when they received a big hug or a handshake and a heartfelt “thanks” as a token of appreciation. That’s kind of what applause it like, only thing it’s amplified dozens upon dozens upon dozens of times.
After the final, excruciating money shot, we ran off the field—the dancers, the Characters, the mega-band, the cheerleaders, the T-ballers, EVERYONE. The bands and Mickey went one way; dancers, cheerleaders, T-ballers, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, and I went another. It was every man for himself in what almost turned into a sacrificial offering of Characters.
We Characters bolted for the safety of the dugout, quickly struggling through the onslaught of children, all of them thrilling to see and touch the Characters. We gave no autographs on those days. The T-ballers were lucky if they got a quick pat on the head. We were on a mission to save lives…our own. We tore past professional baseball players (who understandably thought it blasphemy that we were on their field in the first place) to get to our dressing room, where we all ripped off costumes pieces and inhaled bottles of Gatorade. Eventually, we got into our street clothes, went back to our hotel, and partied well into the night.
The Disney World Series was a smash hit. We went on to perform it that year at Chicago’s Wrigley Field, Boston’s Fenway Park, the Houston Astrodome, and my favorite—the old Yankee Stadium where we met “the Boss,” George Steinbrenner and his grandchildren. Mr. Steinbrenner was so taken with the show that he sent each of the Characters baseballs that were autographed by the team, Yankees jackets, and baseball hats.
