Why the Disney The Magic Box musical in Abu Dhabi will 'allow you to feel like a child again'

Creative producer says show spanning 100 years of content and including almost 80 beloved songs is a truly nostalgic experience

Disney The Magic Box, a musical coming to Abi Dhabi's Etihad Arena in February, is a celebration of all things Disney. Photo: Proactiv Entertainment

Tucked in Room 300 at Disney's headquarters on 42nd St and Broadway in New York City during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown was Felipe Gamba and his crew, plotting and creating a theatrical show that combines all the best Disney movies into one.

As part of the creative process, they would lock themselves in that room for days and line the walls with Post-it notes of song names and movie moments from the 1920s till today.

After 10 years of spending more time on planes than on ground to ensure the shows produced worldwide by Disney Theatrical Group ran smoothly, Gamba got over his “10-year jet-lag” while confined to that room as he planned his own version of a theatrical experience. But there were also fears that live theatre would never return.

“When doors started to reopen, it was very clear that we were really craving to be together and that the experience of theatre, which is so collective, cannot be replaced,” he tells The National.

Gamba grew up in Colombia before moving to New York, so with Disney The Magic Box, he wanted to have the show in places where people have come to love musical theatre but have little access to it. “We should be originating content not just centrally in New York, right? We should be letting content be born out of these territories to begin with.”

Finding your inner-child

Disney the Magic Box is coming to Etihad Arena in February. Photo: Disney

With songs from almost 80 Disney productions combined into one show, Gamba and his team drew up an original storyline of the protagonist Mara, a woman in her twenties, who lost touch with her inner-child. In the pursuit of finding that part of herself, Mara takes the audience through a non-literal representation of “100 years of Disney movies into a blender.”

“I really wanted to think of this less as a retelling of the movies and more as a reconnecting with the emotions that those movies sparked in you as a viewer when you first saw them,” says Gamba, who left his role at Disney after 15 years as an executive to pursue being a creative producer.

The takeaway from the show for him is to have every person in the audience connect with their inner-child so fiercely, as he had when creating this show.

I never realised as I was writing the show with the ideas about reconnecting with the inner child that the writing of it would make me do the same thing

Felipe Gamba

What makes the story special to the audience is not just the element of relatability, but also one of familiarity. He describes it as “going into familiar content through an original length,” where Mara lives a new story through scenarios we have come to know.

Mara is a member of the audience, says Gamba. “She's any of us. She's all of us. The principle character in the show is the audience, and that was a very intentional choice.”

Actress Ashely Scott, 23, who plays Mara says her character is someone anyone can relate to.

"The spirit of Mara is that on a fundamental level. Mara is someone in everyone, and the box symbolises her overcoming her fears and all her anxieties and stresses in the world," she says.

"She comes out having connected with her inner child and understanding that to progress in life, you can't leave your past person behind. You have to hold their hand and continue forward with them."

Felipe Gamba, centre, backstage with the cast and crew of Disney The Magic Box. Photo: Proactiv Entertainment

Through their three previous shows in Buenos Aires, Cape Town and Johannesburg, Gamba experienced what it is like for audience members to connect with their childhood. As he sat behind families from grandparents to children, he could see them responding to different things since the show jumps back and forth from the 1920s all through to the latest Disney movie.

He describes it as a tap on the shoulder, a moment of recognition, bringing together the eldest and the youngest of them. “But what's funny and beautifully endearing is grown-ups behaving like children, because we've given them license to feel like children. That is what the show does. It allows you to feel like a child again,” he says.

Nostalgia makes for the best stories

As a child, Gamba had a vast collection of Disney books. The first he ever read was Walt Disney's biography. His collection and deep knowledge of everything Disney-related comes from a place of obsession and appreciation, or as he describes it “between nerdy and creepy”.

One of his fondest memories from the early 80s is visiting his local video rental store with his parents in Colombia. He remembers going into the store every time, wondering what the next Disney movie will be, until they brought in Mary Poppins (1964).

“I remember sitting in my mother's tiny car heading back home with that tape in my hand with a sense of excitement over what was going to be inside because I had the books and I was obsessed with them,” he says, smiling. “My own relationship with those tapes in that video rental place in Colombia is the driver for what The Magic Box became. You know, I just wanted the audience to feel for 90 minutes what I felt in that car holding that tape,” he adds.

The show promises to be a whimsical and nostalgic experience. Photo: Proactiv Entertainment

Gamba believes in bringing joy through nostalgia. “We all feel nostalgic regardless of age,” he says, adding that while multigenerational audiences will feel nostalgia for a time that has passed, it will be a joyful reconnection.

By introducing physical puppets of Mickey Mouse and friends, the core characters of Disney on stage, Gamba and his team also bring whimsy and humour that the original characters brought when they were created. “We are playing with that style of almost silly comedy from the cartoons,” he says. “We didn't want the show to be pensive.”

Looking ahead, Gamba hopes to take the show around the world and is always thinking of ways to make it even better. “Shows are living things, right? That's the other beautiful thing that movies cannot quite do,” he says. “Movies, when they're done … they're done. Shows are always alive.”

Disney The Magic Box will run at Etihad Arena from February 6 to 15