Dream Chasing: My Four Decades of Success and Failure with Walt Disney Imagineering

Weis, the former president of “Imagineering” at Disney, debuts with a lighthearted memoir about his career at the House of Mouse. After studying architecture in college, Weis got a job with Walt Elias Disney Enterprises, the organization that designs Disney parks, in 1980. His first assignment was to help open Tokyo Disneyland, effectively a copy of Florida’s Magic Kingdom Park, but he soon took on more ambitious projects, including revitalizing the underperforming California Adventure park. Weis makes clear that his decades at Disney took their toll, requiring long days and extensive travel. However, he takes pains to point out Disney’s commitment to quality and ethics, as when he discusses requiring that the dorms housing the construction workers who built Shanghai Disneyland include libraries and “recreation opportunities during time off.” The feel-good narrative has little conflict or tension, but details about roads not taken will keep readers turning pages. For instance, Weis describes how in the early 1990s he worked on Disney’s America, a proposed Virginia park focused on U.S. history that would have included mockups of a Civil War fort and the Ellis Island immigration center. (The project was abandoned amid concern it would trivialize its historical subject matter.) Disney fans will find this worth the price of admission. (Sept.)