W On Newsstands Now Issue 6.03 | Mar 1998  Page 1 of 10 previous
| start | next Printing? Use this version  Hack the Magic By
Scott Kirsner  The exclusive underground tour of Disney World.
It's 10:25 on a steamy, late-summer morning in central Florida,
and I'm standing on a narrow steel catwalk surrounded by an old-
growth forest of American historical figures: Ben Franklin, Will
Rogers, Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglass, and a dozen
others. We're waiting for the morning run-through to begin. And
it's dark down here below the stage, save for the glow from
green and amber indicator lights.  Bruce Long, a Disney
Imagineer who is in charge of "show quality" at the company's
six theme parks around the world, is standing next to me. "Make
sure you don't lean over the rails here, or you'll shut down the
show," he says. "We've got indicators that keep an eye on that,
so you don't get hurt by any of the hydraulic lifts going up and
down." Long shoots me a look that lets me know I'm infinitely
less predictable than