The name the lagoon kept.
IllumiNations premiered in January 1988, six days after Laserphonic Fantasy closed, and gave the lagoon its household name. The arrangements built up through five years of synthesizer shows were rescored for full orchestra. The barges kept their lasers and fountains. And the pavilions themselves finally joined the show, outlined in light and dancing on cue, so that the ring of buildings around the water became the set.
Don produced the show's music and, with Bruce Healey, wrote its new theme. The rest of the score kept the classical repertoire the lagoon had been playing since 1983, now with the weight of a real orchestra behind it, nation by nation around World Showcase.
The original show played through September 1996, and what followed wore the name with an asterisk. For Walt Disney World's twenty-fifth anniversary, the lagoon received IllumiNations 25, remembered as 25A, which guests disliked so thoroughly that a rebuilt 25B replaced it in 1997. When the anniversary ended, 25B simply dropped its Remember the Magic line and carried on as 25C, a version with nothing twenty-five about it except the lineage. In one form or another, IllumiNations held the lagoon into 1999, and when it finally came down it was not because the idea was exhausted. The millennium was coming, and Don had already walked into Disney with a plan for it.
Next in the story: IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth. Or go back to the Lagoon.
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