Attractions Expert Q&A: Taylor Jeffs started his theme park career at Disneyland’s Stage Door Cafe before becoming one of the park’s famous ‘plaids’
Taylor Jeffs has been the Chief Creative Officer of Legacy Entertainment for 21 years, working on projects like Chimelong Spaceship and Shanghai Haichang Ocean Park, but before that, he worked at Disneyland and was a Research Specialist at the Walt Disney Company.
Some of Legacy’s other prestigious projects include Lotte World Adventure Busan, The Sea Shell Aquarium at VinWonders, Studio City Macau, Batavia: The Floating City at PIK, Hengdian Shanghai Bund, Kingdom of Poseidon Harbin, and Trans Studio Bali. Legacy also recently announced they were appointed to design an integrated resort in Uzbekistan, the Grand Serai, and Beijing’s new Ocean Park, close to Universal Studios.
What theme park souvenir might we be surprised to find on your shelf, and what’s its story?
I have two. First, there is a gold brick – it’s literally just a brick spray-painted gold – from a show we helped co-produce off-Broadway in New York called In and Of Itself. I saw the show at the Geffen [Playhouse] in Los Angeles and completely fell in love with it. We called and asked, “How can we get involved with whatever you plan to do with this?” And we helped take the show to New York.
It’s not a straight-ahead magic show, but magic is very important in it. It’s a one-man show, and at one point, the performer makes a brick disappear and then asks the audience, “Where in the city, where in all of New York, should this brick reappear?” And people just yell out cross streets. Then he says, “Okay, right now, the brick is at that location. If you go there after the show, the brick is there.”
I’ll say In and Of Itself is the greatest magic show you’ll ever see in your life. It’s actually more of an introspective monologue in which magic is integrated, but it’s the most incredible thing you’ll ever see. One night, we went to dinner after the show, and I waited so everyone could go see the brick on the street. Later that night, I went back and got the brick so I could have a memento of that show. It was sitting at the intersection, so I picked it up and took it home. There’s a different brick every night.
The other souvenir is from the renowned designer of the Rose Parade, Raul Rodriguez. It’s an original painting Raul did for my first big project, which was the Glow in the Park Parade for Six Flags in 2008. That was my first solo project for Landmark Entertainment Group, and I kept that painting of the opening float.
EDITOR’S NOTE: You can watch Derek DelGuadio’s In & Of Itself on Hulu.
What theme park have you always wanted to visit but have never been to?
I’ve been to most of the world’s major theme parks, but there’s one that I haven’t been to: Puy du Fou in France. Every single project we did for a decade, from our Cirque du Soleil park to Chimelong, referenced Puy du Fou. And that’s the one I haven’t been to, so I need to go.
Was there a theme park or attraction that made you want to be in this industry, and how did it inspire you?
I’m an Orange County kid. I grew up in Irvine and was obsessed with Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm, so I wanted to work at Disneyland as quickly as possible. You needed to be 18 years old to apply, but I found a loophole, which was my school’s Regional Occupation Placement (ROP) program, so I could work there and get high school credits instead of money.
I started working at the Stage Door Cafe in Frontierland, and it was literally the lowest possible position – it was a rung below burger flipper – but it’s what I wanted to do, and I was happy. That led to working in the survey department, and that got me into guest relations as a tour guide. Shortly after that, I started working with Landmark Entertainment Group.
What was your favorite ride or attraction as a child, and why?
My favorite ride as a child no longer exists: The Knotts Bear-y Tales Dark Ride at Knott’s Berry Farm, which was a crazy, psychedelic, Rolly Crump-designed dark ride that was later replaced by Kingdom of the Dinosaurs and which is now a new version of Bear-y Tales that’s nothing like the original.
The famous Disney Imagineer, Rolly Crump, created this super trippy, colorful, fluorescent black-light dark ride that was completely original – original characters, original music, everything. And it’s just something you don’t see on that scale very often. I was obsessed with that as a kid, but I only got to ride it for a few years because I think it closed in 1987.
Was there a ride, attraction, or character that frightened you as a child?
The Timber Mountain Log Ride (also at Knotts Berry Farm) because there’s that whole first drop in pitch blackness.
There was a period when I did not want to ride that, including at my fifth birthday party at Knott’s Berry Farm. I think I was one of the only people at the birthday party who didn’t ride the log ride because I was so hung up on that dark section.
What was the oddest or coolest job you’ve had in your career?
I think the coolest was when I was a VIP Tour Guide at Disneyland. I would host celebrities when they came to the park and just hang out with them for the day. It was super fun and ran the full gamut from Tony Hawk to Laura Linney to Harvey Weinstein. Spending a day with Harvey Weinstein at Disneyland was probably the most unique, weirdest, and coolest. We would always be surprised – they would just show up and whoever was available would go meet them.
Photo by Gene Duncan/Walt Disney World Resort
That kind of flexibility not only applied to being a tour guide at Disneyland; it’s the ultimate lesson for everything we’ve done since. Nothing ever goes the way you think it’s going to go at all. You could plan flawlessly, and then three steps in, you’re off the rails. That relates to everything we do at Legacy because projects never go as planned – never ever. Not once. There has been no model project that has been straightforward from beginning to end. And none of us are trained for this. There are a million challenging moments in your career, and what defines you is how you react to them. You say yes or no, and you just figure it out.
What ride or attraction do you think everyone needs to experience and why?
I’m going to say Dream Flight at Efteling. We’ve all seen what Disney and Universal can do when they have hundreds of millions of dollars, but what can everyone else do? What is the model for parks all around the world when maybe you don’t have $20 million? What happens when you have less than that to create a great dark ride? Dream Flight is one of those amazing dark rides.
It’s been operating for over 30 years, and it’s a great dark ride because it was created with a realistic budget for those who don’t have a Disney or Universal sandbox to play with. It’s kind of a next-generation Peter Pan. It’s a hanging dark ride, and very pastoral, that takes guests flying through all these gorgeous environments, like a giant fairy forest.
And nothing goes wrong. It avoids a lot of the trappings and tropes of dark rides – there are no problems, no villains – just a beautiful, magical journey through this dream world. And people love it. It’s wonderful for children; it’s great for grandparents; it’s perfect for everybody.
I’m in the mode of my career where I have two young kids – and even at Legoland, there are a surprising amount of rides kids can’t go on because of height requirements. If I take both daughters, there aren’t many things we can all do, and I’m in the phase of my life where I want to find experiences the whole family can enjoy together.
If you were tasked with creating a new theme park food, what would it be?
Theme parks are the best cheat days; I think that’s a great time to indulge. So, it wouldn’t be a health-conscious snack; it would be the opposite. It would be something crazy that you would never have in your everyday life. It would be the world’s most amazing nachos. The most incredible nachos you’ve ever seen, with a pile two feet high with five different types of meat, four different cheeses, and maybe some vegetables. But again, something you would never do at home is part of the escapism of going to a theme park.
You’re a walk-around character for a day; who do you choose?
I would be a Knott’s Scary Farm Halloween Haunt Monster from their Halloween event.
They have a thousand monsters walking around the park. I would do that because, before I was old enough to work in the industry, my outlet for creativity was building haunted houses in my yard. Later, we did them at malls and at the high school. I was really good at scaring people, so I could easily do that.
What types of attractions would you like to see more of, and why?
I want to see more attractions for the whole family to do together. That’s the genius of Disneyland. It’s incomprehensible because basically every attraction is for everyone, including the new Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, and It’s a Small World. You can spend the entire day doing things that a baby, a nine-year-old, and their grandparents could enjoy equally.
Very few parks have attractions like that – if you’re lucky, they might have one or two. So, if I were building my own theme park from scratch, I would try to do that. I mean, you have to have a roller coaster, but I would try to have 80% or 90% of the attractions be rides that the whole family could experience together.
Was there any challenge or surprise in your career?
When I was at Landmark Entertainment Group, they were ready to pass on a Six Flags parade because the budget was so small. It was 2008, and Six Flags had a million and a half dollars for an entire parade, which is less than half what Disney spends on one float. They were ready to pass on it but then asked if I wanted to do it – and I said I would. I was in my early twenties, at the beginning of my career, and doing a parade at Six Flags sounded like a fun, creative challenge. And what did I have to lose if it went badly?
Photo courtesy of Legacy Entertainment
My favorite composer growing up was Benoît Jutras, the composer of Cirque du Soleil. He wrote the music for Mystère, Quidam, O, and La Nouba – a super successful, famous-in-that-world composer – and here we come with this parade, which had no budget at all. But I was young and naive enough to say, “Hey, why don’t we ask him if he’ll do it?”
So, we went out to dinner with him in Las Vegas, where he was working on Le Rêve at the Wynn Hotel, and he said, “You know, I’m at a point in my career where I’d rather do things that sound fun instead of things where I’m gonna make a lot of money. I’m okay with money.” And then he said, “This sounds like fun.” So, he agreed to do it. And the music ended up being the best part of the parade. We had float designs from Raul Rodriguez and music from Benoît Jutras, and it ended up being this unbelievable little show.
I was in the meeting with the CEO of Six Flags when he found out. He could not believe we had gotten that that caliber of talent for what we were being paid. He said, “We need to get my PR person! We need to put out a press release about this right now!” Six Flags loved it so much, and it was such a hit that we ended up building six of them for different parks.
But the biggest surprise was just the power of asking because people might say yes. They can say no, but they might say yes. What do you have to lose? If they say no, okay, move on to the next. But the surprise is that they might say yes.
Can you talk about what you are working on these days?
We’re working on two big projects that we’ve recently announced. One is a water park resort for Uzbekistan – our first project in Central Asia – which is really cool. We also announced that we’re doing a new giant aquarium in Beijing next door to Universal Studios.
Image courtesy of Legacy Entertainment
Beyond that (and I can’t get specific about what they are), I can say, in general, the kind of projects. We’re working on a snow park and we’re working on a safari park. We’re also working on a sports park, which is really interesting because that’s a nut to crack. There have been a lot of failed sports projects in our industry, so I love the creative challenge of trying to avoid those kinds of trappings and doing one that’s successful if we can.
We’re doing a big theme park in Saudi Arabia. Plus, we’re working on a new theme park for Vietnam. We’re developing some ideas for cruise lines, a new industry for us that we are just dipping our toes into – both on and off the ships. All these cruise ships have private islands and destinations they go to now, so projects like that.
You are going to your favorite theme park; which industry people (dead or alive) are you taking with you?
My daughters. But then that’s the whole joy of life, and the joy of our industry is doing things with them. I just got to take my seven-year-old to Knotts Scary Farm for the first time, and that was the most unbelievable experience for me as a parent and a person in our industry. It’s very emotional.
First, there’s the academic reason. To see the park through their eyes has made me a better designer, for sure, because it reassesses what’s important to the audience versus what’s important to me as a creator – what plays and what doesn’t.
For example, if I were to design my own aquarium, it might be sleek, modern, contemporary, and all that. But if my daughters could choose what aquarium they’d want to go to, it would be colorful, thematic, and richly detailed – and they’re the audience; I’m not the audience. I’m the audience for Broadway shows and nice dinners, but they’re the audience for theme parks and aquariums. So, seeing and experiencing all this through their eyes is academically very important.
Then, as a parent, I’m taking my daughters to theme parks and giving them the same formative experiences that shaped who I am as a person, and I’m seeing how it impacts them. The way my two-year-old remembers places we went and things we did – I know that’s going to be with her forever.
So, it’s a really powerful, emotional feeling to experience all these attractions, parks, and live shows with them for the first time. That’s been one of life’s greatest joys. Taking them to see Cirque du Soleil in the tent a couple of months ago was unbelievable. Incomprehensible because they were so excited by it. They were so moved – it formed such a permanent impression in their minds, and it’s something I always enjoyed and have happy memories of doing with friends and family. So now beginning that new tradition is very special.
Writer Kendall Wolf is a long-time consultant in the themed entertainment industry. She has worked with designers, producers, and fabricators to help developers create unique and successful projects around the world. In 2017, she introduced Merlin Entertainments to a development group in Sichuan province for the first Legoland park in China. Kendall continues to consult for the developer to open more themed resorts in China.
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