Disney Changes "Game Plan" After the Rock's Injury

By Alan Fein

(AXcess News) Hollywood - Walt Disney Corp. (NYSE: DIS) was forced to change its script after Dwayne Johnson, better known to wrestling fans as "The Rock", injured his leg while practicing football for Disney's new family film, "The Game Plan".

Dwayne Johnson, seen here with his trade mark cocked right eyebrow, says to tell fans "nothing can stop The Rock."

While at a football practice Monday for his new Disney film, "The Game Plan", The Rock injured his Achilles tendon. Johnson was practicing for his upcoming role as a professional quarterback in the movie, which was previously known as "Daddy's Girl."

Johnson is to undergo surgery Friday in Miami to repair the torn tendon. Until The Rock can resume filming, Disney's studio is putting production on the shelf. The film's shoot will have to wait for Johnson to undergo therapy as well following his operation. Doctors nor Disney have said how long "The Game Plan" will be kept in limbo waiting for The Rock to recover.

Disney was ready to begin shooting the film in Boston next week Monday.

Walt Disney Motion Picture Group president Nina Jacobson was quoted as saying, "While this is a setback for our production schedule, we completely support him as he recuperates and look forward to resuming production when Dwayne is fully recovered."

"The Rock" said to reporters, "I anticipate that with some TLC, pizza and a lot of donuts, I will be making a speedy recovery and will be able to get myself, and everyone who has been working so hard on this production, back to the business of doing what we love most, making movies."

Johnson has appeared in the films, "The Rundown", filmed in 2003; "The Scorpion King", filmed in 2002; and is best known for seeing his film career take off for "The Rock's" role in "The Mummy Returns", filmed in 2001.

Disney Shows Muscle with Boys Properties

Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean," Disney*Pixar's "Cars" and "Toy Story" and "Power Rangers" Combine to Capture Elusive Boy Market

Disney Consumer Products (DCP) today announced that 2006 will bethe best year ever for boys. Driven by the tremendous success ofDisney*Pixar's "Cars," the establishment of "Pirates of the Caribbean"as a long-term franchise and the ongoing popularity of "PowerRangers," Disney is reaching boys with everything from die-cast,action figures and bikes to MP3 players, video games and books.

"With the strength of our entertainment, we knew 2006 would be theyear we became a power house boys player," said Andy Mooney, chairmanof Disney Consumer Products. "Similar to DCP's girl's portfolio, whichis the best in the industry, our boy's portfolio offers everythingfrom the whimsical 'Cars' and 'Toy Story' characters to the heroicrite of passage that is 'Power Rangers' for younger boys, to thecooler, more aspirational 'Pirates of the Caribbean' brand for theolder boy."

"Power Rangers" - DCP's #1 Boys Brand

DCP kicked-off its year experiencing strong demand for "PowerRangers" action figures, its perennial boy's property, during theHoliday 05 season. In 2005, "Power Rangers" was ranked second in theaction figure category behind "Star Wars," according to The NPD Group.Next year's theme will be called "Power Rangers: Operation Overdrive.""Power Rangers" airs more than 65 times each week in over 40territories worldwide, and continues to expand worldwide withsuccessful launches in Italy, India and other countries this year.

Disney*Pixar's "Cars" - phenomenal success

The tremendous anticipation of "Cars" before the film was releasedcombined with the huge box office opening resulted in record-breakingretail sales for merchandise based on a Disney*Pixar theatrical film.The film's humor, story and character personalities were incorporatedinto its products, which featured many category firsts for aDisney*Pixar film, including the first power ride-on, kids electronicsline and bedroom suite. Currently, "Cars" is recording 10 to 1 moreretail volume than "Finding Nemo" at the same point in its release.DCP plans to expand and refresh product with new creative style guidesfor fall and beyond. Large retailers have already committed to "Cars"feature shops for the entire months of November and December tomaximize the DVD release.

"Pirates of the Caribbean" - evergreen boy's franchise

On July 7, "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" willrelease to theaters and reignite a pirate frenzy that started in 2003."Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl" recorded morethan $650m in global box office sales, and "Dead Man's Chest" is oneof the most highly-anticipated events of the summer. With ongoingentertainment support, DCP is positioning "Pirates of the Caribbean"as an evergreen boy's franchise, comparable in opportunity to its"Disney Princess" franchise for girls.

Since the audience for "Pirates of the Caribbean" is so broad, DCPlooked to create innovative product and edgy creative designs formultiple consumers. Toy licensee, Zizzle's Black Pearl playset wasalready chosen for Toy Wishes "Hot Summer Toys" list, a high-endapparel and jewelry line tied into the current Pirates fashion trendwill launch to specialty stores, and Disney Publishing developed thelargest live-action publishing series ever -- including the latestnovel, "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" (junior novel),currently on the New York Times children's best-seller list. "Piratesof the Caribbean" product will be featured in all key categoriesrepresented at major retailers worldwide.

"Toy Story" - 10 Years Strong

And let's not forget about Woody and Buzz. Ten years from itsinitial release, the "Toy Story" franchise continues to show growth atretailers like Target, which showed double-digit growth in "Toy Story"merchandise sales this year. Additionally, "Toy Story" is thebest-selling boy's property at Disney Store North America, with newBuzz Lightyear and friends product in all key categories featured inmore than 100 stores.

For more information, please visit: www.disneyconsumerproducts.com

About Disney Consumer Products

Disney Consumer Products (DCP) is the business segment of The WaltDisney Company (NYSE:DIS) that extends the Disney brand to merchandiseranging from apparel, toys, home decor and books to interactive games,food and beverages, stationery, electronics and animation art. This isaccomplished through the work of DCP's various lines of business:Disney Toys, Disney Softlines, Disney Home, Disney Food, Health &Beauty, Disney Stationery, Disney Publishing, Buena Vista Games, BabyEinstein, the Muppets Holding Company and Disney Shopping, Inc.'scatalog and disneyshopping.com. The Disney Store, which debuted in1987, also falls under DCP, through stores currently owned andoperated by unaffiliated third parties under licensing agreements inNorth America and Japan, and wholly owned stores in Europe.

Disney's Dinner Bell

Disney's new magic: licensing some pixie dust.
By Rick Aristotle Munarriz
Motley Fool

Updated: 9:34 a.m. ET June 21, 2006

There will be more pixie than dust in Disney's (NYSE: DIS) latest marketing initiative. At the Licensing 2006 International Show in New York this week, Disney unveiled its plan to turn Tinker Bell and her friends into its next big stars.

Until now, Fairies has been little more than an unassuming book line hoping to hook young girls with whimsical story lines. That will change. Disney has tapped Brittany Murphy to voice Peter Pan's spunky sprite in a direct-to-video animated feature next summer. Dolls and toys will follow.

The family entertainment giant has already had a few successful years with its Disney Princesses line. Marketing the heroines of its animated classics has turned into a $3 billion a year franchise. Going from Belle to Bell won't be as easy, especially since audiences know little about Tinker Bell and even less about her fellow fairies, but Disney could be well-served by going in this direction.

The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Narnia have all whetted the appetites of fantasy fans. Even if the audience for Fairies overlaps with the Disney Princesses crowd, Disney would rather hit them from both sides than let toy companies like Mattel(NYSE: MAT) win them over with Barbies and American Girl. Meanwhile, MGA Entertainment's Bratz and Build-A-Bear Workshop's (NYSE: BBW) personalized bears and friends 2B made lines are also gunning for the same audience.

Disney's consumer products division can use the attention. With strength at its theme parks and the resurgence in its media networks, the last time that Disney's consumer products made headlines was when it was partly bowing out of retail by handing over its Disney Stores to Children's Place(Nasdaq: PLCE). Last year, consumer products accounted for just a 7% slice of the company's revenue pie. The top line there has slipped 1% through the first six months of fiscal 2006, despite a 9% improvement in operating profits.

Scoring a hit with Fairies will help. Other recent homegrown successes, like the unlikely hit High School Musical, are already helping. So Tinker Bell, often relegated to gliding high in the sky before a fireworks show, will hopefully take flight for Disney again.

Pixie dust? Who needs it when you have shrewd merchandising at play?

Disney is an active recommendation forStock Advisornewsletter service subscribers, while Mattel is anInside Valueselection. Whatever your investing style, the Fool has a newsletter for you.

Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz is still a kid at heart, smitten over the right kind of animation. He owns shares in Disney. The Fool has a disclosure policy. Rick is also part of theRule Breakersnewsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early.

Researchers Try to Talk with Dolphins at Epcot

LAKE BUENA VISTA (Orlando Sentinel) – Calvin's got rhythm – and scientists are excited, since the Disney performer weighs 450 pounds and breathes through a blowhole. A 12-year-old Atlantic bottlenose dolphin living in the backwaters of Epcot at Walt Disney World, Calvin is being taught a vocal form of communication that involves the cadence of his sounds, something that's never been done before with animals, his researchers said. He is one of four dolphins that spend much of the day swimming around Epcot's Living Seas attraction to the delight of customers, then moonlight at Disney as scientific research subjects. Calvin stars in an experiment that has scientists exploring whether dolphins can communicate with language that doesn't rely on the pitch, timbre or intensity of vocalizations – the variations that humans most typically use to form words – but on the sounds' duration and rhythm. Think Morse code: One long sound could mean one thing. A bunch of quick sounds uttered in staccato might mean another. In a project overseen by New College of Florida psychology professor Heidi Harley, Disney researchers and trainers are teaching Calvin to associate such rhythms with specific objects. The trainer, normally Disney marine mammal specialist Leslie Larsen-Plott though others take turns, holds up an object. If Calvin responds by vocalizing the right rhythm, he gets a fish. A basketball, for example, is identified with chirp pause chirp pause chirp pause, a rhythm that researchers dubbed the "dribble." Chirp pause long whistle means the Batman action figure. Long whistle pause long whistle pause long whistle is the watering can. So far, Calvin has seven rhythms down, and two more to go in the first phase. Harley has presented some of their findings at two scientific conferences, for the Acoustical Society of America and the Comparative Cognition Society. The next step is to see if Calvin can find objects when the trainers play back recordings of his rhythmic sounds. Perhaps some day they might see if dolphins could communicate with each other with the rhythms.

Disney Institute propaganda

How do you promote a new business venture that you'll bulldoze a few years from now? Like this:

Official Pirates Site Launched

(comingsoon.net) – Walt Disney Pictures has launched the official website for the highly-anticipated Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, hitting theaters on July 7th. At the site, you can view trailers, learn about the movie, get downloads such as desktops, buddy icons, e-cards, the movie poster and digi-tal trading cards, as well as play games, view the gallery and the world map. The world map takes you to scenes in the movie in which you'll have to "plunder" items in order to be able to open the chest of Davy Jones at the end for hidden items.

Disneyland Autopia Cars Race for Charity at the Indy 500

HONG KONG (Xinhua-PRNewswire-AsiaNet) – Checkered flags waved, crowds cheered and engines roared as two American traditions teamed up to celebrate special milestones. In honor of Disneyland's 50th anniversary and the 90th running of the Indianapolis 500, "The Happiest Place on Earth" and "The Greatest Spectacle in Racing" teamed up for the "Minnie Indy Charity Race" on Wednesday, May 24 (at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Minnie Mouse herself was on hand to wave in the likes of Danica Patrick, Dan Wheldon, Eddie Cheever, Jr., and Dario Franchitti who were among the 31 IndyCar Series drivers who participated in the whimsical race. They were driving miniature cars taken directly from one of Disneyland's original opening day attractions – the ever-popular Autopia. Instead of racing along the highways of Disneyland's Tomorrowland, the Autopia cars and their speed-loving IndyCar Series drivers traversed a comical obstacle race course (at top speeds of 10 mph!) that took place on a specially designed "Minnie" roadway created on the famous Brickyard. The Autopia tradition will continue this summer as a new generation of futuristic cars cruise over to Hong Kong Disneyland where they will make their new home in Tomorrowland. Guests of all ages will whiz down the highway of Tomorrow in their electric space cars and encounter all sorts of alien landscapes, promising a fun adventure for the entire family. "This summer Hong Kong Disneyland will welcome its very own version of Autopia," said Bill Ernest, executive vice president and managing director Hong Kong Disneyland Resort. "This will be a very exciting moment for all our guests as they experience for themselves the classic Disney Autopia attraction – with a futuristic twist!"

Deluge Hits "Cars" Outdoor Premiere

CONCORD, NC (Hollywood Reporter) – A heavy rainstorm couldn't dampen the spirits of the 30,000 people who turned out for the premiere of Disney/Pixar's "Cars" at an elaborate event staged at the Lowe's Motor Speedway. Friday's spectacle featured a 12-lap auto race, a performance by country star Brad Paisley, and the screening of the movie on four giant custom-built screens. A deluge hit the speedway right before the event, causing a planned helicopter entrance to be aborted and delaying the celebrity arrivals. When the rain finally cleared, a 166-yard long red carpet leading into the Speedway sprang to life with the high-wattage voice cast of the movie, including Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Bonnie Hunt and NASCAR greats Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt Jr. The film opens June 9.