Disneyland's It's a Small World adds characters in wheelchairs throughout ride
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It's a Small World's scope of diversity just got a little bigger at Disneyland.
The iconic attraction — which takes guests on a musical boat ride through scenes inspired by people and locales around the world — reopened after a two-week refurbishment with new animated figures in wheelchairs.
Kim Irvine, the executive creative director of Walt Disney Imagineering at Disneyland, told CNN that the change was part of an ongoing initiative of looking "with a magnifying glass" for inclusion opportunities at the resort.
Christian Thom/Disneyland Resort It's a Small World ride at Disneyland adds scenes featuring dolls in wheelchairs.
One of the characters in a wheelchair appears in a scene that takes place in South America, while the second shows up amid the experience's conclusion, which unites people from all reaches of the world to sing the ride's signature tune.
The outlet also indicated that Disney plans to add characters in wheelchairs to versions of the ride in Florida and Paris, though there was no mention of the ones currently operating at Hong Kong Disneyland and Tokyo Disneyland.
Paul Hiffmeyer/Disneyland It's a Small World at Disneyland.
First created for the 1964 New York World's Fair, the Disneyland version of It's a Small World opened in 1966 with more than 300 audio-animatronic figures representing global regions. Guests travel through different countries and natural environments — all while the figurines sing the ride's titular song, which was penned by Oscar-winning Mary Poppins songwriters Richard and Robert Sherman.
Disney dug deep into its film roster when devising the ride, bringing on Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan designer and animator Mary Blair as the attraction's art director, as well as costumer Alice Davis, who recently died on Nov. 4 at age 93.
"What a wonderful story that Walt and Mary Blair, and the original Imagineers, put together about the children of the world and our unity all under one bright sun," Irvine told CNN, "and how we really should rejoice together in that."
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