Happy Haunts Materialize: Will the Haunted Mansion exhibit return?

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Happy Haunts Materialize Foolish Mortals Welcome Sign

In 2019, Disneyland hosted a “50 spirited years of retirement unliving” event to celebrate the Haunted Mansion’s 50th birthday. You needed a special ticket for the after-hours event, but they also set up a Happy Haunts Materialize exhibit, which was open to any park visitor. Will the release of the new Haunted Mansion movie cause it to rematerialize?

I don’t know, but it would be cool if it did. It was a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the Haunted Mansion’s origin story. A “ghoul-ery,” as Disney so cleverly termed it, used original sketches and artifacts to show how the concept evolved from a kernel of an idea to the ride it grew to be.

I was lucky enough to go to the special after-hours event. (Or, as my husband likes to tease me, “foolish” enough to pop for the outrageously-priced tickets.) But I was also happy I noticed the Happy Haunts Materialize sign when I visited the park during the day.

“What’s this all about?” I remember thinking. I headed inside to find out. Here’s what awaited.

How the Haunted Mansion Materialized

How the Haunted Mansion Materialized info board
This sign explained all.

An info sign at the start of the Happy Haunts Materialize exhibit explained exactly what it was all about. In case the above photo isn’t clear enough to read, here’s what the sign stated:

Since its hinges first creaked open in 1969, the Haunted Mansion has welcomed generations of Guests and Ghouls alike to tour the ghostly retreat. Yet contact between the earthly plane and the boundless realm of the supernatural was not easy to establish; it took over fifteen years for the happy haunts of the Haunted Mansion to materialize. 

During that time, Walt Disney Imagineers were faced with the “chilling challenge” of deciding what a haunted house attraction at Disneyland should be. Should the ghosts be grinning or should they be grim? Should the attraction focus on the “hot and cold running chills” of its setting or the “wall-to-wall creeps” that inhabit it?

In celebration of 50 years with our Grim Grinning Ghosts, the Disney “Ghoul-ery” invites you to a special viewing of the Haunted Mansion’s residents as they appeared in their corruptible, concept state. Kindly step all the way in to explore the eerie evolution of the Haunted Mansion’s design, from a walk-through attraction at the top of Main Street U.S.A., to a “Museum of the Weird,” to the ghoulish delight that we know today. As you trace the attraction’s “disquieting metamorphosis,” you’ll discover how Walt Disney Imagineers made final arrangements for a Haunted Mansion that was both silly and spooky by building off the sympathetic vibrations of each other’s ideas.

Now, as they say, “look alive,” and we’ll continue our little tour…

The Original Haunted Mansion Imagineers

Original Haunted Mansion artists and Imagineers
Under each of their names was a pithy epigraph reminiscent of some found in the Haunted Mansion’s cemetery. In fact, in some cases, they have headstones there.

Who were the Imagineers instrumental in creating the Haunted Mansion? There were nine, including:

  1. Marc Davis “conjured” many of the Mansion’s most memorable characters, including “the corruptible mortals in the Stretching Portraits and several silly spooks in the Graveyard jamboree.”
  2. Claude Coats “advocated for playing up the spookiness of the eponymous Mansion’s creepy crypts and doorless chambers.” That contributed to the attraction’s “chilling aura of foreboding.” But it was “the choice to set the memorable foreground characters of Marc Davis against the captivating backgrounds of Claude Coats” that “ended up being the perfect magical mixture that conjured the Haunted Mansion to life.”
  3. Ken Anderson’s “spooky concepts for the Haunted Mansion…would go on to inspire many of the characters and environments that are iconic to the Haunted Mansion today.”
  4. Xavier “X” Atencio’s “script fleshed out the story of the Haunted Mansion.” He also “penned the words of the Ghost Host that echo through” its halls.
  5. Rolly Crump’s sketched “man-eating plants, haunted fortune-teller wagons, and coffin-shaped clocks.” They were intended for the scrapped “Museum of the Weird” but “helped inspire many of the Haunted Mansion’s most memorable moments.”
  6. Blaine Gibson is best known for sculpting the famous “Partners” statue of Walt Disney holding Mickey Mouse’s hand. However, Gibson also “helped bring many of the Haunted Mansion’s spooks to life—or, rather, un-life.” Among them were the Hitchhiking Ghosts and the Swinging Wake’s “ghastly guests.”
  7. Duane Alt’s “paintings helped inform overall atmosphere…and the eerie environs of the Haunted Mansion.”
  8. Jack Ferges was a giant at 6’8″, but he “was known for his tiny, intricate models and expressive sculptures.” He’s responsible for transforming the concept sketches of “many of the attraction’s 999 silly spooks” into three-dimensional renderings.
  9. Joe Kaba had an “impressive eye for sculpture” and a “knack for molding expressive faces in particular,” many of which inhabit the Haunted Mansion.
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The Happy Haunts Materialize “Ghoul-ery”

There was so much to look at it in the “Ghoul-ery,” and so much behind-the-scenes info to absorb about the Haunted Mansion’s creation. I snapped pics like crazy. Here are some of my favorites:

The Entrance

50 Years Materialize Art of the Haunted Mansion exterior Disneyland
The entrance to the Happy Haunts Materialize exhibit.

The “Ghoul-ery”

Happy Haunts Materialize ghoul-ery wall with concept art
Happy Haunts Materialize “Ghoul-ery” wall displaying concept art and original sketches.
Coffin group of photos on Haunted Mansion Materializes exhibit
Another view of a wall with concept sketches.
Coffin Haunted Mansion Happy Haunts Materializes exhibit sketch
The plaque underneath explained, “One of the first scenes Guests pass in their ‘Doom Buggies’ is the Conservatory where a skeleton is trying to push up his casket lid from the inside. This creepy rendering by X Atencio is an early concept for the coffin which can ‘hardly contain’ its unfortunate inhabitant. In the final attraction, the corpse crying, “lemme out!” is actually voiced by none other than X Atencio.”
Happy Haunts Materialize Case and Banners
One of the cases and some of the exhibit’s banner decorations.
Constance, Feathed Familiar Raven and Captain Gore
Left: Constance the Black Widow Bride. Top Right: Raven familiar. Bottom Right: Captain Gore.
Haunted Mansion Constance concept art as victim
Constance the Black Widow Bride is “infamous for decapitating her husbands but the earlier concept of the Bride had her as the victim rather than villainess. Marc Davis drew this where she had lost her head.”

Portrait Hallway

Werewolf and other Haunted Mansion concept portraits at Happy Haunts Materialize exhibit
Haunted Mansion Portrait Hallway concept corner.
Very early Haunted Mansion Portrait Hallway sketch
The plaque under this sketch explains, “a Portrait Hallway appears in many early concepts for the Haunted Mansion, including in this rendering by Ken Anderson, which imagined the attraction as a guided tour. In this earlier version, your host, Beauregard the Butler, is about to be attacked by hairy hands coming out from the panel behind him.”
Haunted Mansion Portrait Hallway concept art
Here’s what the plaque said about this stunning image: “This chilling rendering of the Portrait Hallway by Marc Davis highlights many features that can be seen in the Haunted Mansion today, including the statue busts whose eyes follow you and several recognizable changing portraits.”
Goddess portrait concept art Haunted Mansion
“This changing portrait draws inspiration from the Greek myth of Daphne and Apollo, in which Daphne turns into a laurel tree to escape Apollo’s advances. Though Daphne did not end up gracing the Haunted Mansion’s walls, another woman from Greek mythology did slither her way into the Portrait Hallway: Medusa!”

Haunted Mansion Wallpaper Inspiration

Rolly Crump's plant design became Haunted Mansion wallpaper
The plaque underneath explained: “Rolly Crump had a knack for anthropomorphizing common objects like chairs, candles, and plants. A closer look at the shape of the faces on this carnivorous plant shows how it evolved into the Haunted Mansion’s ‘eerie eyes’ wallpaper pattern.”

The Swinging Wake

Swinging Wake concept art
“Here, shadowy phantoms dance as Claude Coats sets the stage for a ‘swinging wake’ in the Haunted Mansion’s Grand Hall with set pieces like an eloquent banquet table and a spooky, cobwebbed chandelier. Though in this rendering the Organist is part of a full ghostly band, in the attraction itself he is instead accompanied by floating banshee heads coming out of his pipe organ.”

The Bride

Drawing that inspired the Haunted Mansion bride
“Though this exact changing portrait by Marc Davis was not used in the Haunted Mansion, the idea of a young woman who murders her suitors with a hatchet was not axed. Constance Hatchaway, the Black Widow Bride, is a ‘kindred spirit’ of the lethal lady depicted here.”
Haunted Mansion Constance concept art as victim
“Guests today will encounter Constance, the Black Widow Bride, who is infamous for decapitating her husbands. However, in earlier concepts the Bride was more victim than villainous; in this piece by Marc Davis, she lost her head, instead of the other way around.”

Madame Leota and the Seance

Concept sketch for Madame Leota
The plaque underneath this sketch explained this early “concept of a medium conducting a seance inspired the character of Madame Leota. For over a century, people had been hosting seances to summon spirits from regions beyond, but this was the first depiction of a spirit itself doing the summoning.”

The Hitchhiking Ghosts

Original depiction of hitchhiking ghosts
The original depiction of hitchhiking ghosts. Guests today glide by a mirror in their Doom Buggy and pick up a ghostly hitchhiker on their way out. It came from a “similar gag” Ken Anderson envisioned when the Haunted Mansion was originally conceived as a walk-through attraction.

The Graveyard

Early concept art of the Haunted Mansion's graveyard ghouls
Early concept art of the graveyard ghouls. TOP: Creepy creeps pop out in the form of shrieking, floating banshee heads, including a one-eyed cat.

Sculptures

Haunted Mansion Caretaker face sculpture
A sculpture of the Caretaker’s face, one of the few mortals in the Haunted Mansion ride.
Creepy Haunted Mansion female specter sculpture
I don’t know who she was meant to be because I sadly didn’t get a photo of her info card, but she’s spectacularly spooky, isn’t she?
Haunted Mansion tea time sculpture man
This tiny sculpture of a tea-sipping specter fits right in with the grinning ghosts of the Haunted Mansion.
Haunted Mansion tea time sculpture woman
His female companion looks like a happy haunt, too.
naked Hitchhiking ghost sculpture front
Thank goodness they chose to cloth the Hitchhiking Ghosts. This poor fellow is skin and bones!
naked Hitchhiking ghost sculpture back
But I have to admit, he also made me chuckle. Not that we did it a lot, but growing up, whenever someone in my house ran around naked, we’d sing, “Nudie butt! Nudie butt!” That’s what played in my mind when I saw the naked Hitchhiking Ghost from this angle.

Unused Concept Art

Haunted Mansion Captain Gore concept art
This sketch reminded me of a Scooby-Doo villain. But here’s its story: “In one of Ken Anderson’s first story concepts for the attraction, the eponymous Mansion was owned by a murderous sea captain, Captain Gore. Though the storyline changed, the notion of a mysterious mariner sailed on.”
Changing Dracula concept art Haunted Mansion
“The pictures in the Haunted Mansion’s Portrait Hallway transform from normal-seeming subjects into sinister scenes. In this unused concept by Marc Davis, the ‘daft disguise’ of Count Dracula’s human form drops away as he turns into a giant vampire bat.”
Jekyll and Hyde concept art not at Disneyland but at Paris
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde the mad scientist didn’t make the cut for the Haunted Mansion. However, it is the inspiration for the Apothecary in the Phantom Manor in Disneyland Paris.
Candle Man Haunted Mansion concept sketch
“Walt Disney found Rolly Crump’s sketches for the Haunted Mansion -like this one of a ‘Candle Man’ to be really ‘weird.’ So weird, in fact that Disney felt they should be collected in a ‘Museum of the Weird’ that would be adjacent to the main attraction. The Museum’s concept was ultimately scrapped, but many of Crump’s ideas made it into the final version of the Haunted Mansion.” I found this one of the most disturbing sketches for some reason.

Takeaways about the Haunted Mansion from the Happy Haunts Materialize Exhibit

The behind-the-scenes peek at the Haunted Mansion’s origin story was fascinating. It certainly didn’t come together overnight, did it? It took fifteen years to come to fruition.

Learning more about the Imagineers involved and who collaborated to create the beloved attraction that fans still enjoy today was also neat. I especially liked finding out where the Haunted Mansion’s iconic wallpaper came from —a Rolly Crump design!

However, how cool they kept some of the scrapped ideas too. Especially because it reflects other directions they considered taking the Mansion.

I must admit, it would’ve been pretty cool to have a “Museum of the Weird” to visit too. Maybe it would’ve been something like the Swiss Family Treehouse? (Which I guess Disneyland no longer has, but Magic Kingdom does.)

And what if it had become a guided walk-through tour attraction instead of one with Doom Buggies? Would it have been as popular?

Speaking of Doom Buggies, if the Happy Haunts Materialize exhibit had any info about them, I didn’t see it. Which was both surprising and disappointing. I would’ve loved to see concept art for them and learn about their origin story.

Two other surprising revelations involved Madame Leota and the seance and the Caretaker. Who knew that prior to brainstorming ways to incorporate Spiritualism into the Haunted Mansion, there’d never been a depiction of a spirit conducting a seance before?

And I never thought about the Caretaker being one of the only mortals in the Haunted Mansion attraction. Which makes sense. After all, us Foolish Mortals are there for the ghosts.

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Which Happy Haunts Materialize exhibits did you like best?

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7 Comments

  1. The “Ghoul-ery” artwork is pretty amazing!

  2. I coughed up money to go to that event, too! LOVED IT. I think I went on the ride about 10 times, plus a couple of extra times when I went again during the day. My absolute favorite ride. And I saw the movie yesterday, liked it better than the first one.
    They really went all out for the 50th anniversary. Even had some people in costume lurking in the ride.

  3. Author

    OMG!!! What if we were there on the same day and didn’t know it?! What if we were in line a the same time?! I LOVE that you went to that too! This is such cool info to learn!!!

    AND that you already saw the movie. You really ARE a fan! NO JOKE!!!! lol

    Also, OMG! The friend I went to the 50th with spotted someone as we went through the ride and she grabbed me so tight. She’s a HUGE Disney fan, but NOT a HM fan. (Which she didn’t admit to me until after we rode the ride the first time that night. In fact, she said that might’ve only been the second time she’d been on the ride. It scared her too much!)

    But I didn’t see the guy so I thought she’d lost her mind. I’ll show her your comment. I owe her an apology. lol

  4. They had at least three points where living people were posted: the Knight suit in the spooky hallway, at the table with the ghostly birthday party, and one of the hitchhiking ghosts. I tried to get non-flash pictures of them.
    And I even wore one of my Haunted Mansion t-shirts to the movie! It’s where my inner-Goth was born. Probably why I love Halloween so much.

  5. Author

    OH WAIT!!! Okay, my friend Tracie reminded me we spotted the Knight. Well, she did at first, then grabbed me and I didn’t believe her until he moved for the next person. She reminded me that I DID see it and had already apologized to her right there during the ride. I TOTALLY spaced it, though. LOL

    And I’m SO bummed I didn’t notice the others. Dang it!

    And yep. I think HM is responsible for creating a lot of Goth-loving folks! Scooby-Doo too! Has he ever visited the Mansion? Now THAT is something I’d like to see!!!!

  6. Author

    Wow is right, Maria! I had no idea there was a D23 club (and even if you’re not an official member, I think you may qualify as an unofficial one lol). But these are all great events. The Halloweentown reminds me of a post I still have not yet written that includes mention of it. Sigh. Well…your comment is actually an unknowing kick in the pants that I needed. Thank you for all of it! lol

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