After Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party begins at the Magic Kingdom, Disney's Hollywood Studios gave its answer: The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights.
I worked at the show, in front of the Christmas tree on dec. 29, 2009. That night we got the entire Osborne Family there, to host the show and see the lights. It was funny 'cause a lot of people asked me if Ozzy Osbourne will show up!!! I met a real nice family before the show but the place where they came
from just escapes me.
This video shows the Making Of, Highlights of the 2009 first show with the Mad Russian Christmas song and something from before and after the show playing Santa Claus is Coming to Town.
This huge display of christmas lights was a gift from Jennings Osborne, from Arkansas, to his six-year-old daughter when she made a request to decorate their home in lights for Christmas.
It became bigger and bigger and Mr. Osborne purchased two adjacent properties to display the lights.
By 1993, they reached more than 3 million lights including a globe of light in the backyard, a Christmas tree with 80,000 lights with 70 foot, 2 carousels and much more!!!
The lights created massive traffic jams throughout the neighborhood bringing legal issues. In 1994, to be able to stay with the lights on, Mr. Osborne agreed to several law conditions such as set schedule for the show and hiring people to help the neighbors enter and exit the local.
One day, Mr. Osborne agreed to switch the lights on for a family that arrived just after the display had been turned off, violating the court order and netting hum a $10,000 fine.
This time, the court sided with the neighbors and ordered the display to be turned off permanently.
With all the national attention for this case, a lot of cities wanted to host the lights.
When John Phelan (WDW Project Director) offered to host the lights on “Residential Street”, Mr. Osborne thought that it was a residential street in Orlando, but it was just the name of a place at MGM Studios. As a fan of the resort, Mr. Osborne said yes to Disney.
This year you can see the display on “Streets of America” at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. The dancing segments cycle roughly every 30-40 minutes, runs every night (Nov. 10, 2009 – Jan, 04, 2010) as soon as the sky get dark.
2010 UPDATE:
Q: The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights at Disney's Hollywood Studios are fantastic. This year I noticed that of the five soldiers, the middle soldier (with Mickey ears) had a nametag. Can you tell me what was the name on the tag (it was too far to read) and why did that soldier have a nametag? Greg, Snohomish Washington
A: According to John Phelan, show director for the light show, "The nametag reads 'Dan.' It is in honor of Dan Summers who was an entertainment technician who passed away in January 2009 from cancer. Dan worked for many years on the display and he was very passionate and dedicated to it. He was one of the key individuals who figured out how to make the lights 'dance.' But most of all, Dan loved to be on the street with the guests, answering questions about the display. The crew came up with the idea of honoring Dan with the nametag."
