I've been an audience participant at a lot of shows in Orlando but in fifteen years I've never been able to crack the big one: The Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular.
Until now.
This past Christmas Eve, I was with my parents celebrating the Disney way, and as evening approached, we wandered on in to the Indy show. The show does three of the most famous scenes from Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Being Christmas Eve, the theater was packed to the gills, it probably holds several thousand people.
That's what makes volunteering for this show so hard! They pick a dozen folks out of a couple thousand, and so you have to bring your A game to be a volunteer. I did my best, wearing a bright red Disneyland shirt, screaming joyfully when he asked for volunteers, and finally got it! And not just any spot, but the coveted "last pick", where you get to let out a primal scream for the crowd. Thanks to my Mom and her trusty Powershot, you can see for yourself!
It was great fun! After the introduction you see above we got our requisite turbans and robes for the Cairo market scene, and got a front row view of the action as the stunt performers worked all around us. Afterwards we received our final parting gift, yes, an official Disneyland cup of water!
Until now.
This past Christmas Eve, I was with my parents celebrating the Disney way, and as evening approached, we wandered on in to the Indy show. The show does three of the most famous scenes from Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Being Christmas Eve, the theater was packed to the gills, it probably holds several thousand people.
That's what makes volunteering for this show so hard! They pick a dozen folks out of a couple thousand, and so you have to bring your A game to be a volunteer. I did my best, wearing a bright red Disneyland shirt, screaming joyfully when he asked for volunteers, and finally got it! And not just any spot, but the coveted "last pick", where you get to let out a primal scream for the crowd. Thanks to my Mom and her trusty Powershot, you can see for yourself!
Official Disney World paper cup
After being a volunteer, we got to return to our seats in time to see the great finale with the out of control airplane and the cool explosions. At that point I was glad that the sun had gone down, fire looks so much cooler at night!
Boom goes the fuel dump
One more surprise came later. During the Christmas Break, a student of mine from Calculus last year wrote me an email to ask if that was really me volunteering at the Indy show. If it was not me, she said "I'm just giving you a heads up that you have a doppelgänger in Claremont." First, major props for use of the word doppelgänger! Second, that's just crazy amazing that one of my students happened to be in the audience. It's a small world after all.
